Side-by-side distribution
Penetration Tester
$184,700
median · per year, annualized USD
- Disclosing
- 31.5%
- Live roles
- 73
Platform Engineer
$195,000
median · per year, annualized USD
- Disclosing
- 44.3%
- Live roles
- 4,041
Highest-paying jobs
Offensive Security Engineer, Agent Products
Offensive Hardware Security Engineer, Platform Security
Member of Technical Staff (Offensive Security Engineer)
Principal Offensive Security Engineer
Senior Information Security Engineer, Offensive Security
Staff Offensive Security Engineer
Senior Information Security Engineer, Offensive Security
Penetration Tester
WebApp Offensive Security Software Engineer
Offensive Security Engineer
Highest-paying jobs
Platform Engineer
Senior Staff+ Software Engineer, Kubernetes Platform
Staff+ Infrastructure Engineer, Cluster Infrastructure
Software Engineer, Research Infrastructure
Senior Security Platform Engineer I
Principal .NET Software Engineer- Cloud Payments Platform
Principal .NET Software Engineer - Cloud Payments Platform
Staff+ Software Engineer, Safeguards Infrastructure
SOC Emulation Engineer - Hardware Emulation Infrastructure
Infrastructure Engineer
Top companies hiring
| Company | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
| GR GRVTY | $215,000 | 2 |
|
Robinhood
|
$191,444 | 2 |
|
Accenture Federal Services
|
$174,200 | 2 |
M9 Solutions
|
$120,000 | 2 |
TP-Link Systems Inc.
|
$106,000 | 2 |
|
OpenAI
|
$418,500 | 1 |
|
Anthropic
|
$362,500 | 1 |
|
Perplexity
|
$312,500 | 1 |
Top companies hiring
| Company | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
Speechify
|
$170,000 | 103 |
|
OpenAI
|
$308,250 | 28 |
Nuro
|
$200,450 | 24 |
Palantir
|
$167,500 | 24 |
Databricks
|
$225,000 | 21 |
Coinbase
|
$202,483 | 20 |
Reddit
|
$244,500 | 18 |
Anduril Industries
|
$222,000 | 18 |
Penetration Tester salary by location
| Location | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
| Seattle | $362,500 | 3 |
| San Francisco | $312,500 | 5 |
| New York | $236,000 | 7 |
Platform Engineer salary by location
| Location | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
| San Francisco | $228,500 | 413 |
| Seattle | $214,250 | 110 |
| New York | $210,000 | 320 |
| Austin | $202,500 | 39 |
| Los Angeles | $187,500 | 31 |
| Boston | $185,000 | 64 |
| Toronto | $185,000 | 61 |
| Chicago | $183,000 | 22 |
| Denver | $180,000 | 29 |
| Atlanta | $170,000 | 10 |
Penetration Tester vs Platform Engineer: which pays more?
The median for Penetration Tester is $184,700 per year (typically $136,250–$218,250), versus $195,000 for Platform Engineer ($166,525–$230,000). That puts Platform Engineer about 6% ahead at the median.
Both figures are computed live from active listings on JobsRadar and normalized to annualized USD, so Penetration Tester and Platform Engineer are compared on equal terms regardless of the currency each role was originally posted in. Only roles that publish a salary range feed the medians; numbers refresh every few hours as new roles post and older ones close, so this comparison reflects the market right now rather than a fixed survey. Use it as a directional benchmark when weighing one path against the other.