AI Engineer: market
An AI Engineer brings models into the product: builds LLM applications, RAG search, agents and evaluation pipelines, and makes AI features work reliably and predictably. We currently track 4 460 open positions for this role, 4 220 of them fresh. Postings most often require Python, model APIs and open-source LLMs, vector databases and RAG, quality evaluation (evals), backend skills (FastAPI, queues) and a cloud. By co-occurrence in requirements, Python, LLM, AWS and Azure appear most often. 34% of the postings allow fully remote work. Below is a live slice of the AI Engineer market: geography, seniority, adjacent stack and sources.
The AI Engineer market currently has 4,460 open roles, 4,220 of them freshly observed. Median salary $9,166/mo.
34% of AI Engineer postings allow fully remote work; the share counts only postings that state the format.
⚠ salary known for 399 of 4460 jobs; remote share from 3895 with a stated format; 4220 counted as fresh observations; trend and hiring difficulty are not shown
Timeline: postings and sources
How many AI Engineer postings appeared each week since 4 May, and from how many sources. The second line separates market growth from coverage growth: a jump in the week new sources were connected means we started seeing more, not that the market grew.
New postings and active sources per week
Sources over the period: 247
New sources connected: 11 May +6 · 18 May +7 · 25 May +2 · 1 Jun +9 · 8 Jun +2 · 15 Jun +4 · 22 Jun +25 · 29 Jun +36 · 6 Jul +18 · 13 Jul +25 · 20 Jul +18 · 27 Jul +3 · 3 Aug +5 · 10 Aug +2 · 17 Aug +4 · 24 Aug +5 · 31 Aug +5 · 7 Sept +7 · 14 Sept +8 · 21 Sept +10 · 28 Sept +6 · 5 Oct +8 · 12 Oct +8
Week = posting first-seen date, all statuses; postings are selected by the same rule as this page's counter. Sources are distinct collection channels; their names are not published.
Salaries over time
Median AI Engineer salary per week, USD per month.
Median salary, USD per month
Only postings with a USD salary and a known period (month or year), $500–$50,000 per month. Weeks with fewer than 10 such postings are left blank — that means no data, not zero.
Remote work over time
Share of AI Engineer postings offering fully remote work, per week.
Remote postings, %
The share is among postings that state a format (remote, hybrid, office). Weeks with fewer than 10 such postings are left blank.
Technologies over time
How the share of AI Engineer postings mentioning each of the top technologies changed.
Postings mentioning the technology, %
Share among postings with a tagged stack; the series starts on 10 Aug: earlier stack tags were assigned differently. Weeks with fewer than 20 tagged postings are left blank.
Countries over time
How the share of AI Engineer postings in each of the top countries changed, per week.
Postings in the country, %
Share among postings with a known country; the chart shows the five countries with the most postings over six months. Weeks with fewer than 20 postings with a known country are left blank. A rising share can mean a newly connected source in that country rather than market growth.
Demand and observed supply: AI Engineer
| Open demand | 4,460 |
| Observed supply | — not published |
⚠ candidates matching a vacancy are not counted yet: demand and the observed pool are shown
Salary distribution: AI Engineer
One in ten earns under $3,464, one in ten over $19,125. Half the market falls between $6,304 and $14,112. Sample: 399.
The range histogram for AI Engineer uses only postings with an explicit compensation range; the median is computed over the same sample.
Demand geography: AI Engineer
| country | jobs |
|---|---|
| US | 1,160 |
| PL | 436 |
| GB | 418 |
| IN | 287 |
| DE | 277 |
| CA | 123 |
| FR | 113 |
| SG | 109 |
| BR | 68 |
| AU | 61 |
The top country for AI Engineer demand is the US (1 160 positions).
⚠ job counts only: salary by country is not published
Used together with
In AI Engineer requirements the most frequently named skills and technologies are Python, LLM, AWS and Azure.
Demand by grade: AI Engineer
| grade | jobs |
|---|---|
| senior | 1,336 |
| principal | 417 |
| lead | 293 |
| middle | 187 |
| junior | 91 |
Senior-and-above is about 88% of 2 324 AI Engineer postings with an explicit grade.
⚠ demand side only: the grade of the observed pool is unknown for most of it
Employers: AI Engineer
Demand is spread across 2,072 employers. The largest accounts for 4.2%, the top ten for 11.8%; the remaining 88.2% is long tail.
| share | value |
|---|---|
| top-1 | 4.2% |
| top-3 | 7.9% |
| top-10 | 11.8% |
| long tail | 88.2% |
AI Engineer openings come from 2 072 distinct employers; the largest one accounts for only 4.2% of postings — the market is not tied to a single hirer.
⚠ names are not shown: staffing agencies and end employers are not yet told apart by the classifier
Where Zorky sees this market
Observed across 125 sources; the largest accounts for 14.2% — this market does not rest on a single channel.
AI Engineer postings arrive mostly from ATS & career sites and job boards & aggregators.
Recent openings: AI Engineer
- AI Engineer - Go To Market · $10,042
- AI Product Engineer · $10,750
- AI Engineer · US · $17,708
- Forward Deployed AI Engineer · CA
- AI Engineer · CA
- LLM Serving Engineer (Cloud AI Engineering), Senior / Staff Engineer · CA
- AI Engineer Lead[100%REMOTE] · US
- Senior AI Engineer - H/F/X · FR
Adjacent markets
⚠ adjacent markets for comparison are not defined yet
How this is measured
- Vacancy
- an open job that cleared the quality gate and lists at least two technologies
- Observed candidate
- a candidate whose stack contains this technology; an aggregate — not a single record leaves the perimeter
- Matchable candidate
- not counted yet
- Window
- jobs open at the moment the snapshot was built
About the data
- Some breakdowns are hidden: their data coverage is not yet sufficient.
- Statistics are shown only where the sample clears a quality gate.
- A missing block does not mean a value of zero.
Breakdowns currently hidden: 8.
Data as of 2026-10-25
Frequently asked questions
Common questions about the AI Engineer role — short answers from the same data slice.
What does an AI Engineer do?
An AI Engineer brings models into the product: builds LLM applications, RAG search, agents and evaluation pipelines, and makes AI features work reliably and predictably.
Which skills do AI Engineer postings require?
Postings most often require Python, model APIs and open-source LLMs, vector databases and RAG, quality evaluation (evals), backend skills (FastAPI, queues) and a cloud. In the current slice, Python, LLM, AWS and Azure appear in requirements most often.
How does an AI Engineer differ from an ML Engineer?
An ML Engineer trains and ships their own models; an AI Engineer more often works with existing models and builds product systems around them — retrieval, agents, evaluation and guardrails.
How remote-friendly are AI Engineer jobs?
34% of postings with an explicit format allow fully remote work; the slice tracks 4 460 open positions.
Get the full AI Engineer market details
Full role analytics — salary bands, employers, trends and available candidates. Leave a contact and we'll send the details.