Counted October 17, 2026 · from employers’ own postings
Research: 973 open roles, 63 entry level.
Asking questions rigorously — user research, scientific research, R&D and analysis.
627 of these postings state no level; the entry-level count is over the ones that do, plus any that ask for a year or less and are not titled senior. Pay is the median of posted bands, in USD, only where eight or more roles posted one. Only open roles are counted.
The roles, as the postings name them
Open roles and posted pay by role.
| Role | Open roles | Median posted band |
|---|---|---|
| Researcher | 74 | $263K |
| Quantitative Researcher | 43 | $175K |
| Research Engineer | 40 | $250K |
| Applied Researcher | 27 | $234K |
| Security Researcher | 17 | $213K |
| Director | 15 | $198K |
| Research | 15 | $173K |
| Applied Ai Researcher | 11 | $200K |
| Operations Research Analyst | 10 | $133K |
| Scientist | 10 | — (4 of 8 bands) |
| Ai Engineer | 9 | — (4 of 8 bands) |
| Ai Researcher | 9 | $249K |
What each pays, on its own page: Quantitative Researcher.
A role is the posting’s own title with its level, shift and schedule set aside, so “Registered Nurse – ICU (Nights)” and “Senior Registered Nurse” are one role. The twelve most posted; pay is the median of posted bands, where eight or more roles posted one.
The skills, as the postings name them
What the postings ask for.
| Skill | Postings | At entry |
|---|---|---|
| Python | 338 | 46% |
| Machine Learning | 309 | 37% |
| Deep Learning | 174 | 14% |
| Statistics | 152 | 35% |
| C | 113 | 22% |
| Data Science | 106 | 19% |
| Software Engineering | 106 | 5% |
| Physics | 103 | 27% |
| Data Analysis | 94 | 2% |
| Investigation | 83 | 16% |
| Experimentation | 82 | 8% |
| SQL | 75 | 3% |
A count of open postings naming each skill, the twelve most named; “at entry” is the share of the 63 entry-level postings that name it. Never a trend, never a score of you. Which of these you already have, and what you would learn first, is on your CareerVersion.
The ladder, by level
What each rung pays.
| Level | Open roles | Median posted band | Middle half |
|---|---|---|---|
| INTERN | 29 | — (7 of 8 bands) | — |
| JUNIOR | 15 | — (5 of 8 bands) | — |
| MID | 14 | $90K | $83K–$141K |
| SENIOR | 127 | $145K | $103K–$170K |
| STAFF | 20 | $183K | $159K–$261K |
| PRINCIPAL | 47 | $225K | $213K–$262K |
| MANAGEMENT | 94 | $153K | $108K–$202K |
Levels as the postings name them. A rung shows a median only where eight or more postings at that level carried a band; the middle half is the twenty-fifth to seventy-fifth percentile of those bands.
Who is hiring
The employers with the most open.
| Employer | Open roles | Entry level |
|---|---|---|
| Bosch Group | 85 | 5 |
| City of New York | 64 | — |
| OpenAI | 45 | — |
| IFS | 32 | — |
| Point72 | 29 | 3 |
| Paloaltonetworks | 24 | 1 |
| Capital One | 20 | — |
| IMC | 20 | 3 |
| Smiths Group | 16 | 3 |
| Harvard University | 15 | 1 |
Counted from employers’ own job boards. The twelve with the most open roles in this career tonight; “entry level” is how many of those ask for no prior experience.
Where the work is
10% of open research roles are remote.
- Remote10%100 roles
- Hybrid13%125 roles
- On site66%638 roles
- Not stated11%110 roles
As the boards state it. Nothing in the postings supports a city-level figure, so none is given.
How this was counted
Every figure here is counted from 973 open postings read from 232 employers’ own job boards on October 17, 2026, and recounted every night. Pay is the band the employer posted — never an estimate, never a model: a level shows a median only where eight or more postings carried one, and 365 of these postings did. Titles are grouped by the words the postings use, with levels, shifts and schedules removed, so one role is one row. The same counts as Markdown are at facts.md.
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Counted October 17, 2026 from 973 open postings; refreshed nightly. Facts as Markdown: facts.md.