Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Ask HN: Startup Salaries in Europe

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 41 posts

Re: Ask HN: Startup Salaries in Europe

#31

Post by himlion »

fittyfox wrote: post #19
sldan wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I pay around 1100 Euros for a 110qm apartment "downtown" and have no car. That is incredibly cheap, which neighbourhood is it if I may ask? I live in Munich (well outside of Munich a bit but work in Munich) and trying to relocate with rents being very expensive. I can get a 1 room apartment (30ish square meters maybe) in a decent block for that money you pay in Berlin.

I lucked out a bit. It's somewhere in the West, I got the apartment for 1600 Euro/month but then went to the lawyer and looked and the rent prices around me. My landlord then had to reduce rent. It's kinda hard right now to find apartment with good quality/price ratio. But yeah, Berlin is still much cheaper then Munich if you look for family-sized apartments.

You can do something similar in the Netherlands, but it results in a very sour relationship with your landlord. They probably won't ever fix anything and it has led to intimidation and worse occassionally.

Re: Ask HN: Startup Salaries in Europe

#32

Post by indigo945 »

dakiol wrote: post #12
bruce511 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Context matters. You take home more than just money. In most of Europe you take home free, or nearly free, health care, education and so on. In the USA you take home a strong military. And that's before we consider local cost of living. Comparing take-home £ in isolation is almost meaningless - it doesn't equate to disposable income after expenses - or what that disposable income can buy. IOW making 200k in SF is les…

This is not exactly correct but almost. I Europe expect around 40% percent of your gross salary to be gone in taxes. Health insurance is not 100% free (e.g., you go to the doctor and he prescribes you some pills. You have to pay for those pills yourself. Sure the doctor doesn't charge you for the hour). Education is not 100% free. For example, in Germany it would cost you around 400 Euro per semester to get enrolled…

    > Health insurance is not 100% free (e.g., you go to the
    > doctor and he prescribes you some pills. You have to 
    > pay for those pills yourself. Sure the doctor
    > doesn't charge you for the hour).
Just to be clear, the pills are still often subsidized and very cheap where they are not. It is uncommon to have medical expenses of more than 30€ per visit even for cosmetic concerns.

Also important to note that most of the fee of 300€ per semester of university pays for a public transport ticket which allows you to take busses and trams in the city where your university is located and usually also trains within your Bundesland.

Re: Ask HN: Startup Salaries in Europe

#34

Post by patrickmahomes »

thiago_fm wrote: post #26
fittyfox wrote: post #14

Living in Berlin, various StartUp experiences. 2013: 34k (junior Frontend) 2014: 40k (Fullstack JS) 2015: 50k (Frontend) 2016: 60k (Frontend) Went freelancing after this... 2020: 85k offer for Senior Software Engineer All numbers are from StartUps. You have to know however that you probably won't find a unicorn in Europe just yet. It's not the same mentality as in the US. I currently work for a US company with a Euro…

Mind to share the company? I can count in one hand companies in Berlin paying more than 80k/year for senior devs. Even for well-seasoned companies, maybe only team leads get paid that much, and for many companies, not even.

Contentful, GetYourGuide, N26 to name a few pay similar salaries for mid-level engineers. most other companies don't though.

Re: Ask HN: Startup Salaries in Europe

#35

Post by toto444 »

255kb wrote: post #13

There is a spreadsheet for France (in French). It's quite Paris-centric, but it gives an idea. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Zjvz-Ud2TR3rco2BTq0X...

Wow! Back end developper avance < 50K euros on average. That is not much. I am genuinely surprised.

Re: Ask HN: Startup Salaries in Europe

#36

Post by Peroni »

tsamtsam wrote: post #29
Peroni wrote: post #22

Happy to give you specific salaries for London, UK. Let me know what roles you're interested in and I'll post numbers. For context, I've been running talent functions for tech startups in London for about ten years as well as running a number of tech job boards over the years.

I'd be super grateful if you could share numbers for frontend/fullstack roles!

Typical entry level roles start at around £32k.

Senior individual contributor roles (so not factoring in team lead roles) go to as high as £90k but around £70k is more typical of the average senior frontend developer.

Re: Ask HN: Startup Salaries in Europe

#37

Post by glotgizmo »

UK, small county with growing tech scene. My personal experience:

Junior - £16-18k

Mid Web Developer - £30k

Very early startup React/Laravel - £28-30k

Senior/Head of Web Development - £30k

Software Developer - ~£42k

Expected future salary - £50k-£60k (~15 years experience)

Reading HN can give you a very unrealistic view of salaries when you look at the UK outside of London.

Re: Ask HN: Startup Salaries in Europe

#38

Post by pepe56 »

olegious wrote: post #9

I made about 2x less in Europe than the US in a similar sized startup, this is in product management. But there were other perks- 35 days minimum vacation (I was required to take those days by law), a very clear work life balance, more relaxed work environment and a better quality of life overall. I did end up moving back to the US to make 3x more (money is important to me right now), but am planning to return after…

I think this is a very good summary. The number on your paycheck is not representative of how good your quality of life is. You can almost never compare salaries 1:1 even in different cities of the same country. It was mentioned on this thread as well, but €60k in rural Germany, €80k in Berlin and €120k in Munich are quite similar in terms of what you get, cost of property/land and stuff. All 3 are basically very much upper middle class in those regions.

Re: Ask HN: Startup Salaries in Europe

#39

Post by pepe56 »

ck_one wrote: post #3
dakiol wrote: post #2

A good rule of thumb (although it's difficult to summarize the salaries of all the countries in Europe) is: Juniors up to 30K. Mediors up to 50K. Seniors up to 80K. This is for software engineers.

At least in Germany they are higher. A friend who is still in college got an offer as a new grad for ~75k. This offer is probably in the top 10% though. I don't know a single friend from college who starts with less than 45k as a new grad. Those who get 45k usually don't have internship experience.

Also, 75k as a new grad is even more unlikely in a startup. This salary as a new grad might happen if you apply for a job at Microsoft in Düsseldorf or Salesforce in Munich, but it’s definitely not the norm even for large companies.
Post reply on HN