AI salaries · updated November 3, 2026

AI Research Engineer salary

Research engineers turn research ideas into working training runs, experiments and tools at scale. Across 75 open postings that publish pay, the median is $370K a year, and the middle half pay $313K to $600K.

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Median yearly pay

$370K

10th
$275K
25th
$313K
75th
$600K
90th
$675K

From 75 open postings at 10 companies that publish pay.

  • $370KMedian posted pay
  • $126K–$850KLowest to highest posted
  • 75Postings with pay
  • 115Open roles now

Pay breakdown

By experience level

Median of each posting's pay range, grouped by the level in the job title.

  • Mid level 63$425K
  • Senior 10$300K

Remote or in the office

Remote roles often pay by the location you live in; on-site roles here are mostly in high-cost cities.

  • Remote 18$340K
  • On-site or hybrid 57$425K

Top-paying companies

Companies with at least two open AI Research Engineer postings that show pay, by median.

  • Anthropic 26$638K
  • OpenAI 15$440K
  • Harvey 11$340K
  • Mercor 3$340K
  • Scale AI 3$300K
  • Decagon 6$300K
  • Applied Intuition 6$275K
  • 1X 2$250K

How we calculate this

We read the pay ranges employers publish on their own job postings (US pay-transparency laws require most of them), count each posting once at the middle of its range, and use only yearly US-dollar pay. Equity and bonuses are not included; for sales roles some employers publish on-target earnings (base plus commission) instead of base pay. The data refreshes twice a day from 3,633 AI job postings with pay.

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AI Research Engineer jobs that show pay.

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