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Follow the money: Switzerland remains Europe's top destination for tech pay. Average Swiss salaries dwarf those on offer across the rest of the continent. European techies looking for the biggest payday are far better off in Switzerland than anywhere else, with average salaries eclipsing all other countries on the continent. According to recent employment data, the typical expected salary is 106,900 CHF ($137,000), with the highest packages often earned in Zurich, Bern, Geneva, and Thun. The figures comfortably trump those of other major tech hubs in Europe, such as Germany and the UK, where the average salaries for tech jobs are €62,400 ($74,000) and £65,000 ($88,000) respectively. Germantechjobs.de, which compiled the data, didn't give a reason for the discrepancy in salaries. Generally speaking, however, salaries are higher in Switzerland due to a number of factors, including the cost of living and the volume of tech and fintech giants with a presence in the country. Across the board, the top-paying roles in each region are reserved for IT architects, security professionals, and AI/ML experts. Developers with skills in Java, Python, and Go also tend to do well, while those working with PHP or .NET, and those on the helpdesk, are often paid the least. The majority of pros, wherever they land on the pay scales, claim to be unhappy with their compensation. Sixty-six percent of the hundreds surveyed by the jobseeking platform thought they should be paid more, although 55 percent agreed that their pay was "manageable," but still not ideal. Fourteen percent of respondents said "it is hard to get by." Salaries were also, perhaps unsurprisingly, the main sticking point for jobseekers, prioritizing pay over pretty much everything else when looking for new roles. It was the most influential factor for 34 percent of jobseekers, although coming in a close second place was potential for remote work, with 33 percent saying this was the most important factor. While those with a few years under their belts have the luxury of being able to prioritize these kinds of things, for juniors, it's a different story. More than three-quarters of them feel the amount of experience companies demand for junior roles is too much, despite more than half landing a role in less than three months after they began their search. For around a quarter, however, the process took longer than six months and in some cases over a year. The ever-increasing role AI is playing in the modern workplace – 90 percent of orgs say they're using it to some degree – is also compounding the pressure on juniors to get ahead early. Some developers (42 percent) believe that AI has made it more difficult to land their first role, although a significant proportion also feel like their jobseeking lives are easier because of the availability of AI tools. AI is piling on the pressure for more experienced IT workers too, with 39 percent reporting higher performance demands than before the GenAI era.