Side-by-side distribution
Research Scientist
$219,375
median · per year, annualized USD
- Disclosing
- 53.2%
- Live roles
- 380
Security Engineer
$190,000
median · per year, annualized USD
- Disclosing
- 47.4%
- Live roles
- 1,974
Highest-paying jobs
Research Scientist, Interpretability
Research Engineer/Research Scientist, Pre-training
Research Engineer / Research Scientist -Personal AGI, Proactivity
Research Engineer/Research Scientist - Personal AGI, North Stars
Research Engineer / Research Scientist- Personal AGI (Post Training)
Research Engineer / Research Scientist - Personal AGI, Personality and Model Behavior
Research Engineer/Research Scientist, Personal AGI-Model Experience
Staff / Principal Research Scientist - USA
Research Engineer / Research Scientist, Tokens
Research Engineer / Scientist, Alignment
Highest-paying jobs
Cyber Security Engineer (5462)
Security Engineer
Senior Security Platform Engineer I
Senior AI Security Engineer II
Lead Security Engineer
Principal Security Engineer, Infrastructure Security
Principal Software Engineer, Infrastructure Security
Offensive Security Engineer, Agent Products
Staff+ Application Security Engineer - M&A
Staff+ Application Security Engineer
Top companies hiring
| Company | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
|
Anthropic
|
$377,500 | 12 |
Anduril Industries
|
$221,000 | 8 |
Astera Institute
|
$225,000 | 7 |
|
OpenAI
|
$425,000 | 6 |
Waabi
|
$212,750 | 6 |
| SA Scale AI | $243,000 | 5 |
Nuro
|
$229,900 | 5 |
World Labs
|
$300,000 | 4 |
Top companies hiring
| Company | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
Aurora Innovation
|
$222,000 | 22 |
|
Anduril Industries
|
$196,250 | 22 |
Accenture Federal Services
|
$151,800 | 19 |
SpaceX
|
$142,500 | 16 |
Mozilla
|
$86,043 | 16 |
Palantir
|
$170,000 | 14 |
|
OpenAI
|
$339,000 | 13 |
|
Anthropic
|
$362,500 | 12 |
Research Scientist salary by location
| Location | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
| Seattle | $291,650 | 11 |
| Boston | $275,000 | 8 |
| San Francisco | $267,500 | 67 |
| New York | $243,000 | 38 |
| Toronto | $212,000 | 8 |
| London | $203,341 | 10 |
| Los Angeles | $80,000 | 3 |
Research Scientist vs Security Engineer: which pays more?
The median for Research Scientist is $219,375 per year (typically $176,950–$275,000), versus $190,000 for Security Engineer ($153,550–$235,000). That puts Research Scientist about 15% ahead at the median.
Both figures are computed live from active listings on JobsRadar and normalized to annualized USD, so Research Scientist and Security 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.