the north carolina tech salary report: 2026 edition
This is Torc's annual snapshot of what tech roles actually pay across North Carolina's two biggest markets, Charlotte and Raleigh-Durham, pulled together from Glassdoor, Payscale, Built In, Levels.fyi, ZipRecruiter, and Robert Half's 2026 salary guide. We'll update this one annually, so bookmark it rather than screenshotting it.
how nc stacks up nationally
North Carolina ranked #1 in the country for tech occupation growth in NC Tech's 2026 State of the Technology Industry report. That's the headline. The nuance: when NC's tech wages are normalized for purchasing power (accounting for the state's lower cost of living), the state ranks 18th nationally, down three spots from 15th the year before, a sign that cost of living has been creeping up faster than wages in some pockets of the state. The practical read for job seekers: NC is growing jobs faster than almost anywhere in the country, but the days of it being a dramatically underpriced market relative to the coasts are narrowing.
software engineer salaries: charlotte vs. raleigh-durham
level | charlotte | raleigh-durham |
entry level | $123,569 avg (glassdoor) | $116,872 avg, associate-level (glassdoor) |
mid-level / software engineer | $113k - $148k (built in / glassdoor range) | $119k - $142k (built in / glassdoor range) |
senior software engineer | $193,596 avg (glassdoor) | $192,797 avg (glassdoor) |
sr. software development engineer | N/A, not separately tracked | $181,900 avg (glassdoor) |
A quick caveat that applies to every number in this report: Glassdoor, Payscale, and Built In all sample differently, Glassdoor leans toward total comp from larger companies, Payscale leans toward base salary, and Built In's sample skews more startup and mid-size. That's why you'll see meaningful spreads even within a single city. When in doubt, treat the Glassdoor figure as the higher-end "total comp" estimate and Payscale as the more conservative "base salary" estimate, and assume your actual offer lands somewhere between them depending on company size and equity structure.
salary by specialization (national bands, nc-relevant)
Robert Half's 2026 salary guide breaks out starting salary bands by specialization nationally. These aren't NC-specific, but they're the most reliable cross-role comparison available, and NC's major employers (banks in Charlotte, infrastructure and life sciences companies in Raleigh-Durham) generally hire within these national bands rather than a discounted regional scale for specialized roles.
role | low | mid | high |
ai/ml engineer | $134,000 | $170,750 | $193,250 |
data engineer | $127,000 | $156,250 | $180,750 |
data scientist | $121,750 | $153,750 | $182,500 |
devops engineer | $118,000 | $145,750 | $173,750 |
cybersecurity engineer | $118,500 | $144,000 | $190,750 |
software engineer | $109,250 | $142,000 | $175,500 |
network/cloud engineer | $110,000 | $132,000 | $155,000 |
The pattern worth noting: AI/ML engineer now sits at the top of this list, edging out even cybersecurity at the high end, a meaningful shift from a few years ago when cybersecurity and DevOps dominated the in-demand-roles conversation. Data engineer and data scientist both sit close behind, reflecting the same growth NC Tech's reports have flagged statewide.
the ai salary signal specific to nc
This is the most useful NC-specific data point in the whole report. From November 2022 through November 2025, NC employers posted 56,820 AI-related job listings across nearly 5,940 different employers, with an average advertised salary of $132,000. Wells Fargo ranked first among all NC employers seeking AI talent over that period, ahead of Accenture, Deloitte, and PwC, evidence that AI hiring in NC is being driven heavily by banks and large enterprises retrofitting AI into existing systems, not just AI-native startups.
what's driving the numbers in each metro
Charlotte: Salary growth concentrates around core-banking modernization, fraud-detection ML, and GenAI-enabled capability work at Wells Fargo, Bank of America, and Truist. The highest-paying industries locally are financial services, HR & staffing, and retail & wholesale.
Raleigh-Durham: Salary growth concentrates around AI infrastructure (Red Hat, Cisco), analytics (SAS), and regulated life-sciences data work (IQVIA, GSK). The highest-paying industries locally are financial services, telecommunications, and aerospace & defense, a notably different mix than Charlotte's bank-dominated premium.
how to use this report
Benchmarking an offer: compare against the Glassdoor figure for your level and city first, it's the most total-comp-inclusive number, then sanity-check against Payscale's base-only figure to understand how much of your offer might be bonus or equity
Setting comp bands as a hiring manager: Robert Half's specialization table is the most defensible cross-role anchor since it isn't skewed by any single company's sample size the way city-specific Glassdoor data can be
Evaluating a career pivot into AI/data: the salary premium for AI/ML and data engineer roles over generalist software engineer roles is real and widening, worth factoring into any reskilling decision
the bottom line
NC's tech salaries are healthy and growing, but the state's days of being a steep discount versus the coasts are narrowing as cost of living rises and demand intensifies, especially in AI and data roles. Charlotte and Raleigh-Durham now sit close enough in both pay and cost of living that the better question isn't "which city pays more" but "which city's dominant industries match the work I want to be doing." We'll refresh this report annually as new data comes in.
