Generative AI Salary: Your 2025 Guide

The potential salary you can earn in a generative AI career will depend on what role best fits your career goals and what aspect of generative AI you’re most excited to work within. Three potential careers you can explore in generative AI include AI engineer, prompt engineer, and AI writer. Learn more about the average generative AI salary in each career and how factors like where you live, the industry and company you work for, and your experience level can impact your earnings. 

What is generative AI?

Generative AI refers to artificial intelligence models with the ability to create unique text, images, video, audio, or code. You can interact with these models with prompts, which are written instructions that tell the model what you’d like it to accomplish. 

Generative AI models use deep neural networks, which learn the underlying data patterns like text or images. After studying the underlying patterns and characteristics of a huge amount of training data, generative AI models can predict your prompt’s objective. They create an output with the same underlying patterns or characteristics as the item you’re looking for. They then generate the rest of the details randomly using characteristics or traits from other similar items the model observed in training. 

Generative AI can be used for various purposes, including solving business problems and conducting more effective research in industries such as finance, health care, manufacturing, and more.

Careers in generative AI

There are many job opportunities in generative AI for those looking to work with this technology. You could become an AI engineer or research scientist to find new ways to improve generative AI models or to apply generative AI models to solve problems. You could work as a prompt engineer to find creative ways to get great responses from generative AI models. Another potential generative AI career is to become an AI content writer or reviewer to create new content or review user-submitted or AI-generated work. 

Generative AI job outlook

Generative AI is a transformative technology that is reshaping how companies and organizations operate. Some experts believe that generative AI could be as transformative to the economy as the invention of the steam engine or personal computer. According to a report from MarketsandMarkets, the generative AI market is predicted to grow from $20.9 billion in 2024 to $136.7 billion by 2030, with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 36.7 percent [1]. These factors imply that generative AI will see job growth for the foreseeable future. 

*All average base salary data as of March 2025—does not include additional pay.

Generative AI salary: AI engineer

As a generative AI engineer, you will use AI principles to design solutions to problems, focusing on generative AI. The average base salary for a generative AI engineer in the United States ranges from $113,939 to $158,492, according to three salary aggregate websites. Explore how the data breaks down from each source [2, 3, 4]:

Factors that impact salary

The amount you can earn as a generative AI engineer will depend on factors like your experience in the field, where you live, and the company you work for. Explore how much these variables can affect your salary. 

Experience

As you gain experience working with artificial intelligence, you may qualify for higher-paying work. Glassdoor offers insight into how much your salary can vary depending on your experience in the industry [2]:

• 0–1 years: $91,572

• 1–3 years: $105,007

• 4–6 years: $118,330

• 7–9 years: $128,613

• 10–14 years: $147,909

• 15+ years: $165,419

Location

Where you live can also make a big difference in how much you earn. ZipRecruiter lists the top highest-paying cities for generative AI engineers [3]: 

• Portola Valley, CA: $161,492

• Nome, AK: $143,729

• Cupertino, CA: $142,947

• Sacramento, CA: $142,267 

• Berkeley, CA: $141,869

• Sitka, AK: $139,580

• Sunnyvale, CA: $138,097

• Menlo Park, CA: $136,541

• San Francisco, CA: $136,341

• Santa Clara, CA: $136,076

Company

You will find that the company you work for is another reason your salary will vary. Glassdoor lists the top five highest-paying companies for AI engineers and their average base salary ranges as [2]: 

• NVIDIA: $249,000 to $362,000

• Google: $240,000 to $360,000

• Apple: $233,000 to $343,000

• Meta: $231,000 to $336,000

• X: $221,000 to $319,000

AI prompt engineer average salary 

As a prompt engineer, you will be an expert in writing prompts for generative AI algorithms to get meaningful responses. According to ZipRecruiter and Glassdoor, the average AI prompt engineer salary ranges from $62,977 to $136,573, respectively [5, 6]. The exact salary you can expect will vary based on factors like what company you work for, where you live, and your education in the field. 

Experience

Earning more experience in the field is one way to qualify for a higher-paying job. Glassdoor also offers insight into how experience can influence the average prompt engineer salary [6]: 

• 0–1 years: $98,201

• 1–3 years: $111,855 

• 4–6 years: $122,949

• 7–9 years: $128,631

• 10–14 years: $138,437

• 15+ years: $155,796

Location

Your location, whether for work or residence, can influence your earning potential due to factors like where top-paying companies are located and how competitive the job market is for prompt engineers. ZipRecruiter reports some of the highest-paying cities for prompt engineers as [5]: 

• Cupertino, CA: $77,698

• Berkeley, CA: $77,112

• Redwood City, CA: $77,106

• Berlin Corners, VT: $76,971

• San Carlos, CA: $76,044

• Sitka, AK: $75,867

• Fremont, CA: $74,630

• Justin, TX: $74,375

• Mountain View, CA: $74,293

• East Palo Alto, CA: $74,208

Company

One large variable in how much you can earn as a prompt engineer is what company you work for. Glassdoor lists some of the highest-paying companies for prompt engineers as [6]: 

• Google: $230,000 to $348,000

• Soul AI: $145,000 to $217,000

• Srima Tech: $118,000 to $173,000

• Turing: $106,000 to $175,000

AI writer or content reviewer salary

As an AI writer or content reviewer, you will be responsible for creating content with the help of generative AI models. The average salary for an AI writer or content reviewer ranges from $44,404 to $84,151 a year, according to Glassdoor and ZipRecruiter, respectively [7, 8]. As with other careers, your income will depend on several variables. 

Experience

Additionally, Glassdoor data reports how your salary might vary based on years of experience [7]:

• 0–1 years: $43,199

• 1–3 years: $44,829

• 4–6 years: $46,418

• 7–9 years: $48,314

• 10–14 years: $51,908

• 15+ years: $59,779

Location

Where you live and work also greatly affects how much you can earn as an AI writer. According to ZipRecruiter, the top ten highest-paying cities for AI writers are [8]: 

• Barrow, AK: $104,834

• Nome, AK: $104,390

• Hettinger, ND: $104,014

• Berkeley, CA: $103,038

• Sitka, AK: $101,375

• San Bruno, CA: $100,535

• Wyoming, WY: $100,361

• Sunnyvale, CA: $100,116

Company

Among the variables that impact how much you earn, the company you work for is influential. Below is the total pay for the top 10 highest-paying companies for a content reviewer in the United States, per Glassdoor [7]:

• X (formerly Twitter): $133,000 to $207,000

• Booz Allen Hamilton: $50,000 to $80,000

• GoodRx: $60,000 to $97,000

• Meta: $52,000 to $91,000

• US Department of Defense: $52,000 to $83,000

Learn generative AI on Coursera

You can begin a career in generative AI by developing generative AI skills and learning more about what you can do with this technology. To get started, explore programs and courses to help you learn the skills you need on Coursera. For example, you could enroll in Generative AI with Large Language Models offered by Deep Learning.AI and AWS to learn about generative AI, large language models, and machine learning.