Security engineer salary
What remote US security engineer roles pay at each experience level, and where the next step up sits. All roles
Pay by experience level
Median posted pay by the experience each posting asks for. The role family is the base title plus the steps on the ladder below, 183 postings.
How pay is spread across postings
Each outline is one experience band. Taller means more postings at that pay. Dashed lines mark each band median.
Half of 5 to 10 year postings pay between $140,000 and $191,000, with a median of $166,000. The medians are $130,000 for 2 to 5 years, $166,000 for 5 to 10 years and $190,000 for 10+ years.
What each step up the ladder pays
Each bar runs from the 25th to the 75th percentile within one experience band, so it holds the middle half of postings. The dot is the median. A step needs 30 postings in a band before we draw it.
Among 5 to 10 year postings, the median moves from $159,000 for Security engineer or analyst to $171,000 for Senior security engineer or analyst, a difference of $12,000.
| Step | 2 to 5 years | 5 to 10 years | 10+ years |
|---|---|---|---|
| Security engineer or analyst | not enough postings yetn 29 | $158,550middle half $131,250 to $191,500, n 35 | not enough postings yetn 9 |
| Senior security engineer or analyst | not enough postings yetn 4 | $170,500middle half $149,614 to $186,788, n 46 | not enough postings yetn 10 |
| Staff, principal or lead | not enough postings yetn 0 | not enough postings yetn 13 | not enough postings yetn 19 |
| Security manager | not enough postings yetn 0 | not enough postings yetn 5 | not enough postings yetn 2 |
| Director of security | not enough postings yetn 0 | not enough postings yetn 1 | not enough postings yetn 12 |
How pay changes with job title
Each outline is one step of the ladder, and each posting counts once, in the highest step its title matches. A step needs 30 postings in the view to be drawn. Dashed lines mark medians.
For postings asking for 5 or more years, the median is $159,000 for Security engineer or analyst and $189,000 for Staff, principal or lead. Postings asking for 2 to 5 years are shown in the charts above.
| Step, 5 or more years | Median | n |
|---|---|---|
| Security engineer or analyst | $159,045 | 44 |
| Senior security engineer or analyst | $166,750 | 54 |
| Staff, principal or lead | $188,664 | 32 |
Left out with fewer than 30 postings in this view, Security manager (n 7), Director of security (n 13). This view combines the 5 to 10 and 10+ bands, which come from the same continuous pulls. The 2 to 5 band is never combined with them.
Where this role leads
Two kinds of next move. Steps up the ladder compare the same experience band at both ends. Nearby roles compare whole role families.
These roles list similar skills, so they are common moves. Each figure is the other role median minus this one, in the same experience band, and each role mixes every step of its ladder. It is not the raise a move would bring.
The skill groups this role asks for
Skills that tend to be listed together are grouped. The bar shows the share of this role's postings that list at least two skills from a group. Postings with no skills listed are left out.
Security appears in 80% of the 183 postings that list skills, followed by cloud infrastructure at 43%.
Security
80% of postings, n 147- cloud security
- incident response
- threat modeling
- vulnerability management
- application security
- identity and access management
Not enough postings on both sides, within one ladder step, to compare pay.
Cloud infrastructure
43% of postings, n 79- aws
- ci/cd
- terraform
- kubernetes
- infrastructure as code
- azure
Not enough postings on both sides, within one ladder step, to compare pay.
Pay comparisons show association and not cause. Postings that ask for a skill group may differ in employer, industry or the work itself, and listing a skill does not guarantee the raise. A comparison appears only for 5 to 10 years of experience, within one ladder step, with at least 30 postings with and without the group.
Top hiring employers
- 9th Way Insignia5
- Cisco4
- Healthmark Group3
- CVS Health3
- CrowdStrike2
- gFiber2
- EverCommerce2
- Allstate2
How wide posted pay ranges are
Median gap between the top and bottom of the range, within each experience band. Postings with a single figure are left out.
A typical 5 to 10 year posting's range spans $43,000 from bottom to top, so the top is about 1.32 times the bottom.
| Experience | Median range width | Top as a multiple of bottom | n |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2 to 5 years | $39,000 | 1.37 | 31 |
| 5 to 10 years | $43,000 | 1.32 | 98 |
| 10+ years | $53,000 | 1.32 | 49 |
Experienced in technology and looking for a remote role?
Get roles like this scored to you every morning. 7 days free.
A few remote roles each morning, scored 0 to 100 against what you told us you want. Each score shows the lines from the posting behind it.
Start free7-day free trial. No credit card.