Average salary in San Diego in 2026, and what actually counts as good

A typical job in the San Diego metro pays $58,690 a year before tax. $97,410 puts you in the top quarter, and $152,580 in the top 10%.

Those figures come from the Bureau of Labor Statistics' Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics survey for May 2025, the latest release. They cover every job in San Diego County, from downtown and Sorrento Valley to Chula Vista, Escondido and Oceanside. The national median for all jobs is $50,980, so the typical San Diego salary is about 15% higher.

That typical salary is almost exactly what a job pays in Minneapolis-St. Paul ($59,320). A one-bedroom apartment in San Diego costs $1,054 a month more. So this guide starts with what specific jobs pay here, then shows where any salary sits on the San Diego scale and how much of it is left once taxes and rent are paid.

What six senior jobs pay in San Diego

We ran six realistic resumes through PayScope's market value model with the location set to San Diego. Each belongs to a fictional professional with about ten years of experience, at senior level, in a field San Diego hires for in large numbers: hospitals, wireless technology, biotech and genomics, clinical trials, medical devices and defense aerospace. PayScope reads the skills and experience in a resume and compares them with people and job openings in the area, so the ranges below describe what the market pays for that kind of profile in San Diego right now.

Source: PayScope market value model, one resume per role, senior level, location San Diego, CA, run on October 24, 2026. Figures in thousands, as the model displays them.

The six medians sit close together, between $142,000 and $172,000. Inside each role the spread is wider: a senior software engineer in the bottom quarter earns about $46,000 less than one in the top quarter for what is nominally the same job. Most of that gap comes from skills, such as firmware versus cloud work, which wireless standards, and how much of the system the engineer owns. The same is true of the marketing manager row, where the bottom and top quarter are also $46,000 apart.

The nurse row is the one that surprises people from other states. A senior ICU nurse in San Diego has a median of $142,000. When we ran a comparable senior nurse resume for Minneapolis, the median came back at $97,000. The BLS figures for all registered nurses point the same way: a median of $139,520 in the San Diego metro against $103,040 in the Twin Cities. These are all senior roles, which is why every median here is far above the metro's typical $58,690. Earlier in a career, pay for the same jobs is lower.

How pay is spread across San Diego

The BLS surveys employers about what they pay and estimates the pay level at each point of the scale, from the lowest-paid tenth of jobs in the metro to the highest. Find your own salary in the table to see where you sit among everyone working here, whatever their job.

Source: BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025, all occupations. The metro has 1,538,060 jobs in the survey. The average (mean) is $79,060, or $38.01 an hour, pulled up by the highest earners, which is why we use the median as "typical".

The San Diego premium grows as you move up the scale. At the bottom quarter the metro pays about $4,200 more than the national figure, at the median about $7,700 more, and at the top-10% line about $24,000 more. The metro's four largest occupations, home care aides, fast food workers, retail salespeople and cashiers, have medians between $35,300 and $42,190, so most of the premium sits in the better-paid half of the market.

The BLS counts jobs by where they are, not where people live, and covers employees only, so the self-employed are left out. It also converts hourly pay to a full-time year of 2,080 hours, so a part-time job shows up at its full-time rate. If you count only people who actually worked full time all year and live in the metro, the Census Bureau's American Community Survey for 2024 puts the median at $73,054. That is a different group measured a different way. It is close to the $71,000 to $73,000 that salary sites show on Google, while the $111,000 and $124,000 figures you may also see are median household incomes, which add up every earner in a home.

What counts as good once taxes and rent come out

A salary is only good if it covers a life here, so we worked out take-home pay for a single person in California at each point of the scale. The calculation uses 2026 federal income tax brackets and standard deduction, Social Security and Medicare, California's State Disability Insurance (1.3% of all wages), California income tax, and a 5% pre-tax 401(k) contribution. For California tax we used the 2025 schedules, because the Franchise Tax Board publishes the 2026 ones late in the year; for the salaries in this table the difference is a few dollars a month. The 5% is our assumption: contribute nothing and the typical salary takes home about $200 a month more today. We did not deduct health insurance premiums, which vary too much by employer to model, so your real take-home will usually be somewhat lower.

For rent we use HUD's Fair Market Rents for 2026 for the metro: $2,459 a month for a one-bedroom and $3,001 for a two-bedroom, including utilities. Both are up about 4% to 6% on 2025. HUD sets these at the 40th percentile of what recent movers pay, so they describe an ordinary apartment, not a new building by the water.

Source: PayScope calculation with 2026 IRS brackets, 2025 California Franchise Tax Board schedules, FICA, California SDI at 1.3% and a 5% 401(k); rent from HUD FY2026 Fair Market Rents. Health insurance and other payroll deductions not included.

On the typical $58,690, a one-bedroom alone takes two thirds of what reaches your account and leaves about $1,260 a month for food, transport, insurance and everything else. On that budget, sharing is the usual way to make the numbers work. Even against gross pay, the usual 30% rule of thumb, the rent is half the typical salary.

Rent falls to 30% of take-home only at about $152,500, which is the top-10% line. At the top-quarter line of $97,410 a one-bedroom still takes 43% and leaves about $3,200.

Sharing changes the picture faster than a raise does. Half of a two-bedroom costs about $1,500. On the typical salary that is 40% of take-home, and at $80,000 it is 31%, close to the rule. A couple who both earn the typical metro salary and file jointly take home about $7,435 a month between them, and a two-bedroom takes 40% of that. If one partner earns the median and the other the top-quarter line, the share drops to 32%.

So a practical answer: to rent a one-bedroom alone and keep it near 30% of take-home, "good" in San Diego means a top-10% salary of about $150,000. With a roommate, around $80,000 gets you close. Two typical incomes in one household still spend about 40% of take-home on a two-bedroom.

San Diego city, Carlsbad and the rest of the county

The BLS does not split its figures below the metro, but the Census Bureau's survey of residents does. Among people who worked full time all year in 2024, here is the median by the city they live in.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2024 1-year estimates, table S2001, in 2024 dollars. Smaller cities such as Encinitas, La Mesa and Santee are not included here.

Full-time workers who live in the city of San Diego earn about $14,000 more at the median than those in Chula Vista, and the city's margin of error is small enough to trust that gap. Carlsbad residents sit highest, about $16,000 above the city, though its margin is wide. San Marcos's margin is wider still, so its figure cannot be told apart from the city's. El Cajon, Vista, Oceanside and Escondido form a lower group, roughly $54,000 to $63,000. These figures describe who lives in each city, not what employers there pay, since many people commute into Sorrento Valley, Kearny Mesa and downtown.

Why your number may differ from the average

The metro median tells you where the middle of the whole job market sits. It says very little about what you should be paid.

Your role and level set the range, and in San Diego they put every senior profile we tested well above $130,000 at the median. Your specific skills then decide whether you sit in the bottom or top quarter of your own role, which for the senior software engineer is the difference between $152,000 and $198,000. That gap is about six times the $7,700 difference between the San Diego median and the national one.

The useful comparison is with people doing your job, at your level, in this metro. Upload your resume to PayScope and you get that comparison: a San Diego range for your profile and where your current pay sits inside it.

FAQ

What is considered a good salary in San Diego?

On the job scale, $97,410 puts you in the top quarter of jobs in the San Diego metro and $152,580 in the top 10% (BLS, May 2025). For a single person renting a one-bedroom alone, rent falls to 30% of take-home only at about $152,500. With a roommate, a salary around $80,000 keeps your half of a two-bedroom near 31%.

Is $100,000 a good salary in San Diego?

Yes, by the numbers: $100,000 is above the top-quarter line of $97,410 for jobs in the metro. A single filer takes home about $5,780 a month after federal and California income tax, FICA, SDI and a 5% 401(k). A typical one-bedroom at $2,459 takes about 42% of that, so it is a comfortable salary with a roommate or partner and a tight one for renting alone.

Can you live comfortably on $70,000 a year in California?

It depends heavily on where. In San Diego, $70,000 takes home about $4,360 a month for a single filer. A one-bedroom at HUD's 2026 Fair Market Rent of $2,459 would take 56% of that, while half of a two-bedroom takes 34%. So $70,000 works in San Diego with shared housing, and it is a hard budget for living alone.

What percentage of Californians make over $100,000 a year?

32.3% of Californians who worked full time all year earned $100,000 or more in 2024 (4,418,806 of 13,682,847), according to the Census Bureau's American Community Survey. In the San Diego metro the share is 34.5%. The median for full-time, year-round workers was $69,440 statewide and $73,054 in the San Diego metro.

How much is the typical San Diego salary per month after taxes?

About $3,717 a month. That is the typical $58,690 after 2026 federal income tax, 2025 California tax schedules, Social Security, Medicare, 1.3% California SDI and a 5% 401(k) contribution, before health insurance premiums. Without the 401(k) it is about $3,918.

Why do different websites give different average salaries for San Diego?

They measure different things. For jobs in the metro in May 2025, the BLS median is $58,690 and the mean is $79,060 ($38.01 an hour). For full-time, year-round workers who live in the metro, the Census median for 2024 is $73,054. Salary sites use their own data and land around $71,000 to $73,000, and the $111,000 to $124,000 figures are median household incomes, which combine every earner in a home.