The Highest-Paying Jobs At Apple [RANKED]

Tim Cook Customer
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Who gets paid more at Apple: designers or engineers? 

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We've assembled a list of some of the top-paid jobs at Apple, based on data gathered from Glassdoor.

Salary data on Glassdoor is based on anonymous salary reports that were voluntarily shared by both current and recent employees.

Start printing your resume if you see your role on here.

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21. Mac Genius

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Theodore Ritz | Business Insider

Salary: $41,824

Mac Geniuses are super important to the shopping experience at Apple's stores. But they don't receive a lot of love from Apple, it seems (at least in terms of salary). 

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20. Assistant Apple Store manager

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Daniel Goodman / Business Insider

Salary: $51,287

Apple needs some people to help run its stores. Assistant store managers get paid better than the rank-and-file Mac Geniuses and sales representatives.

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19. Lead Mac Genius

apple genius
marymuses

Salary: $52,206

After you've spent a little bit of time at an Apple Store as a Genius, you'll get paid a little bit more.

Lead Mac Geniuses get paid about half what a good software engineer at Apple gets paid.

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18. Account executive

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is greeted by employees as he arrives for his first day on the job at the Justice Department  in Washington, Friday, Feb. 4, 2005. The grandson of Mexican immigrants and a trusted confidant to President Bush, Gonzales faces a the task of protecting the nation from terrorism while defending criticism of the anti-terrorism USA Patriot Act, and legal controversies surrounding foreign detainees. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
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Salary: $74,457

Account executives manage business-to-business relationships and are tasked with maintaining them. Apple has a bunch of relationships with advertisers and hardware component manufacturers, so it needs people to manage them.

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17. Business analyst

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Flickr / bpsusf

Salary: $85,865

Business analysts are working away to make sure Apple is a well-organized and well-designed company internally. They're there to make sure Apple's business is running smoothly.

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16. Financial analyst

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Chris McGrath / Getty

Salary: $89,728

Apple also has to have a good team of quantitative crunchers to make sure its business is running smoothly and its finances are in line. 

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15. Software quality assurance engineer

macbook pro nightmare 1

Salary: $92,733

Apple also has to make sure the software it's shipping doesn't have bugs and will be well-received by Apple customers. That's where QA engineers come in.

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14. Systems engineer

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Flickr / oskay

Salary: $95,713

With a ton of suppliers and factories, Apple has to carefully manage logistics to make sure its products get shipped on time. Systems engineers make sure the chain isn't broken and manage Apple's risk.

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13. Project manager

Project Manager
YouTube

Salary: $101,716

Project managers have to make sure all the bits and pieces of a specific project come together and are finished on time. They're overseeing a bunch of different disciplines within Apple.

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12. Firmware engineer

engineering-students
OregonDOT/ Flickr

Salary: $105,270

Firmware engineers make sure all of Apple's software plays nice with its hardware. It's a critical role that requires expertise in both hardware and software.

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11. Test engineer

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Ebay

Salary: $106,446

Test engineers develop processes that stress test products in order to assure they meet Apple's standards for quality. They're responsible for creating a testing process that ensures every Apple device shipped is fully functional and free of defects.

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10. Senior systems engineer

new ipad a5x chip
Apple

Salary: $107,740

This is actually one of the lowest-paying senior roles at Apple. Still, senior systems engineers get paid more than twice as much as a typical retail employee.

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9. Database administrator

Apple data center
Apple

Salary: $109,415

Apple also has to crunch through a ton of data — whether it's usage data, serving apps through the App Store, or making sure some of its web-connected services like Siri are working. Database administrators make sure Apple's databases run quickly and don't go offline.

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8. Software engineer

coders
Flickr / muir.ceardah

Salary: $110,784

Software engineers are the "brains" behind Apple's applications and operating systems. For comparison, software engineers at Google make just a little bit more on average, at $118,982.

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7. Hardware engineer

woz beer
Flickr / Brett Jordan

Salary: $113,577

Hardware engineers are around to make sure Apple's hardware is up to snuff. Given that Apple is, at its heart, a hardware company, it makes enough sense that hardware engineers get paid slightly more than software engineers.

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6. Mechanical engineer

Coffee on iPad
Flickr / Brett Patterson

Salary: $119,150

Apple's products also face a lot of traditional mechanical problems, like dealing with heat and moving parts. Mechanical engineers make sure Apple's products don't fall apart as a result of trivial problems.

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5. Product design engineer

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Apple

Salary: $119,742

Design is a hugely important part of Apple. The company pays its product designers very well — often more than a typical software engineer.

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4. Product manager

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Flickr / Dplanet::

Salary: $120,182

Product managers make sure each product gets shipped while meeting Apple's bar for quality, and they interact with just about every part of the process. They're in touch with marketing, design, software, and hardware engineers — and everything in between.

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3. Senior software engineer

c3 technologies maps ios 6
Screenshot

Salary: $130,130

Senior software engineers get paid slightly less than senior hardware engineers. At this level, you're probably working on some of Apple's most sensitive products, like maps or the iPhone operating system.

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2. Senior hardware engineer

ipad prototype
Ebay

Salary: $138,753

Once you've spent enough time at Apple, you'll be promoted up to a senior hardware engineer. That's when you start making big bucks.

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1. Industrial designer

jony ive tbi

Salary: $167,260

Surprise! Steve Jobs has said time and again that Apple is a company that sits at the crossroads of design and technology. At its core, it has a bit of creative DNA (infused by music, mostly) that makes its products hum in a way companies like Google can't quite match.

Obviously the guys in charge of the overall visual appearance of a product and how it communicates visually with consumers is a key role at Apple, and a highly valuable one.

(Note: we're assuming Apple design guru Jony Ive actually gets paid much, much more than this.)

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