Most quant salary numbers online are self-reported guesses. This one is not. We pulled 672 approved H-1B Labor Condition Applications for quant roles at 186 financial firms, filed in FY2023 and FY2024 with the US Department of Labor's Office of Foreign Labor Certification, and grouped them by role, seniority and employer. Every number below is a figure an employer legally committed to pay a real person.
One caveat does all the heavy lifting, so read it first: these are base salaries only. H-1B filings report base pay, never the bonus. At a bank, base is usually 80–90% of total compensation. At a hedge fund, base can be half of it or less. So wherever you see a fund paying more than a bank below, the real gap is wider than the number shows.
The headline numbers
Across all 672 filings, the median quant base salary was $140,000. The middle half of the market sat between $115,000 (25th percentile) and $180,000 (75th percentile). That spread is the real story: "quant" is not one salary, it is a range that doubles depending on which seat you take.
Base salary by role
The role you pick matters more than almost anything else on your CV.
| Role | Median base | Filings |
|---|---|---|
| Quant Researcher | $175,000 | 182 |
| Quant Trader | $150,000 | 32 |
| Risk & Model Validation Quant | $145,000 | 67 |
| Quant Developer | $142,100 | 55 |
| Quantitative Analyst (broad) | $130,000 | 336 |
Researchers lead on base, and once you add bonuses the lead widens, because research seats are where the biggest variable pay sits. But notice the second line of the story: risk and model validation quants out-earn the generic "quantitative analyst" title, and there are far more of those seats than there are research chairs at a top fund. The roles that rarely trend on Reddit are often the ones that are actually hiring.
Base salary by seniority
| Level | Median base | Filings |
|---|---|---|
| Junior / Analyst | $125,000 | 170 |
| Mid / Associate | $125,000 | 61 |
| Senior / VP | $145,000 | 135 |
| Lead / Director | $173,300 | 45 |
Base pay climbs slowly with seniority precisely because the bonus does the opposite. A junior analyst might take home base plus a 10–20% bonus; a director or a senior researcher can earn a multiple of base in variable pay. If you only track base, you will badly underestimate what the senior seats actually pay.
The split nobody tells beginners: funds vs banks
Group the same filings by employer and the market cleaves cleanly in two. These are median base salaries, each from firms with enough filings to be meaningful.
| Multi-manager & quant funds | Median base |
|---|---|
| Point72 | $255,000 |
| Citadel | $250,000 |
| Two Sigma | $225,000 |
| Balyasny | $200,000 |
| Banks | Median base |
|---|---|
| Citi | $165,000 |
| Barclays | $153,000 |
| Bank of America | $145,000 |
| JPMorgan | $143,400 |
| Wells Fargo | $130,000 |
A fund's base alone beats most banks' base by $80,000–$120,000 — and then the fund pays a far larger bonus on top. This is why the "just get into a hedge fund" advice is everywhere. What it leaves out is that funds hire a fraction of the headcount, interview far harder, and cut faster when a book underperforms. Banks pay less and give you a longer runway to learn. Both are rational choices; they are just different trades.
How to read any quant salary number
- Ask what the number includes. Base, base plus bonus, or a sign-on-inflated first-year figure are three different things. H-1B data is pure base, which makes it strict but honest.
- Anchor on the median, not the top. The screenshots that go viral are the 95th percentile. The median is the job you are actually likely to get.
- Weight the role over the logo. A researcher at a mid-tier fund can out-earn an analyst at a brand-name bank. The seat sets the ceiling.
- Location changes the real figure. These are US filings; a $140k base in New York is not a $140k base in a lower-cost city, and markets outside the US run on entirely different scales.
Because H-1B filings are US employers, every figure here describes the US market. If you are hiring or job-hunting elsewhere, treat these as the US benchmark, not your local one.
See where you'd sit
We keep this dataset live. You can filter the same filings by role, seniority and employer, and see the full distribution rather than a single median, in the Desk2Quant Quant Salary Explorer.
If the numbers make you want a particular seat, the rest of the site is built to get you there. Start with what a desk quant actually does or the full how to become a quant guide, then work through the role-specific interview playbooks and labs when you are ready to prepare in earnest.
Methodology: 672 certified H-1B Labor Condition Applications for quantitative roles at 186 employers, filed FY2023–FY2024, from the US DOL Office of Foreign Labor Certification public disclosure data. Salaries are the base wage stated in each filing. Medians are shown per group; employer tables include only firms with enough filings to be representative.