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Ask HN: How are salaries for senior devs in Berlin at the moment?
Thinking of moving to Berlin for access to a market with better opportunities for software developers.
Background is 5+ years experience in enterprise development roles, docker/K8S/cloud experience included. EU citizen so visa not a problem, also speak German.
What are salaries like at the moment and is it still a good option for developers?
- adithyasrin 5y agoYou're looking at 80k+ easily, so that's atleast around 4200 or 4300 netto a month which you'll be comfortable with. And yes the market is really hot right now!
- heckerhut 5y agoThis
- actusual 5y agoWhat is "netto"?
- fliggertigibet 5y agoNetto is net. Basically after tax and social payment deductions
- scarby2 5y agoI was wondering if it were some kind of slang based on the supermarket... (in my company we describe everything in terms of how many cheeseburgers from a specific restaurant we can buy with the money)
- maciekpaprocki 5y agoIts actually a real economic thing. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Mac_Index https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Mac_Index
- salzig 5y agoCounting by Cola or Kebab works also pretty good.
- koilke 5y agoDo not forget Ben and Jerry's
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- chimen 5y agoSeems low for a senior in Berlin. I pay close to that amount in Romania. Edit: NVM, netto - got it - it's allright.
- comodore_ 5y agothat sounds about right. but if you're not married, you're more likely to get to ~3,800€ a month after taxes and social security contributions, which comes in at ~42% combined.
- drchiu 5y agoIs this in USD?
- playing_colours 5y agoEUR. My current company pays around 70-90k for SSE, but we have levels for individual contributors above Senior - Staff and Principal. The salaries for them can go up to 140k .
- tester756 5y ago>You're looking at 80k+ easily, so that's atleast around 4200 or 4300 netto so 50k? what's the point of giving salaries not in netto? it just makes it harder to compare
- mikelward 5y agoI'm not familiar with German job listings, but in the US, listing are "gross" (or "brutto" for German speakers). Providing the gross amount could make it easier to compare internationally. (Perhaps it would be even better to list net salaries everywhere, but taxes can vary by person, so that's not always possible.)
- tester756 5y ago>but in the US, listing are "gross" oh shit so they don't pay 100k after tax to junior devs? mamma mia, american dream is ded
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- dcolkitt 5y agoA single American earning 100k gross would only pay about 13k in taxes. Less if you’re maxing 401(k). In America taxes are quite low until you’re in the top brackets.
- sushid 5y agoNo this is incorrect. If you're in CA, you are looking at a tax burden of roughly 30% if you're making 100k.
- cmbell715 5y agoWell yeah, California has by far the highest state income tax. And I’m guessing some of the bigger cities have city tax as well. But in a state like TN or FL that don’t have that burden, it’s far less. Just for my main FTE in TN for 2020, I paid 12.5k on 150k (I also have 3 kids, so there is some tax credit there).
- akvadrako 5y agoI'm not in Berlin, but The Netherlands, which is probably similar. Most senior positions are around 50-80k, but there are a few over 100k. However if you're willing to do contracting you can make a lot more - there are plenty of full-time, long-term gigs with rates of 80-110/hour.
- omgwtfbbq 5y agoYou can nearly triple your pay by contracting?
- theodric 5y agoJesus, that's depressing. 13 years ago I, 25, got a medior infra syseng role in Amsterdam at €70k and 30% ruling, net €4k. The market collapsed during the crisis and never came back.
- Aboh33 5y agoYeah and the positions also keep getting bunched together with no end in sight. I suspect in the future we will see postings such as DevQASecMLOps and salaries will bump up nominally
- callahad 5y agoFor the Netherlands, Gergely Orosz recently published an interesting article titled "The Trimodal Nature of Software Engineering Salaries in the Netherlands and Europe" at https://blog.pragmaticengineer.com/software-engineering-salaries-in-the-netherlands-and-europe/ https://blog.pragmaticengineer.com/software-engineering-sala... It's a worthwhile read, but this bit from the start is notable: > The 2019 Honeypot Amsterdam developer survey says, "the most experienced developers earn an average of €55,000 high as over €70,000". The 2021 Talent.io salary report puts the most experienced software engineering salaries in Amsterdam at €60,000/year. Meanwhile, I've observed the average senior total compensation figures at Uber nearly double from €110,000 in 2015 to €170,000-€230,000/year by 2020. It's not just Uber: Booking.com senior total packages have gone up by 50% from around €100,000 in 2016 to €150,000+, as part of the EU salary research I've been running
- 5y ago
- dyeje 5y agoLevels.fyi always a good resource: https://www.levels.fyi/Salaries/Software-Engineer/Berlin-Germany/ https://www.levels.fyi/Salaries/Software-Engineer/Berlin-Ger...
- Leherenn 5y agoIt sounds heavily biased towards big companies (if not FAANGs). For Switzerland for instance, over 70% of the salaries are from Google. If you're looking at working for them, then great, but I don't think it's very representative of the general market.
- dyeje 5y agoI'm a bit tired of folks using this talking point. There is alot more data on the site from a variety of companies these days. The data seems to match what it being said in this thread too, so are you saying this thread is also not representative of the market?
- closeparen 5y agoIs Berlin a market where 5 YOE is plausibly "senior" in the same way it is for Silicon Valley?
- dathinab 5y agoSeniority level is more dependent on your skill level. While looking for a mid level position I applied to some senior level positions and it generally boils down to "show me you have the skills and you might have the job". Furthermore some "senior level" jobs where actually looking for mid level devs. In the mid level dev segment getting around 50k€ is quite viable. When I was looking for a job multiple offers looking for actual senior backend devs with higher salary where open (through don't ask me for the rang of the salary, I don't remember as I'm not quite at the senior level yet).
- bradhe 5y agoI just moved here from the USA and I think it's varies by the type of company you work for drastically. If you work for a bigger German company or an American company doing business here, you'll find salaries that are 90% or 95% of US salaries in like Denver or Atlanta. If you work for a German company that is early (or late) on, you'll find salaries that are more like 50%. Feel free to reach out to me, I have pretty good (current) data on the subject but I'd rather share it privately.
- melbourne_mat 5y agoThe market is very hot right now in Australia. Our government closed the borders so only Australians can apply. That combined with an unwillingness of staff to move roles means there's a big shortage. Salaries have shot up in the software industry. I have seen $1000 AUD per day contact rates for senior engineers. That equates to $220k AUD before tax (-30% net).
- weird-eye-issue 5y agoCongratulations
- tonfreed 5y agoI'm reluctant to ask for that much, though, when things open back up you'll be the first with your head on the block
- melbourne_mat 5y agoIt's true: contractors will be the first to go when things spring back.
- bruce343434 5y agoSo take while you can
- quickthrower2 5y agoSame as entry level FAANG then :-) love Australia
- gabereiser 5y agoThe company I work for is hiring devs in Germany. DM me.
- em-bee 5y agopart-time remote too?
- 2bor-2n 5y agoI am looking for work in Germany. Your DM please?
- cpach 5y agoJust FYI: Your e-mail is not public. (See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27106893 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27106893 for some more info.)
- gabereiser 5y agofixed
- natalyarostova 5y agoDespite being aware how markets vary, it will never not shock me that 25-27 year old barely non-jr devs on my team make double that. Can’t help but think things are in disequilibrium over the long run.
- suitophobia 5y agoThis article on salaries in EU tech hubs is potentially relevant. Also takes into account cost of living. https://www.offerzen.com/blog/developer-salaries-across-tech-hubs-in-south-africa-and-europe-2021 https://www.offerzen.com/blog/developer-salaries-across-tech...
- Trias11 5y agoWhat's Senior Security Strategist position salary equivalent there? US Equivalent is ~USD $180k
- Varqu 5y agoYou can check the salaries directly provided by companies on: https://germantechjobs.de/jobs/all/Berlin https://germantechjobs.de/jobs/all/Berlin (disclaimer: I am the co-founder of this job board)\ In your case, you would be looking at something between: 60'000 and 90'000 EUR.
- mcntsh 5y agoI've been working as a Sr SWE in Berlin for 3 years, and I network with a lot of others. 60-90k is probably the most accurate range. Developers making 100k+ are in the top 5% of the market in the city. If you're making 100k in Berlin you'd be making 3-400k in the Bay Area. Taxes are high. You're probably getting slightly less than 4k a month after taxes/insurance. Your apartment/utilities will be around 1200.
- bruce343434 5y agoWhat is the typical disposable income?
- mcntsh 5y agoAs a single person if you don't pinch pennies too hard, but you aren't going crazy either and you mainly eat at home, you'll probably have 1800-2k after expenses (rent/bills/food).
- BrS96bVxXBLzf5B 5y agoThe comments here are disheartening looking at it from the UK. In the south of England I'm making 32k as devops lead at a small digital agency (handling the infrastructure for a collection of Wordpress sites and Umbraco sites, nothing crazy, a bit under 500k unique hits/week). It's difficult to know how hard I should be considering something else, or if thinking about it is just getting caught up in HN-comment-inflation.
- mcntsh 5y agoDigital agencies pay less, since they're often contracted out at competitive rates and they aren't propped up by imaginary investor money. I worked in agencies for most of my career. They're more rewarding to work for, and offer great experiences, but if you want money you have to move into the corporate/startup world.
- jstx1 5y ago> It's difficult to know how hard I should be considering something else Hard - I don't know which city you're in but £32k is low for a senior role anywhere in the UK. In London that's a low salary for a graduate role. I'm similarly disheartened when I read people mentioning that £90-120k salaries are fairly common in London (those numbers seem completely our of reach to me) or when I read about salaries in the US.
- agent008t 5y agoJust curious - what is your annual spend, including paying for somewhere to live? In London, a smallish 2-bed apartment would rent for £2500/month. So around £32000/year just for somewhere to live. Overall, 2 people living in an apartment within cycling commute of work would spend around £60000/year - not being frugal but not exactly living in luxury either.
- mrcartmenez 5y agoFalse. There are over 6500 properties with at least two bedrooms listed for rent on Zoopla for less than £1500per month. https://www.zoopla.co.uk/to-rent/property/london/?beds_min=2&price_frequency=per_month&price_max=1500&q=London&results_sort=newest_listings&search_source=home https://www.zoopla.co.uk/to-rent/property/london/?beds_min=2... If you don’t have kids, get one of the several thousand one bedroom places listed for less than 1k per month.
- ukoki 5y agoYou can make plenty of money doing enterprise devops freelancing with the big German companies. I'm currently on around £320k/year contracting for a couple of household-name companies. I think most of these companies are based in Frankfurt and Rhine-Ruhr though not Berlin, although they do seem happy to accept remote workers like me.
- andrejguran 5y agoIn January I got offer from both Amazon (L5) and Shopify (Senior Eng) for 130k package f in Berlin. If you're looking for a higher salaries I recommend going for a bigger names
- MandieD 5y agoSalaries for IT/software engineering in Germany work kind of the opposite of the US: generally speaking, you’ll make better money in mid-size cities at one of the big old industrials (e.g.: Siemens, Bosch) than in startup-hot Berlin. IG Metall Tariff is what you’re looking for. I’ve snickered at a couple recruiting mails trying to get me to leave my “boring” giant family company’s IT department for a ~30% paycut and “usually under 45 hours” workweek (mine’s currently 35). I am “in Tariff” - my base salary is determined by the main IG Metall contract for Bavaria. My employer can pay me up to 28% over that base amount based on my annual performance evaluation. If they want to reward me more, they can choose to bump me up a step. If they wish to pay me even more than that, I am then “außer Tariff,” which means they can pay me as much as they like over that higher minimum, and I’m no longer “limited” to a 35/40 hour workweek. Managers in my department are usually AT, but I also have several IC colleagues with 15+ years of SWE experience who are. TL;DR - Germany values boring; go boring, get paid.
- sdevonoes 5y agoIn my experience, a very accurate range is 70K-90K Euro (gross) for senior individual contributors. No matter if you have 5 or 20 years of experience. More than that and you probably need to be principal engineer or something like that. Making more than 100K Euro gross in Germany (and probably in most of continental Europe, besides Switzerland) is consider top 5%.