Chemical Engineer salary
What a chemical engineer actually earns, from 238 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 2026-09-06.
Switch the market above to see chemical engineer pay in the 2 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
A chemical engineer earns a blended US median near 102,230 dollars, with the typical middle running from 84,231 dollars to 126,452 dollars. The official OEWS median is higher, 121,860 dollars, because job ads skew toward the roles that pay below the occupation-wide average. The official trend has moved up about 12 percent since 2019. By seniority, posted pay runs from roughly 79,815 dollars to 93,177 dollars. The nearest adjacent move on our skill graph is industrial engineer, at 37 percent coverage; the instrument maps the rest.
Open chemical engineer roles
Live openings tagged to this occupation, from company career pages and remote boards. Apply at the source.
Alkylation SME - Staff Process Engineer (Houston, TX, US, 77002) at Delek USUnited States · Remote2d agoApply- Chemical Engineer at Occupational Safety and Health AdministrationDallas, Texas$116k–$150k2d agoApply
Verfahrensingenieur at Bucher Municipal AGNiederweningen, Zürich, Switzerland2d agoApply
Senior GTM Systems & Process Engineer at HackerOneUSA · Remote2d agoApply
Graduate Process Engineer at Mott MacDonaldManchester2d agoApply
Job Weekend Shift SMTA Process Engineer Specialist at LeidosHuntsville, AL$59k–$107k2d agoApply
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$84,231$102,230$126,452
- United Kingdom$58,029$68,772$87,277
Switzerland · official wage bands
median CHF 8'730/month
Swiss postings do not state pay, so these are not posted salaries: they are the federal wage survey (Lohnstrukturerhebung 2024) for the ISCO group 21 Naturwissenschaftler, Mathematiker und Ingenieure: standardized gross monthly, full-time, 13th salary included pro rata. The band covers the whole occupation group, which is coarser than this occupation alone.
Annual ≈ CHF 104'760 at the median. Source: Bundesamt für Statistik, LSE 2024.
Top-paying US states
OEWS median by state, highest first.
- Texas$135,160
- Virginia$132,550
- New York$132,480
- Washington$130,830
- Maryland$129,710
- Massachusetts$119,260
Roles that pay more, that these skills already reach
Median pay from each destination’s own postings, with the readiness a chemical engineer profile already covers.
- 600 open business analyst roles$122,331 median · +$20,101 · 12% readiness
- 600 open electrical engineer roles$119,104 median · +$16,874 · 15% readiness
- 272 open mechanical engineer roles$112,630 median · +$10,400 · 21% readiness
- 75 open environmental engineer roles$108,611 median · +$6,381 · 20% readiness
Every measured move out of this role, ranked by readiness: alternative careers for a chemical engineer.
Is your offer fair?
Run a specific number through FairElephant, which weighs it against this data, your location, and remote market rates.
Related salaries
- Industrial Engineer salary$99,826 median
- Electrical Engineer salary$119,104 median
- Mechanical Engineer salary$112,630 median
Quick answers
How much does a chemical engineer make?
The blended US median is about 102,230 dollars, with a typical range from 84,231 dollars to 126,452 dollars, against an official OEWS median of 121,860 dollars.
What can a chemical engineer move into?
The nearest adjacent role on our skill graph is industrial engineer, at 37 percent skill coverage. Run the instrument for the full set of reachable moves.
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 17-2041. Unemployment is the 2025 BLS (Bureau of Labor Statistics) CPS (Current Population Survey) annual-average rate for “Chemical engineers.” Live corpus 238 observations, 2026-09-06. Definitions in the glossary.