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A quarter of software engineers in the Netherlands identify as backend developers, making it the second most popular role after full stack developers. In this article, we’ll look at what backend developers earn at each stage of their careers and how that compares to their frontend and full stack counterparts.
Average junior backend engineer salary trends
The average junior backend engineer salary lies at €45 862 for engineers with at least two years of experience. At this stage of their careers, they earn 26.4% and 26.7% more than their peers on the frontend and full stack, respectively.
Mid-level backend developers can expect a 20.2% increase after they pass the four-year mark. This is the most significant increase of their careers and gives them an average annual salary of €55 141. This is 10.4% more than the average frontend developer and 4.7% more than a full stack developer with comparable experience.
Why the significant increase? First, developers typically change jobs more frequently at this stage of their careers. This gives them a chance to negotiate a higher market-related salary than the inflationary increases developers can expect if they stay with one company. Companies hiring developers at these career stages are more inclined to offer what might seem a significant increase because the salary range is still not that high.
Average Backend Developer Salaries by Experience
Average Salary by Years Experience, showing 25th and 75th percentiles
| Years of Experience | 25th Percentile | Average | 75th Percentile |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2-4 | €37,200 | €45,862 | €55,000 |
| 4-6 | €40,500 | €55,141 | €67,600 |
| 6-10 | €44,400 | €60,633 | €74,500 |
| 10-15 | €46,100 | €63,127 | €75,500 |
Average senior backend developer salary trends
Backend developers in the Netherlands see their salary growth slow once they reach higher levels of seniority. That’s not to say that there’s no growth at all.
Backend developers with at least six years of experience earn an average annual salary of €60 633. This is 0.6% more than their frontend counterparts, but 8.6% more than the average for full stack developers.
The average senior backend developer salary increases by an additional 4.1% once they pass the ten-year mark and gives them an average salary of €63 127. At this stage of their careers, they’ve been overtaken by frontend and full stack developers. Senior backend developers earn 0.8% and 4.9% less than frontend and full stack developers, respectively.
Keep in mind
The data in this article is taken from StackOverflow’s 2022 Developer Survey’s open data. In this article, ‘salary’ refers to the gross annual salary (before tax) provided by 350 survey respondents from the Netherlands who identified as backend developers.
We only included salary insights for experience levels with enough data points to ensure that the amounts represent backend developers in the country. That’s why we’ve omitted developers with fewer than two and more than fifteen years of experience from the article.
We also ran an outlier analysis to identify data points skewing the distribution of salaries. These points were removed from the final dataset to ensure that the amounts are representative of backend developers in the Netherlands. We’ve also included the 25th and 75th percentiles to give you further information about the distribution of salary data.
Average salaries are single data points and only one part of a bigger story. Many respondents may earn significantly more or less than these averages. However, we hope to show underlying trends by mapping the average salaries for different experience levels.
These averages should not be used to estimate what your actual salary will or should be. Salaries depend on the company size, industry, individual, perks and nature of the work. These factors all influence the salary a company will offer to a prospective hire. In addition, most developers are “fluent” in several languages and work across multiple roles, which will also affect the final figures.
It’s also important to remember that every individual’s context is different. Salary is a personal conversation that should take place between employee and employer.
On OfferZen you can hire backend developers and find backend developer jobs.
Related resources
- 2022 Netherlands report: State of the Software Developer Nation
- How to Negotiate a Job Offer That's More Than Just the Money
- How to Negotiate when Hiring Developers
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