If you're weighing a data scientist salary San Francisco job offer, knowing where your number lands in the market is the first step to negotiating with confidence. This page breaks down annual gross base salary benchmarks by experience tier, sourced from CV_DATA 2026-Q1, so you can assess any offer against real percentile data.
How to Read These Benchmarks
All figures represent annual gross base salary in USD. Each tier shows three percentiles: P25 (lower market), P50 (median), and P75 (upper market). If your offer falls below P25 for your experience band, it warrants a closer look. If it sits at or above P75, it is a strong offer by market standards. Total compensation, including equity, bonus, and benefits, is separate from these base figures.
Junior Data Scientist (0–2 Years Experience)
Entry-level data scientists in San Francisco see a wide range depending on the employer and specialization. The P25 base sits at $87,210, the median at $112,200, and the P75 at $143,820. If you are early in your career and receiving an offer below $87,210, the base is below the lower quartile of the market. An offer at or above $143,820 places you in the top quarter of earners at this level.
Mid-Level Data Scientist (3–5 Years Experience)
The mid-level tier shows a significant jump in compensation, reflecting the premium San Francisco employers place on proven data science experience. P25 is $156,060, the median reaches $199,920, and P75 climbs to $260,100. An offer near the $200K mark is solidly median for this band. Offers approaching or exceeding $260,100 are genuinely competitive.
Senior Data Scientist (6–10 Years Experience)
Senior practitioners command substantially higher bases. The P25 for this tier is $252,960, the median is $317,220, and the P75 is $384,540. At this level, the gap between a median and a top-quartile offer exceeds $67,000 in base alone, making negotiation particularly high-stakes. Use these figures as your floor and ceiling when evaluating any senior-level offer.
Staff / Lead Data Scientist (10+ Years Experience)
Staff and lead roles represent the top of the individual-contributor track. P25 base is $338,640, the median is $416,160, and P75 reaches $502,860. Offers in this band are often accompanied by significant equity packages, so total compensation can diverge substantially from base. Still, a base below $338,640 for a staff-level role in San Francisco is below the lower quartile of the market.
Putting Your Offer in Context
San Francisco remains one of the highest-paying markets for data scientists globally. For comparison, you can see how compensation stacks up in other major tech hubs: Data Scientist Salary London: Evaluate Your Job Offer and Data Scientist Salary Amsterdam: Evaluate Your Job Offer. If you are also evaluating software engineering roles in the same market, the Software Engineer Salary San Francisco: Evaluate Your Job Offer page provides a useful baseline for comparison. Use CompVerdict to paste in your full offer details and get an instant verdict against these benchmarks.
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