Skills › database
SQL Server jobs: demand and pay (October 2026)
360 open data & AI postings at 190 companies mention SQL Server, or 2.7% of all data & AI postings we track (as of October 18, 2026).
2.7%share of data & AI postings
190companies hiring
$145Kmedian pay, US (n=116)
—week over week (needs more history)
SQL Server pay by level
| Level (from title) | Median pay | Postings with pay (n) |
|---|---|---|
| Mid (II) | — | 3 |
| Senior | $141K | 52 |
| Staff / lead | — | 3 |
| Principal | — | 2 |
| Manager | — | 4 |
| Director+ | — | 1 |
| Level not stated | $146K | 51 |
Median of the published range midpoint, US postings in USD, annualized. Shown only when n ≥ 10; “—” means fewer.
Roles that ask for SQL Server
| Role | Postings | % of that role |
|---|---|---|
| Database Engineer / DBA | 144 | 47.4% |
| Data Engineer | 104 | 5.8% |
| AI Engineer | 49 | 1.3% |
| Data Architect | 15 | 3.8% |
| Data Scientist | 11 | 0.7% |
| Data & AI leadership | 9 | 0.8% |
| Data Governance & Quality | 8 | 3.6% |
| BI Developer / Analyst | 7 | 4.7% |
| Data Analyst | 6 | 0.5% |
| Analytics Engineer | 5 | 1.4% |
| Machine Learning Engineer | 2 | 0.1% |
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How it's measured: a posting counts if its title or description matches the SQL Server patterns in our taxonomy. Postings by the vendor itself are excluded. See the methodology.