Mechanical Engineer salary
What a mechanical engineer actually earns, from 1,106 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 mechanical engineer pay in the 5 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
Mechanical engineering is the steady middle of the engineering pay band and one of its most secure corners. The blended US median is about 112,000 dollars with an OEWS median of 102,320, and unemployment runs 1.3 percent, low even by engineering standards, because the discipline underpins manufacturing, energy, aerospace, and building systems all at once. Pay rose 16 percent since 2019, a real gain driven less by any single boom than by the breadth of industries that need the skill. The spread inside the band is mostly about sector and sign-off: product and manufacturing roles cluster in the middle, while the PE license and senior responsible-charge seats pull the top. If your pay has flattened, the two levers are the license, which gates the higher-responsibility roles, and the industry, which moves the baseline more than the title does.
Open mechanical engineer roles
Live openings tagged to this occupation, from company career pages and remote boards. Apply at the source.
- Senior Network R&D Engineer at ExotecWasquehal, FranceTodayApply
- Mechanical Design Engineer , 100% Stelle at X-Rite Europe GmbHRegensdorf, Zürich, Switzerland2d agoApply
- R&D Engineer, Endovascular Catheter Development at Acrostak (Schweiz) AGWinterthur, Zürich, Switzerland2d agoApply
- Product Development Engineer Medizintechnik 100% at CeramTec Schweiz GmbHSpreitenbach, Aargau, Switzerland2d agoApply
Maschineningenieur / Maschinentechniker Entwicklung Konstruktion Werkzeugmaschinen 80 -100% at ABS Personalberatung AGRegion Biel, Bern, Switzerland2d agoApply
Principal Mechanical Engineer, Water at AECOMManchester2d 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$90,402$112,630$134,597
- United Kingdom$57,985$68,218$81,862
- Australia$64,149$89,451$102,137
- Canada$64,983$74,501$82,405
- Netherlands$56,119$61,670$70,079
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.
- Alaska$129,990
- California$126,370
- Massachusetts$122,670
- Louisiana$114,050
- Maryland$111,740
- Washington$109,370
Roles that pay more, that these skills already reach
Median pay from each destination’s own postings, with the readiness a mechanical engineer profile already covers.
- 43 open aerospace engineer roles$129,497 median · +$16,867 · 16% readiness
- 23 open robotics engineer roles$128,468 median · +$15,838 · 13% readiness
- 600 open electrical engineer roles$119,104 median · +$6,474 · 36% readiness
Every measured move out of this role, ranked by readiness: alternative careers for a mechanical engineer.
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 mechanical engineer
- architect → mechanical engineermeasured route
Related salaries
- Civil Engineer salary$95,550 median
- Architect salary$99,684 median
- Electrician salary$74,155 median
Quick answers
How much do mechanical engineers make?
The blended US median is about 112,000 dollars, with the official BLS OEWS median at 102,320 and a typical range of 92,000 to 135,000.
Is mechanical engineering a secure career?
Yes: unemployment is 1.3 percent, low even for engineering, because the skill underpins manufacturing, energy, aerospace, and building systems.
What raises a mechanical engineer’s salary?
The PE license, which gates higher-responsibility roles, and the industry: aerospace and energy pay above the baseline more than a title change does.
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 17-2141. Unemployment is the 2025 BLS (Bureau of Labor Statistics) CPS (Current Population Survey) annual-average rate for “Mechanical engineers.” Live corpus 1,106 observations, 2026-09-06. Definitions in the glossary.