How salary benchmarking actually works — and where most tools get it wrong
Salary benchmarks are the most-quoted and least-understood data in compensation. The "average salary" published for a role in a city is usually a wide range presented as a single number, and the methodology behind it — which job titles were included, which seniority levels, which years of data — is rarely visible. The number you remember from a headline is almost never the number you should negotiate against.
This benchmark tool computes three percentiles for your role in each market: P25 (the lower-quartile salary, what entrants and underpaid roles tend to earn), P50 (the median), and P75 (the upper-quartile, what well-positioned and senior individual contributors earn). Where you sit on that distribution today is the starting point — not your absolute salary in isolation, and not the company-average figure for your employer.
The comparison then runs the same percentiles in a destination city, accounting for local cost of living, taxation, and currency effects. A 20% nominal raise in a high-cost city can leave you with less real purchasing power than a flat move to a lower-cost market. The verdict line tells you which scenario actually wins on the metric you care about — net purchasing power, not gross sticker price.
Frequently asked
Where does the salary data come from?
Each percentile is built from a blend of public sources: government statistical agencies, industry compensation surveys, professional associations, salary disclosure laws (active in several US states and many EU countries), and large-platform aggregates. We weight more heavily the sources that publish methodology and that disclose sample size. For markets where data is thin (smaller cities, specialized roles), we widen the confidence interval and flag the result accordingly.
Why does my real market value depend on so much more than years of experience?
Experience is the single biggest factor for most knowledge-work roles, but the salary curve flattens significantly after 8 to 12 years. From that point, the main drivers of variance are: specific technical or domain skills with active demand, scope of responsibility (number of reports, budget owned, revenue influenced), industry premium (finance, deep tech, and pharma pay structural premiums), and negotiation history (each job change typically captures more uplift than internal promotions). The "top skills" table on your result shows which skills are paying outsized premiums in your market right now.
How is the "remote-first" angle calculated?
For each role and experience level, we estimate the share of openings explicitly hiring remotely and the typical salary range those openings pay. Remote-first compensation is bimodal in many roles: companies hiring globally to save money pay below the highest local markets but above mid-cost ones, while companies hiring globally to access talent pay near or above their headquarters market. The salary range shown reflects the realistic spread once both clusters are accounted for.
What is the "negotiation script" really useful for?
The script is a starting template. It anchors you on a target ask based on your percentile gap and frames the conversation around market evidence rather than personal need. The most common negotiation mistake is asking for a percentage uplift on your current salary rather than asking for the market rate that fits your experience and skills. The script flips the frame: it leads with what the market pays, then asks whether the employer can match or explain the gap.
Does the benchmark account for total compensation, including equity and bonus?
The percentiles you see are typically base salary plus annual cash bonus where bonuses are predictable. They do not fully model equity (RSUs, options, profit-sharing) because equity outcomes depend heavily on the company stage and your tenure. For startup-heavy industries or for roles where equity is a major part of comp, treat the percentile range as the floor: expect total comp to land 10 to 40% higher than the salary-only figure if equity vests as expected.
Is this career advice?
No. The benchmark is a data tool that helps you locate yourself on the market curve and frame compensation conversations. It does not assess fit, culture, growth trajectory, or non-monetary factors that often matter more than salary. Use it as one input among several when evaluating a role, an offer, or a relocation — and pair it with conversations with people actually doing the job in the market you are targeting.