Side by side

QA Engineer vs Site Reliability Engineer

Site Reliability Engineer pays more: a median of $158,500 against $137,000. Demand is comparable on both sides. QA Engineer is the more remote-friendly of the two, by 8.9%. Listings for QA Engineer move faster — median age 30 days against 90.

Comparison

Side by side

MeasureQA EngineerSite Reliability EngineerGap
Open postings42,51638,673+3,843
Posted this week3,2161,680
Median salary$137,000$158,500$-21.5k
25th percentile$108k$125k
75th percentile$170k$197k
Salary disclosed7.2%7.6%
Remote share11.9%3.0%+8.9pp
Median age of posting30d90d
Open over 60 days48.1%36.0%
Visa sponsorship22.5%14.0%
Pay

Pay distribution

QA Engineer

$62k$237k

Site Reliability Engineer

$71k$274k
Freshness

How old the listings are

QA Engineer

just posted30d median90d+

Site Reliability Engineer

just posted90d median90d+
Demand

What each side asks for

QA Engineer — technologies

TypeScript
72.0%
Terraform
65.8%
Kubernetes
59.6%
Java
53.4%
SQL
47.2%
PostgreSQL
41.0%
dbt
34.8%

Site Reliability Engineer — technologies

Node.js
72.0%
Python
65.8%
Azure
59.6%
GCP
53.4%
Go
47.2%
Tableau
41.0%
dbt
34.8%

QA Engineer — employers

Beacon Robotics
9.4%
Northwind Systems
8.7%
Rivergate Media
8.0%
Quarry Analytics
7.2%
Aperture Labs
6.5%
Pinewood Education
5.8%
Tidewater Insurance
5.1%

Site Reliability Engineer — employers

Northwind Systems
9.4%
Beacon Robotics
8.7%
Lakeshore Hospitality
8.0%
Meridian Software
7.2%
Solstice Biotech
6.5%
Aperture Labs
5.8%
Kestrel Health
5.1%

Track this slice

A weekly note when openings, pay or freshness move for QA Engineer vs Site Reliability Engineer.

More comparisons

Other Engineering comparisons

Both sides are counted the same way on the same day, so the gap is comparable even where the absolute numbers move. Salary figures use only postings that publish a range — the disclosure rate is in the table because a median over 20% of a cohort is a weaker number than one over 70%.