Side-by-side distribution
Principal Engineer
$223,250
median · per year, annualized USD
- Disclosing
- 46.2%
- Live roles
- 1,771
Technical Product Manager
$190,000
median · per year, annualized USD
- Disclosing
- 53.6%
- Live roles
- 1,029
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
Highest-paying jobs
Technical Program Manager
Technical Program Manager
Director, RISC-V Software TPM & Ops
Staff Technical Program Manager, Physical Design
Technical Program Manager, Architecture
Technical Program Manager, Product Software
Technical Program Manager, Strategic Initiatives
Technical Program Manager, Hardware Chips Development
Technical Program Manager, Applied API & Product
Technical Program Manager, API Platform
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 |
Top companies hiring
| Company | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
|
Anduril Industries
|
$193,000 | 62 |
|
Anthropic
|
$345,000 | 14 |
Aurora Innovation
|
$221,500 | 14 |
|
OpenAI
|
$271,000 | 12 |
Fluidstack
|
$213,000 | 12 |
CoreWeave
|
$207,000 | 9 |
Scout Motors
|
$155,000 | 9 |
| SA Scale AI | $209,150 | 8 |
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 |
Technical Product Manager salary by location
| Location | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
| San Francisco | $214,450 | 127 |
| London | $209,051 | 5 |
| Austin | $208,000 | 16 |
| New York | $203,000 | 86 |
| Seattle | $203,000 | 51 |
| Denver | $173,568 | 10 |
| Boston | $172,500 | 27 |
| Los Angeles | $164,500 | 10 |
| Chicago | $147,500 | 3 |
| Toronto | $130,000 | 13 |
Principal Engineer vs Technical Product Manager: which pays more?
The median for Principal Engineer is $223,250 per year (typically $187,500–$275,639), versus $190,000 for Technical Product Manager ($155,000–$220,000). That puts Principal Engineer about 18% ahead at the median.
Both figures are computed live from active listings on JobsRadar and normalized to annualized USD, so Principal Engineer and Technical Product Manager 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.