SINGAPORE: Singapore’s tech sector is showing signs of recovery in 2025, with hiring activities also picking up after a tough year of layoffs and hiring freezes in 2024, according to Tech Career SuperApp NodeFlair’s 2025 Asia Tech Salary Report released on Tuesday (Apr 8).
The report was based on over 130,000 data points across job roles and countries.
This year, game engineers saw the highest salary increase at 28% year-on-year (YoY), followed by solutions engineers (11.3%), SysOps (7.6%), systems engineers (4.2%), and blockchain engineers (3.9%).
Salaries of blockchain engineers in the top 10% rose between 28% and 41%, but pay went down for most. With many Web3 and blockchain companies shifting to fully remote setups, NodeFlair noted that more top-tier talents in Singapore are working for top-paying companies abroad.
Product managers (3.5%), software engineers (3.3%), site reliability engineers (1.0%), and DevOps (0.1%) also saw salary increases.
Ethan Ang, NodeFlair’s founding director, said, “The tech sector continues to grapple with uncertainties amidst layoffs and the rise of AI. That said, it is heartening to see signs of recovery with software engineer salaries rising again.”
While salaries for software engineers have gone up, marking a shift from last year’s 1.0% decline, other roles haven’t been as lucky. Seven out of 16 tech job categories in Singapore recorded salary drops in 2024.
Unlike the previous report, where data scientists bucked the trend of pay cuts, data roles were hit again this year, following declines in 2023.
Amid the rise of artificial intelligence (AI), salaries across AI-related roles in Singapore — especially data-focused roles — fell by 1.2% to 2.4%, a sharp contrast to the 11.3% YoY increase in 2023. Data scientist salaries dropped 1.2% YoY, and data engineer salaries fell 1.5% YoY, while data analysts saw the sharpest decline at 2.4% YoY.
The report attributed this drop to projects and solutions now powered by OpenAI’s technology, which require more traditional software engineers than data-related talents.
Besides data roles, salaries of mobile engineers (0.2%), quality assurance (QA) professionals (2.4%), and systems analysts (3.9%) also declined. Cybersecurity professionals were hit the hardest, with salaries falling by 4.6% YoY.
When asked about how he hires the best engineers, Director of Open Government Products Li Hongyi said, “The best people I’ve hired are not necessarily the most credentialed but the ones who really want the mission to succeed and are proactive in doing whatever is needed to get there. As long as someone is engaged, I find that they eventually get the skills they need, and I can give them a lot of responsibility.”
On job security and career growth, GXS Bank CTO Rajat Malhotra advised workers to “focus on creating value for others and improving your skills and knowledge to do that.”
“If you are very good at creating value, you will generally be able to get compensated well, whether it’s with promotions and pay increases in your company or something else you choose to do yourself,” he said.
He also pointed out that while AI might replace developers who simply code, it “will never replace an engineer” who engineers a solution. “We utilise the power of AI in that process [engineering efficient banking solutions to solve customer pain points], but we use it as a supplement, not a replacement,” he added.
Meanwhile, Padlet’s country head of Singapore, Shuyang Quek, said that AI can help with efficiency but only when used in a way that’s fit for purpose. “Things do move very quickly, so staying up-to-date and adopting cleverly is always a bit of a challenge,” he said. /TISG
Read also: Is IT still the “It” job this year? Here’s how much IT professionals earn in Singapore
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