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Front end developer average salary

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Front End salary

What is a front end developer?

Front end development refers to everything that users see, touch, click, and use — the visual layout, user interface/interaction, and user experience. It is also known as client-side software (as opposed to “server-side” software) and consists of buttons, images, links, and pages that all need to function efficiently, accurately, and quickly in order for the user to carry out a particular task. As a rule, this means that developers must be familiar with HTML code (probably HTML5), styling with CSS (probably CSS3), and make everything interactive with JavaScript.

Frameworks like AngularJS and BackboneJS are also highly in demand. A front end developer salary depends on a range of factors, including skill set, level of expertise, and location. If you’re looking to recruit a fAront end developer, are you sure that you’re offering a fair salary? Perhaps you need to prepare yourself to carry out a major sourcing project, or you’re about to carry out some screening for this role.

While front end developers might not be at the top of the chart in terms of salary, their role brings with it some unique challenges and opportunities. Above all, they must work in partnership with everyone in the team, giving them a broader role in the development process than server-side developers. Front end developers can therefore not only code, but are also people who can sit down with visual and UX designers, and solve major challenges as part of a team.

To give you a full understanding of the subject, we’ve put together up-to-date, industry-specific data.

We also have salary data for JavaScript and .NET, among others.

Average front end developer salary

$92,547.50

If you put all sources together, the average front end developer salary is $92,547.50 but the differences between data sources can be large.

Web developer (United States)

front end developer salary data PayscaleCurrency: USD | Updated: 10 Mar 2019 | Individuals Reporting: 5,776

According to PayScale’s data, the average front end developer salary in the US is $69,411 per year(at the time of the publication). According to PayScale, the median hourly rate is $24.42.

Currency: USD | Updated: 6 Mar 2019 | Individuals Reporting: 3,786

On the other hand, Glassdoor’s data shows that the average front end salary base pay is $77,908 per year (plus an average cash compensation of $3,301).

Front end developer salary Glassdoor

Currency: USD | Updated: 13 Mar 2019 | Individual data sources: 22,477

Interestingly, Indeed.com reports much higher salaries, with an average salary of $108,851 per year.

front end developer salary data IndeedCurrency: USD | Updated: 14 Mar 2019 | Individual data sources: 36,143

front end developer salary data ZipRecruiterAlthough ZipRecruiter.com does not provide their own calculation of an average front end salary for a particular type of job, a search for jobs with the keywords “front end web developer” results in the above data for particular salary ranges. It is, therefore, possible to calculate an average salary of (at least) $114,020 per year.

Experience

As you would expect, front end developer salary levels depend heavily on the level of experience of a particular developer.

front end developer salary data by experience

Front End Developer Salaries

According to PayScale:

Experience Average total compensation
less than 5 years $65,338 (excluding bonuses, and overtime pay)
5 to 10 years (mid-career experience): $78,000
10 to 20 years (experienced) $87,000
20+ years (late-career experience) $89,000

According to Glassdoor, (as of 28.02.2019):

Experience Average total compensation
1 to 3 years $67,423
4 to 6 years $76,652 (excluding bonuses, and overtime pay)
7 to 9 years (mid-career experience) $82,226
10 to 14 years (experienced) $87,160
15+ years (late-career experience) $90,403

Location

Location is one of the most important factors influencing the salary of front end developers. According to PayScale, front end developers in San Francisco earn 37% more than the national average, with Washington and New York coming second and third (15% and 13% respectively).front end developer salary by location

Front end developer salary NYC, SF, and LA

By contrast, Glassdoor states that frontend developer salary median base pay is as follows in the following geographical locations:

  • In SF, front end developers get on average $114,646 per year (47% above average)
  • In LA, front end developers earn $89,920 per year (15% above average)
  • In NYC, front end developers earn $93,395 per year (10% above average)
  • In Washington, front end developers earn $83,138 per year (7% above average)

Other factors increasing frontend developer salary

Core skills

Core salary front end developer skills include HTML, CSS, and JavaScript (JQuery), as well as knowing how to create Responsive Web Design, being familiar with Adobe Photoshop and using Git (version control) with ease.

Skills required for higher front end salary

According to PayScale, the skills that increase pay for this job the most are JavaScript frameworks such as Node.js and AngularJS.

Useful additional skills

Whilst the following skills on their own add little value to a front end developer’s portfolio, when a developer is familiar with a number of them in addition to the core skills, they add a great deal of value:

  • Video editing
  • Design skills (Adobe Creative Cloud)
  • UX and UI
  • SEO
  • Wireframing/Prototyping tools
  • Google analytics

Before you go

We also have other great resources devoted to a software developer salary, such as:

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