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Open AI’s wild staff salaries have been revealed, with one member of the company being well over half a million dollars.
Sam Altman’s OpenAI is one of the most watched companies on the planet right now, and not just because ChatGPT is everywhere. With Microsoft tied in, rivals circling, and AI tools being shoved into every app imaginable, the real fight has turned into a talent war.
That means the most valuable commodity in the whole boom isn’t a shiny new model name; it’s the people who can build, scale, secure, and ship it. OpenAI doesn’t publish pay bands the way some firms do, and most employees won’t be posting their packages online either. However, thanks to the less glamorous world of US federal paperwork, a rare peek at what OpenAI pays has now landed in public.
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Reported by SupercarBlondie, the standout figure is especially huge: one OpenAI role is listed at $685,000 a year in base salary, for a Member of Technical Staff (Research Scientist).
The filing details come from rules around hiring overseas workers, where employers have to list base pay. It’s worth stressing what these numbers aren’t: they don’t include bonuses or stock options, which can push total compensation way beyond the salary line. The Wall Street Journal previously reported that OpenAI handed out an average of $1.5 million per employee in stock options.
Across the list, the ranges show how high things run well beyond the research teams. Customer Success roles appear between $165,000 and $240,000, while Go To Market Staff is listed from $180,000 to $290,000. Support and community staff are shown between $180,000 and $235,000. Meanwhile, Member of Finance staff jobs can expect to make you even more with Open AI, with estimations that employees can make between $240,000 and $260,000.
Product jobs also land in hefty territory. Program Staff is listed from $150,000 up to $355,000, Product Management from $210,000 to $325,000, and Design Staff from $245,000 to $310,000.
Engineering is where it starts getting silly. Software Engineers under the “Member of Technical Staff” banner are shown between $170,000 and $490,000. Hardware Engineers go as high as $555,000, and Data Science roles stretch up to $490,000, depending on the title.
It all lands as OpenAI reportedly sits at around 4,000 people. Altman has previously talked about slowing hiring to avoid layoffs later, yet Business Insider reported OpenAI hired 60 overseas employees in Q4 of last year.
