There are a few ways to try and discover what your market rate is. The first method is a set of websites or statistics that you can find pretty easily. You'll

There are a few ways to try and discover what your market rate is. The first method is a set of websites or statistics that you can find pretty easily. You'll hear Glassdoor and Salary.com as a couple examples. Some schools might have data on their past graduates. I know that Carnegie Mellon [1] publishes their data, which includes the employer a graduate joined, the location, and some compensation data. Unfortunately, much of what you'll find is anonymously self-reported, and when people self-report salary information they are probably more likely to exaggerate up than exaggerate down. A second method of getting numbers on market rate is from talking to people. For you, that may be other graduates who have already landed jobs or people that graduated last year who may be willing to share what they were paid. Recruiters who work local markets are also a good resource for this information, as they actually see the job offers and are likely to have more accurate figures than the self-reported data seen on salary websites. As for overestimating or underestimating, most people here are going to tell you to never give a number first. Negotiation is described as having a winner and a loser, and if you don't get the maximum amount someone was willing to spend than you lost. There isn't a clear way to determine how much someone would have spent, so approaching negotiation in this win/lose manner isn't all that useful. Someone who knows the market rate for their experience and skills is in a much better position, and someone with a long track record of successful employment that knows their market rate is completely set and more able to use tactics in negotiating that are being offered to you here in this thread. Unfortunately, you (as an entry-level candidate) won't typically have that same amount of leverage or power in negotiations, as entry-level candidates are generally considered more homogenous. In other words, if a company finds an entry-level candidate being somewhat 'difficult' (for lack of a better word), they may take the attitude that there may be 10 other entry-level candidates who won't be. I'm not saying you shouldn't negotiate - in many cases you should, and in some cases you shouldn't (most obvious being when a company offers you what you requested or even more than you requested). Last bit of advice - if and when you give your number, don't follow it with anything. Entry-level candidates have a tendency to state a number, and if there is even a few seconds of delay by the other party they add "but that is negotiable". Don't do that. There is an article on that a few weeks ago [2] that explains a bit more. 1 - http://www.cmu.edu/career/salaries-and-destinations/2014-survey/Post%20Graduation%20Survey%20Results%202014.pdf http://www.cmu.edu/career/salaries-and-destinations/2014-sur... 2 - http://jobtipsforgeeks.com/2014/08/08/negotiable/ http://jobtipsforgeeks.com/2014/08/08/negotiable/