Side-by-side distribution
Platform Engineer
$195,000
median · per year, annualized USD
- Disclosing
- 44.3%
- Live roles
- 4,041
Principal Engineer
$223,250
median · per year, annualized USD
- Disclosing
- 46.2%
- Live roles
- 1,771
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
Software Engineer, Platform
SOC Emulation Engineer - Hardware Emulation Infrastructure
Highest-paying jobs
Principal Software Engineer
Distinguished Engineer
Staff / Principal Data Engineer
Principal Engineer (Payments)
Principal Engineer
Principal Machine Learning Engineer, Ads Delivery
Principal Research Engineer, Model Training & Post-Training
Principal Engineer, Agentic AI Systems
Principal .NET Software Engineer - Cloud Payments Platform
Principal .NET Software Engineer- Cloud Payments Platform
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 |
Top companies hiring
| Company | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
Roblox
|
$320,145 | 42 |
| AL Astera Labs | $207,500 | 21 |
Motional
|
$285,000 | 20 |
Elastic
|
$134,329 | 18 |
| SE Sezzle | $111,000 | 16 |
Zscaler
|
$213,281 | 14 |
|
Anduril Industries
|
$256,000 | 13 |
Snowflake
|
$321,750 | 12 |
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 |
Principal Engineer salary by location
| Location | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
| San Francisco | $278,000 | 70 |
| New York | $260,000 | 59 |
| Boston | $250,000 | 45 |
| Chicago | $232,500 | 15 |
| Seattle | $232,175 | 34 |
| Austin | $232,000 | 10 |
| Los Angeles | $225,000 | 31 |
| Toronto | $210,000 | 16 |
| London | $199,724 | 16 |
| Denver | $190,000 | 17 |
Platform Engineer vs Principal Engineer: which pays more?
The median for Platform Engineer is $195,000 per year (typically $166,525–$230,000), versus $223,250 for Principal Engineer ($187,500–$275,639). That puts Principal Engineer about 14% ahead at the median.
Both figures are computed live from active listings on JobsRadar and normalized to annualized USD, so Platform Engineer and Principal 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.