If you’re considering a career in coding, you’ve no doubt got loads of burning questions.
What does a typical day in the life of a web developer look like? How long will it take to master all the necessary skills? And perhaps the biggest question of them all “What kind of web developer salary can I expect?”
While pay is a topic that affects everyone, it can be tricky to navigate—especially if you’re new to the industry. Before you go for your first interview or consider a job offer, it’s important to have an idea of your earning potential.
Of course, there is no fixed salary for web developers: pay will vary depending on your skills, location, years of experience and the company you work for.
However, you can certainly establish a realistic range by examining industry data—and that’s exactly what we’ve done. So without further ado, let’s see how much you could earn as a web developer.
If you’re looking to skip ahead to one particular area of our web developer salary guide, simply skip ahead using the table of contents:
- Web developer salaries around the world (2024)
- A closer look at job titles
- Web developer salary by programming language
- How can I boost my web developer salary?
- Web development: A rewarding career path
Are you ready? Then let’s get into it!
1. Web developer salaries around the world (2024)
As with any profession, web developer salaries vary depending on where in the world you’re based.
To give you a rough idea of the kind of money you could be earning, we’ve put together a global snapshot. These figures are based on the latest data provided by Indeed, Glassdoor, and CWJobs for the job title “web developer” (updated in Dec 2023).
Web developer salaries by country
Australia: Aus $85,000 ($57,000 USD)
Canada: CA $76,065 ($57,004 USD)
Germany: €58,000 ($63,000 USD)
India: Rs 432,000 ($5,000 USD)
UK: £36,000 ($45,000 USD)
USA: $88,000 USD
Web developer salaries by city
An international overview can be useful—maybe you’re weighing up either where to take your coding skills, or are considering whether it’s worth your while switching to a career in web development in.
However, drilling down further really helps. Just as there are obvious differences in costs of living between countries, these can be just as acute from city to city.
It’s worth bearing these things in mind when comparing web developer salaries. We’ll start with major cities in North America, and then move east across the Atlantic to see how things are in Europe.
North America
- Austin: $88,000
- Boston: $90,000
- Chicago: $82,000
- Houston: $83,000
- Los Angeles: $90,000
- Montreal: CA$70,000 ($52,000)
- New York: $92,000
- Philadelphia: $82,000
- Phoenix: $84,000
- Portland: $84,000
- San Francisco: $115,000
- Seattle: $135,000
- Toronto: CA$66,000 ($49,000)
- Washington DC: $108,000
- Vancouver: CA$72,000 ($52,000)
The richness of a city’s tech scene and the associated demand for web developers or competition for roles can really affect how much salary you could earn.
As well as that availability of housing and cost of living can really affect your real life quality working as a programmer there—there’s not much point earning six figures if a huge amount of that is spent on rent and bills.
Looking at the trends over the past few years have seen web developer salaries rising due to several factors, chief among them the increased digitization and ensuing demand during the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic.
On top of that, another knock-on trend caused by the pandemic is the growing ubiquity of remote working, particularly for web developers and software engineers. Not being tied to an office and a commute has led to thousands of workers moving away from traditional cities and tech areas such as Silicon Valley in California and pushing further inland.
This remote work migration is also reflected in the sharp increases in web developer salaries in cities such as Phoenix, Austin, and Portland, for example. On top of these factors, another one causing developer salaries to rise is the increased cost of living being experienced globally in 2022 and 2023.
Europe
- Amsterdam: €62,000
- Barcelona: €30,000
- Berlin: €52,000
- Brussels: €55,000
- Copenhagen: DKK780,000 (€82,000)
- Dublin: €46,000
- Hamburg: €51,000
- Lisbon: €46,000
- London: £41,000 (€48,000)
- Madrid: €28,000
- Munich: €55,000
- Paris: €44,000
- Rome: €27,000
- Stockholm: SEK515,748 (€47,332)
As you can see, some variations can be huge, particularly when comparing cities in different countries.
These numbers cannot be everything—as well as being averages, they also do not take into account the variety of bonuses, stock options, and other types of remuneration which do not appear in the base pay.
The amount of taxes you would have to pay also varies massively depending on which country you’re going to be working in, as well as other costs such as healthcare.
Of course, location is not the only factor to consider when thinking about salary. Next, we’ll take a look at how salary varies across different job titles.
2. A closer look at job titles
There are many different job titles that fall under the web developer umbrella, and your level of seniority also plays a role.
Here are some of the most common titles and their corresponding average web developer salaries in the USA:
- Junior developer: $67,000
- Web developer: $88,000
- Senior web programmer: $106,000
- Senior web developer: $106,000
- Frontend developer: $112,000 (for a more detailed breakdown, check out our complete frontend developer salary guide)
- Backend developer: $156,000
- Full-stack developer: $123,000 (we’ve created a dedicated full-stack developer salary guide if you want to see more)
3. Web developer salary by programming language
Of course, many job ads aren’t simply based on the type of position.
Many companies have a tech stack or project built on one specific coding language, and so are looking for a new hire who is experienced in the language, its frameworks, and its libraries.
Alternatively, a company could be looking to take its tech infrastructure in a different direction, and the CTO has decided which language they need to hire specific developers in to build it.
This is where becoming an expert in a particular coding language can really pay off. Below we’ve researched the average web developer salary for the US. If you’re not so familiar with some of them, you’ll find more information in our guide to the most popular programming languages.
- C++ developer: $119,000
- C developer: $73,000
- Go developer: $96,000
- HTML developer: $82,000
- Java developer: $93,000
- JavaScript developer: $109,000 (for more details, check out our ultimate JavaScript developer salary guide)
- Kotlin developer: $90,000
- PHP developer: $85,000
- Python developer: $122,000 (we’ve broken down this more in our in-depth guide to how much you’ll earn as a Python developer)
- Ruby developer: $116,000
- Rust developer: $138,000
- Swift developer: $93,000
4. How can I boost my web developer salary?
As you can see, a career in web development could take you in many different directions.
Whichever route you take, there’s plenty you can do to boost your earning potential. If you’re just starting out in web development, you will most likely begin as a junior. However, you might already be thinking about what you can do to advance your career and climb up the salary ladder.
As with any profession, you can boost your earning potential by constantly adding to your skillset. This might be learning a new programming language in your spare time, or exploring different frameworks.
As your knowledge base grows, you’ll be able to branch out in the workplace and really sell yourself as a valuable all-rounder. Never pass up an opportunity to learn something new!
Although web development is a truly modern field in that you don’t need a certain qualification to become one, some accreditation can help boost your earnings. While the options out there are numerous, our guide to the best certification programs should make choosing one simpler.
At the same time, if you want to increase your web developer salary, you also need to build credibility within the industry. Contribute to open-source projects, take part in hackathons, network at local meetups and, if you have time, maybe consider doing some freelance work. Again, the more skills and experience you gather, the easier it will be to push up your earning potential.
Last but not least, it’s absolutely crucial to move with the industry. Keep up with the latest web development trends, be aware of current technologies, make sure that you’re up on your AI programming tools and stay on top of industry news.
In such a fast-paced field, you need to keep your skills up-to-date in order to maintain and increase your value as a web developer.
5. Web development: A rewarding career path
A career in web development is not only financially rewarding; it also has a lot to offer in terms of job security.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts an impressive 16% employment growth for web developers between 2022 and 2032—much faster than average. On top of that, in the wider job market a web developer salary is very competitive—it ranked as the 6th best job title in tech based on salary and employment rates, with software developer at number 1!
If you’re finding this has grabbed your interest and you want to see what taking the first steps might look like, then why not try it on? Take our free 5-day coding short course to see if you enjoy coding. In it, you’ll build and style your first website with the languages HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.
Sounds like the kind of job you want? Discover how to become a web developer or jump straight to the CareerFoundry Full-Stack Web Development Program.
So in short, if you’re asking “How much will I earn as a web developer?” then the answer is essentially “As much of what you make of it.” The sky’s the limit.
If you’re of course interested in learning more about the world of web development in general, there is an almost endless sea of resources out there. These articles are just the beginning: