Side-by-side distribution
Research Scientist
$219,375
median · per year, annualized USD
- Disclosing
- 53.2%
- Live roles
- 380
Staff Engineer
$220,000
median · per year, annualized USD
- Disclosing
- 54.1%
- Live roles
- 4,834
Highest-paying jobs
Research Scientist, Interpretability
Research Engineer/Research Scientist, Pre-training
Research Engineer / Research Scientist - Personal AGI, Personality and Model Behavior
Research Engineer / Research Scientist -Personal AGI, Proactivity
Research Engineer/Research Scientist - Personal AGI, North Stars
Research Engineer / Research Scientist- Personal AGI (Post Training)
Staff / Principal Research Scientist - USA
Research Engineer / Research Scientist, Tokens
Research Engineer / Scientist, Alignment
[Expression of Interest] Research Engineer / Scientist, Alignment - London
Highest-paying jobs
Senior Staff Backend Engineer ($500k - $1.5m salary)
Senior Staff React Native Engineer ($500k - 1.5m salary)
Senior Staff Frontend Engineer ($500k - $1.5m salary)
Senior Staff Full Stack Engineer ($500k - $1.5m salary)
Staff Software Engineer (Backend)
Senior/Staff Backend Engineer, Applied AI
Senior/Staff Full Stack Engineer, Applied AI
Research Engineer (Senior Staff+), Safeguards Labs
Staff Research Engineer, Discovery Team
Senior Staff+ Software Engineer, Node Infra
Top companies hiring
| Company | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
|
Anthropic
|
$402,500 | 11 |
Anduril Industries
|
$221,000 | 8 |
Astera Institute
|
$225,000 | 7 |
Waabi
|
$212,750 | 6 |
|
OpenAI
|
$425,000 | 5 |
| SA Scale AI | $243,000 | 5 |
Nuro
|
$229,900 | 5 |
World Labs
|
$300,000 | 4 |
Top companies hiring
| Company | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
|
Anduril Industries
|
$222,000 | 111 |
Databricks
|
$226,000 | 77 |
|
Anthropic
|
$405,000 | 57 |
Crusoe
|
$231,000 | 45 |
Grafana Labs
|
$147,923 | 45 |
Archer
|
$192,500 | 38 |
Aurora Innovation
|
$231,500 | 34 |
Okta
|
$206,000 | 34 |
Research Scientist salary by location
| Location | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
| Boston | $275,000 | 8 |
| San Francisco | $265,000 | 66 |
| Seattle | $252,725 | 10 |
| New York | $243,000 | 37 |
| Toronto | $212,000 | 8 |
| London | $203,341 | 10 |
| Los Angeles | $80,000 | 3 |
Staff Engineer salary by location
| Location | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
| Dublin | $257,300 | 5 |
| Seattle | $252,500 | 152 |
| San Francisco | $245,000 | 620 |
| New York | $239,700 | 464 |
| Chicago | $229,500 | 45 |
| Austin | $228,750 | 52 |
| Los Angeles | $221,000 | 64 |
| Boston | $210,000 | 97 |
| Denver | $208,587 | 46 |
| London | $206,683 | 48 |
Research Scientist vs Staff Engineer: which pays more?
The median for Research Scientist is $219,375 per year (typically $176,950–$275,000), versus $220,000 for Staff Engineer ($189,700–$250,000). That puts Staff Engineer about 0% ahead at the median.
Both figures are computed live from active listings on JobsRadar and normalized to annualized USD, so Research Scientist and Staff 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.