Software engineers design, build and run the systems behind products and services. Postings usually ask for one or two main programming languages plus experience with the cloud platforms and delivery tooling a team already uses.
We analyzed 136 U.S. job descriptions from 29 employers for Software Engineering roles. The most requested skills were Distributed systems (37%), Python (36%) and AWS (30%).
1,015open U.S. roles tracked
5 yearstypical experience asked for
$269,270median advertised pay, from 835 roles that state it
Cloud & infrastructure
Distributed systems37%
AWS30%
Kubernetes26%
CI/CD19%
Google Cloud18%
Azure18%
Terraform15%
Linux12%
Docker10%
Microservices10%
Languages
Python36%
Java27%
SQL20%
C++17%
JavaScript15%
TypeScript14%
Rust13%
Go12%
AI & machine learning
LLMs18%
Machine learning10%
Generative AI10%
Security
Incident response14%
Identity and access10%
Product & design
Agile13%
Prototyping10%
Updated November 7, 2026, using job descriptions collected since September 25, 2026. Shares show how many of the sampled descriptions mention a skill, so a low share can still be a firm requirement in the roles that list it. We sample a limited number of descriptions per employer so that no single company dominates, and we only report figures backed by several employers. Advertised pay comes from a different group of roles than H1B filings, so the two are not directly comparable.
