How much do AI training jobs pay? Data from 341 real listings
AI training work pays a typical $50 to $80 per hour. That figure is the median low and median high across 332 hourly listings we collected from Mercor and micro1 and verified on 27 July 2026. Individual rates run from $2 to $300 per hour.
Almost every other article on this topic quotes a single number with no source. This one is built by reading the advertised rate off every listing in our database. Nothing here is modelled or estimated.
The headline numbers
| Measure | Value |
|---|---|
| Listings analysed | 341 (332 hourly) |
| Typical range | $50 – $80 per hour |
| Lowest observed | $2 per hour |
| Highest observed | $300 per hour |
| Listings paying $100+/hr | 102 (31%) |
| Listings paying $150+/hr | 34 (10%) |
The most useful fact here is that roughly a third of listings pay $100 an hour or more. High rates are not a rumour — but they are concentrated in specific kinds of work.
Pay by type of work
What you do matters more than which platform you join:
| Type of work | Listings | Typical hourly rate |
|---|---|---|
| Model evaluation | 60 | $80 – $105 |
| Coding | 50 | $50 – $100 |
| Research | 120 | $65 – $90 |
| Data annotation | 68 | $30 – $50 |
| Writing & feedback | 34 | $15 – $30 |
Model evaluation pays roughly three times what writing feedback pays. The distinction is judgement versus labour: evaluation asks whether a model's reasoning is correct in your field, which requires expertise a lab cannot easily source. Annotation is more mechanical, so it is priced closer to general remote work.
Pay by professional field
This is the single strongest predictor of your rate:
| Field | Listings | Typical hourly rate |
|---|---|---|
| Consulting | 3 | $100 – $200 |
| Design | 3 | $80 – $150 |
| Legal | 19 | $90 – $130 |
| Finance | 20 | $80 – $120 |
| Healthcare | 5 | $84 – $115 |
| Developer tools | 40 | $50 – $100 |
| Marketing | 4 | $80 – $95 |
| Research | 25 | $60 – $90 |
| AI / ML | 145 | $50 – $80 |
| Media | 66 | $30 – $50 |
Regulated professions sit at the top. A qualified lawyer or clinician is scarce, slow to replace and carries real liability judgement — labs price accordingly. Media and general content work sits at the bottom because the pool of capable people is far larger.
Pay by platform
It is worth comparing our figures against what the platforms publish themselves, because they do not agree. DataAnnotation publishes its rates openly — $50–$100+/hr for domain experts and $25–$30+/hr for generalists. Mercor's own rate guide puts the AI-trainer average at about $31/hr, with the top 10% above $100. Outlier publishes no hourly figure at all, only that it has paid out "$500M+ to experts".
| Source | What it publishes | Type |
|---|---|---|
| Our listing data | $50 – $80/hr typical | Advertised rates, 332 hourly listings |
| DataAnnotation | $25 – $100+/hr | First-party published rate |
| Mercor rate guide | $31/hr average | First-party market estimate |
| Outlier | Not published | Aggregate payout only ($500M+) |
The honest gap in all of this — ours included — is that everything published is an advertised rate. Nobody publishes realised earnings after unpaid screening, bench time and gaps between projects. Assume your effective hourly rate is meaningfully below the advertised one.
A logged 40-hour experiment on Outlier with actual take-home figures — the closest thing to realised-earnings data we could find.
| Platform | Listings | Typical hourly rate | Observed range |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mercor | 180 | $60 – $80 | $8 – $250 |
| micro1 | 161 | $40 – $80 | $2 – $300 |
The gap between the two is smaller than the gap between fields on either one. Choosing the right type of work matters more than choosing the right platform.
What this means if you are starting out
- Lead with your profession, not with 'I want AI work'. Your field sets your rate.
- Target evaluation and research listings over annotation — the pay difference is roughly threefold for comparable hours.
- Apply to more than one platform. Acceptance does not guarantee volume on either, and they are not exclusive.
- Read the rate on the individual listing. Platform averages hide a $2-to-$300 spread.
- Treat it as supplementary income until you have seen a few months of actual work offers.
Methodology
We collect listings from the platforms we cover and record the advertised rate on each. The typical range is the median of the low ends and the median of the high ends across hourly listings — a median rather than an average, because a handful of $250+ listings would otherwise distort the figure. Groups with fewer than three listings are excluded from the breakdowns. Salaried roles are reported separately and are not mixed into hourly figures. Data last verified 27 July 2026, covering 341 listings.
If you cite these numbers, please link back to this page so readers can see the methodology and the date.
Related: our Mercor pay breakdown and micro1 pay breakdown go category by category, the platform rankings score pay against data risk, and the beginner's guide covers how to land the first role.