Job market reports · Skill · August 2026

performance optimization

332 live US technical postings name performance optimization in August 2026. Here is which roles ask for it, what those roles pay, and where they are.

Which roles ask for it

Share of the 332 postings naming performance optimization that belong to each role. This is the answer to "what would learning this qualify me for".

  1. 1Software Engineer69%
  2. 2Frontend Engineer13.9%
  3. 3DevOps / SRE / Platform Engineer6.3%
  4. 4Full-Stack Engineer4.2%
  5. 5Data Engineer2.7%
  6. 6Machine Learning Engineer1.8%
  7. 7Backend Engineer1.2%

What postings asking for it pay

Across every role, for the postings that both name this skill and disclose a salary. A skill does not cause a salary — senior roles ask for more of everything — so read this as association, not as a raise.

Disclosed pay where performance optimization is named
n = 71
10th
$156k
25th
$189k
Median
$200k
75th
$245k
90th
$274k

Where those jobs are

Metro share of the postings naming this skill.

  1. 1San Francisco, CA16.9%
  2. 2Silicon Valley, CA13%
  3. 3New York, NY12%
  4. 4Remote10.2%
  5. 5Seattle, WA3.9%
  6. 6Washington, DC2.7%
  7. 7Boston, MA2.4%
  8. 8Los Angeles, CA2.4%

How we counted

457,191 live US postings read directly from 64,697 employers’ own careers pages in August 2026 — not from a jobs aggregator, so a role reposted across several sites is counted once. Full methodology, limitations and external checks.