What Canadian companies post as base pay for data engineers, by city and level.
Key findings
- Senior data engineer base salary, Canada: $132K to $177K, median $138K
- Senior data engineer base salary, Toronto: $129K to $155K, median $135K
- Staff / lead data engineer base salary, Canada: $142K to $185K, median $165K
Salary ranges by city and level
A cell without enough postings shows "Not enough posted ranges yet" and how many postings it has.
| Level | Canada | Toronto | Vancouver | Montreal | Calgary | Ottawa | Winnipeg | Remote (Canada) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Junior (0 to 1 years) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0) |
| Intermediate (2 to 4 years) | $122K to $172K, median $126K, n=10 | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=8) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=1) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=1) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=3) |
| Senior (5 to 7 years) | $132K to $177K, median $138K, n=15 | $129K to $155K, median $135K, n=10 | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=2) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=1) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=2) |
| Staff / Lead (8+ years) | $142K to $185K, median $165K, n=11 | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=9) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=2) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0) | Not enough posted ranges yet (n=2) |
Cite: Phil Mosher, Canadian tech salary data, baselinetalent.xyz, data as of November 2, 2026. CC BY 4.0.
All figures in CAD base salary.
Government survey figures
For data engineers across Canada, the government figures are: Job Bank median $96K, StatCan average offered wage $100K (Table 14-10-0444-01) for data scientists (NOC 21211). All levels, survey data, not job postings. They cover every level, so they sit below a senior posted range.
Skills that come up in hiring
There's no public pay data by skill yet, so read this section as hiring notes, not numbers. The tools you've run in production count for more than the ones you've tried.
Spark, dbt and Snowflake
The combination that opens the most doors.
Real-time streaming (Kafka, Flink)
As companies move from batch to real-time analytics, Kafka and Flink experience is harder to find. Fintech and adtech want it most, since a failed real-time pipeline costs them money.
ML pipeline ops (MLflow, Kubeflow, feature stores)
The line between data engineering and ML engineering is blurring. Data engineers who build and run ML pipelines (feature stores, model serving infrastructure, experiment tracking) are getting roles that used to go to dedicated ML engineers.
Cloud-native data (Databricks, BigQuery, Redshift)
Cloud platform experience is expected. Deep work on cost, performance tuning and multi-cloud data architecture still sets people apart.
What I'd do
Companies from Series A startups to the Big Five banks hire data engineers. Finding people with "data engineer" on their resume is easy. Finding people who've built and maintained production data pipelines at scale is the hard part.
If you're hiring and still treat data engineering as a branch of backend engineering, you'll lose people. Good data engineers see themselves as specialists, and they want modern tools (dbt, Spark, Snowflake, Kafka), not legacy ETL frameworks. An outdated data stack can hurt your hiring more than your pay band.
If you're job hunting with 3+ years of production data engineering, you should have options. Don't take the first offer without comparing. Put your Spark and dbt work up front, because companies look for it.
Methodology
How every number here is built, tested and checked against government data: how the salary data is built.
Questions people ask
What is the average salary for a data engineer in Canada?
Senior data engineers in Canada earn $132K to $177K, median $138K base salary. Intermediate: $122K to $172K, median $126K.
Which Canadian city pays the most for data engineers?
Senior base salary by city: Toronto $129K to $155K, median $135K, Vancouver Not enough posted ranges yet (n=2), Montreal Not enough posted ranges yet (n=1), Calgary Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0), Ottawa Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0), Winnipeg Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0), Remote (Canada) Not enough posted ranges yet (n=2).
How much do junior vs senior data engineers earn in Canada?
Junior data engineers: Not enough posted ranges yet (n=0). Senior: $132K to $177K, median $138K. Staff / lead: $142K to $185K, median $165K. National posted base salary.
What is total compensation for a staff data engineer in Canada?
This page tracks base salary only, not equity or bonus. Staff / lead base salary in Canada: $142K to $185K, median $165K.
Sources
- Public job postings that state a pay range, from employers' own job boards (969 postings from 142 employers). Every posting is listed in the data download. Phil Mosher, baselinetalent.xyz, as of 2026-11-02
- Job Bank wages, NOC 21211, Canada Job Bank (ESDC) / Statistics Canada, updated November 19, 2025. Reference period 2023-2024
- Statistics Canada. Table 14-10-0444-01 Job vacancies and average offered hourly wage by occupation (unit group), quarterly, unadjusted for seasonality Statistics Canada, released 2026-09-15. Reference 2025 Q3 to 2026 Q2
- Job Bank wages, NOC 21211, Toronto Region Job Bank (ESDC) / Statistics Canada, updated November 19, 2025. Reference period 2023-2024