Market data · as of October 26, 2026
Do AI skills increase pay? What U.S. job postings advertise
By Justin KullaLast updated
Mostly yes, in what employers advertise. Across 12,214 paid postings that ask for a specific AI skill, the median advertised pay is $195,500. Across 16,496 paid postings that never mention AI, it is $135,000. That is +44.7%, a raw gap that also reflects bigger employers and more senior roles. Matching postings on function, level and industry, the gap is +16.9%, about $28k a year.
What this number is, and is not
- It is a difference in advertised pay between job postings. It is not what anyone is paid.
- It does not show that learning an AI skill causes a raise. Employers that ask for AI skills may also pay more for other reasons.
- “Like for like” compares postings within the same function, level and industry. That removes most of the effect of AI postings sitting at larger employers, and some of it may remain.
- A posting that mentions AI without naming a skill is in neither group.
The premium by function
Only functions with 30+ paid postings on each side are shown, so a missing function means too little data, not no premium. Sorted by the like-for-like premium where there is one.
| Function | Ask for AI | Median, asks for AI | Median, no AI | Raw | Like for like | Paid postings (AI / no AI) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Research | 18.5% | $222,500 | $118,000 | +88.9% | — | 152 / 318 |
| Data & Analytics | 62% | $210,000 | $137,500 | +52.7% | — | 2,241 / 344 |
| Legal | 10.9% | $207,000 | $138,000 | +50% | — | 255 / 702 |
| Programs | 7.7% | $175,000 | $119,000 | +47.1% | — | 77 / 693 |
| Design | 30% | $197,000 | $144,500 | +36.3% | — | 370 / 195 |
| Investment | 13.3% | $175,000 | $131,000 | +33.5% | — | 70 / 194 |
| Administration | 7% | $103,500 | $77,500 | +33.2% | — | 60 / 259 |
| Operations | 5.6% | $156,000 | $108,000 | +44.4% | +22.6% (about $31.5k) | 486 / 2,303 |
| Human Resources | 13.7% | $155,000 | $115,000 | +34.8% | +20.1% (about $25.5k) | 314 / 729 |
| Engineering | 18.5% | $209,000 | $152,500 | +36.9% | +18% (about $31.5k) | 3,760 / 4,547 |
| Customer Success | 17.4% | $140,000 | $120,000 | +16.7% | — | 215 / 271 |
| Marketing | 23.8% | $172,000 | $137,000 | +25.4% | +16.7% (about $23.5k) | 759 / 613 |
| Finance | 11.4% | $172,000 | $117,500 | +46.3% | +16.5% (about $26k) | 567 / 1,227 |
| Sales | 11.3% | $170,000 | $135,000 | +25.9% | +15.6% (about $23k) | 1,228 / 2,249 |
| Clinical | 2.3% | $165,000 | $143,500 | +15.1% | — | 49 / 621 |
| Strategy | 21.1% | $187,000 | $163,500 | +14.4% | — | 167 / 203 |
| Product | 41.1% | $211,500 | $180,000 | +17.4% | +11.5% (about $23.5k) | 905 / 340 |
| Security | 29% | $207,000 | $149,000 | +38.8% | +9.7% (about $18.5k) | 529 / 438 |
Industry, state and level breakdowns, and what each function asks for most, are on AI skills in job postings.
How we measured it
- Advertised pay only: the midpoint of the range an employer posted, on live U.S. postings read from the full text. “Asks for an AI skill” means the posting names a specific AI skill; “no AI” means it never mentions AI.
- Only postings whose AI fields were read from a full description are used; excerpt-only postings are left out. Board-listed and estimated pay is left out too. Hourly pay is converted at 2,080 hours a year.
- Raw is the median pay of postings that ask for an AI skill divided by the median of postings that never mention AI, minus 1.
- Like for like compares within cells of the same function, level and industry that have 30+ paid postings on both sides, and takes the median log-ratio weighted by the AI side’s count. It needs 50+ AI postings across cells.
- The numbers refresh daily from the live board. 287,725 live postings were read from the full text in the latest snapshot.
How this compares with other studies
Lightcast’s “Beyond the Buzz” report (July 2025), built on more than 1.3 billion postings worldwide, found that postings listing AI skills offer 28% more, about $18,000 a year, and that over half of AI-skill postings are outside IT. Read Lightcast’s report. Ours covers only live U.S. postings on employers’ own career sites, splits them by function and shows the sample sizes. The two measure different things and should not be added together.
Cite this
Free to quote and chart with credit. The table above, as a CSV of aggregates only (no posting, employer or person):
How to cite: NextChapter, “AI-skill pay premium in U.S. job postings”, data as of 2026-10-26, https://launchyournextchapter.com/resources/ai-skills-pay-premium
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