Architect salary
What a architect actually earns, from 1,084 live job postings blended with the official US OEWS (Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics) wage anchor. Pick a market for its median and range, then read the seniority split, the trend, and the country comparison below. Updated 2026-07-23.
Switch the market above to see architect pay in the 3 countries our sources cover, each with its own cost of living. The trend, seniority, and state detail below are United States data, where the official record runs deepest.
What the number means
Architecture is the profession this instrument was built around, and its pay is the reason. The blended US median is about 86,000 dollars with an OEWS median of 96,690, modest for a career that demands a five-year degree, a multi-year internship, and a licensing exam. Call it the prestige tax: the work is admired and the credential is steep, and the pay does not match either. Unemployment is low at 2.2 percent and the trend since 2019 is a healthy 20 percent, so the field is stable and improving, but the ceiling stays lower than the training implies. That gap is the whole thesis behind PivotHop. An architect’s skills, spatial reasoning, project coordination, visualization, and the discipline of shipping a complex thing with a team, transfer to adjacent fields that pay more, from interior design to industrial design to product and UX (user-experience design). The routes below price each of those moves from an architect’s actual skill profile.
Open architect roles
Live openings tagged to this occupation, from company career pages and remote boards. Apply at the source.
- ArchitectMy VA Support, Inc. · United StatesRemoteJul 23
- Senior Architect (Europe)Arcanys · Albania; Austria; Belarus; Belgium; Bosnia and Herzegovina; RemoteJul 22
- Senior ArchitectExperian · São Carlos, BRRemoteJul 22
- Senior Healthcare ArchitectDlrgroup · Boston, Massachusetts, United States$135kJul 21
- GENERAL ENGINEER/ARCHITECT (SENIOR PROJECT MANAGER)Naval Facilities Engineering Systems Command · Naval Base, Norfolk, Virginia$108k–$140kJul 17
- GENERAL ENGINEER/ARCHITECT (CONSTRUCTION ENGINEER)Naval Facilities Engineering Systems Command · Groton Submarine Base, Connecticut$101k–$131kJul 17
By seniority
Posted-median pay by seniority signal in the title, from our corpus. Noisy at the edges where sample sizes are small.
By country
- United States$74,228 – $108,677 · median $85,593
- United Kingdom$51,699 – $63,856 · median $57,135
- Canada$52,603 – $77,451 · median $67,760
Top-paying US states
OEWS median by state, highest first.
- Wyomingmedian $107,040
- Californiamedian $105,840
- Connecticutmedian $105,200
- Massachusettsmedian $101,980
- New Yorkmedian $98,580
- New Jerseymedian $97,980
Is your offer fair?
Run a specific number through FairElephant, which weighs it against this data, your location, and remote market rates.
Move into or out of architect
- architect → interior designermeasured route
- architect → industrial designermeasured route
- architect → mep engineermeasured route
Related salaries
- Civil Engineer salary$92,518 median
- Mechanical Engineer salary$112,411 median
- UX Designer salary$129,764 median
Quick answers
How much do architects make?
The official BLS OEWS median is 96,690 dollars, with a blended posted median near 86,000, modest for a career requiring a five-year degree and licensure. The typical range is 75,000 to 107,000.
Why do architects earn less than expected?
The credential is steep, a five-year degree plus internship and exams, but pay has not kept pace, a gap sometimes called the prestige tax. Unemployment is a stable 2.2 percent.
What careers pay more than architecture for the same skills?
Several adjacent fields, from interior and industrial design to product and UX, reward an architect’s spatial reasoning and coordination at a higher band. The routes below measure each move.
Method: bands are the 25th, 50th, and 75th percentiles of live US postings with stated pay, shrunk toward the official OEWS anchor by sample size (the “blended” figure). Trend is the OEWS annual median for SOC (Standard Occupational Classification) code 17-1011. Unemployment is the 2025 BLS (Bureau of Labor Statistics) CPS (Current Population Survey) annual-average rate for “Architects, except landscape and naval.” Live corpus 1,084 observations, 2026-07-23. Definitions in the glossary.