Well-known tech firms like Meta Platforms Inc., Alphabet Inc. and Snap Inc. pay some of the highest salaries in the industry.
But they aren't the highest-paying tech employers.
That honor went Okta Inc. — a software firm that helps companies with secure user authentication and sign-on — where the median employee earned $397,707 in 2022. Okta's median pay ranked eighth among all publicly traded companies in the U.S.
That's according to an American Inno review of SEC filings and Bloomberg data, which we used to identify the 50 highest-paying publicly traded tech companies.
Workers in the tech sector have been able to command rising salaries for several years due to a tight labor market — and experts say those with coveted skills have been able to withstand the recent turmoil in the sector.
That being said, the analysis showed there are several companies that rank head and shoulders above the rest when it comes to median compensation.
As expected, companies with extremely high concentrations of technology workers and low concentrations of retail or manufacturing workers dominated the top of the list.
Online gaming company Roblox Corp. checked in behind Okta at No. 2 among tech companies, with median compensation of $315,140.
Among some well-known heavyweights, Meta ranked fifth at just under $300,000, while Alphabet wasn't far behind at $279.802.
A total of 29 tech firms had median compensation of more than $200,000.
The list of 50 includes firms operating in software, hardware and other digital services. It excludes biotech firms. American Inno also recently identified the 50 tech companies with the highest CEO pay. The average CEO compensation among the top 50 tech CEOs was $44.4 million.
Median employee pay for major tech companies can vary widely depending on the mix of employees at a company.
Companies with a high number of manufacturing or retail workers will often have lower median pay. That's why you won't find companies like Amazon or Tesla on this list, which each had median employee pay of around $34,000 last year. Apple's median employee pay was $84,000 last year.
Employees at tech firms are among the highest paid of any sector in the country. In a separate study by tech trade association CompTIA, the median tech wage in 2021 was $100,615, 103% higher than the median national wage.
Tech workers in Washington state have the highest median compensation in the country at nearly $130,000, according to CompTIA's data, while the lowest-paying states for tech workers are South Dakota, Mississippi, Wyoming, Louisiana and West Virginia, which all have a median tech wage less than $70,000.
While tech workers are among the country's highest earners, signs are pointing to a slowdown in compensation at some top firms.
Microsoft, which has median employee compensation of $190,000, said it's pausing salary hikes this year and said performance bonuses for executives will be down considerably compared to the year before.
