AI Engineer compensation
AI Engineer Salary at AI Startups (2026)
The median AI Engineer salary at AI startups is $200,000, based on 81 disclosed job postings ($42,500–$334,500 range). Updated September 2026. These are aggregate figures only; we never publish an individual company's offer.
$42,500Minimum
$200,000Median
$334,500Maximum
Sample size: based on 81 disclosed salaries.
01
Median AI Engineer salary by funding stage
| Funding stage | Median salary | Sample size |
|---|---|---|
| Seed | $250,000 | 5 |
| Series C | $237,500 | 17 |
| Series G+ | $220,000 | 7 |
| Series A | $210,000 | 16 |
| Series D | $190,000 | 12 |
| Series B | $175,000 | 15 |
| Series E | $174,986 | 7 |
02
How we calculate this
Roughly a quarter of AI-startup postings disclose pay. We extract the USD range from those that do, normalize each to a midpoint, and aggregate across distinct postings (deduplicated by posting ID). The minimum, median, and maximum above are based on 81 disclosed salaries. We publish aggregate ranges only, never a single company's salary, so the numbers stay representative rather than anecdotal.
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