Nvidia founder and CEO Jensen Huang holds a Vera processor as he speaks during an Nvidia press conference ahead of the CES technology trade show, Monday, Jan. 5, 2026, in Las Vegas. Photo credit: John Locher / AP / Profimedia
Nvidia's meteoric rise has made the chipmaker the world's most valuable company, and new filings with US authorities show what that means for employee wages, Business Insider reports.
Although Nvidia's workforce is relatively small compared to other tech giants, with just 36,000 employees as of early 2025, the stock's appreciation during the boom fueled by enthusiasm for artificial intelligence technology has turned some ordinary workers into millionaires, according to salary data tracked by Levels.fyi.
Some of the oldest employees of the company founded in 1993 have even become billionaires, thanks to the stakes they have received over the years. Nvidia Chairman and CEO Jensen Huang said in an already famous interview last year that he has created more billionaires than any other CEO in the world and that he still reviews the compensation of all employees to this day.
Nvidia does not disclose salary data for its workforce, although public filings for work visas provide one of the few empirical looks at how much it pays for key roles. The figures come from filings that all companies must submit to the Labor Department to sponsor H-1B visas, a visa category intended for foreign nationals employed in “specialty occupations” that require specific educational and professional qualifications.
The numbers reflect only base salary, not the stock or bonuses that typically make up the total compensation package.
Nvidia received about 1,900 certificates for H-1B visas in fiscal year 2025, with some of the most common ones it applied for being software engineers, scientific researchers and product managers. Software engineers can earn between $92,000 and $425,500 in base salary, while scientific researchers can earn between $104,000 and $431,250 and product managers between $131,029 and $379,500.
The salaries are similar to what other US tech giants such as Google, Meta and Microsoft have come to offer following the AI boom.
How much do Nvidia engineers earn?
- ASIC Engineer – $163,925 to $368,000;
- CAD (computer-aided design) engineer – $136,000 to $310,500;
- DevOps Engineer – $140,000 to $270,250;
- Hardware Engineer (Electronics) – $92,000 to $368,000;
- Engineering Manager – $203,879 to $391,000;
- Mask Design Engineer (Semiconductor) – $110,187 to $230,000;
- Mechanical Engineer – $102,336 to $247,250;
- Mixed Signal Design Engineer – $151,091 to $310,500;
- Physical Design Engineer – $96,000 to $310,500;
- Senior Systems Software Engineer – $117,499 to $356,500;
- Software Engineer – $92,000 to $425,500;
- Software QA Engineer (Quality Assurance) – $133,432 to $322,000;
- System Design Engineer – $124,197 to $253,000;
- Software Systems Manager – $208,125 to $425,500;
- Test Engineer – $124,197 to $287,500;
- Verification Engineer – $119,184 to $368,000.
Salaries offered to software architects
- Architect (Systems/Technology) – $104,000 to $425,500;
- Software Architecture Manager – $207,093 to $425,500;
- Senior Architect – $150,821 to $356,500;
- Solutions Architect – $108,722 to $356,500.
Other salaries offered by the most valuable company in the world
- Scientific Researcher – $104,000 to $431,250;
- Business Systems Analyst – $140,000 to $310,500;
- Product Manager – $131,029 to $379,500;
- Program Manager – $75,462 to $368,000.
