Pay benchmarks · Q2 2026
What you'll actually earn.
Real hourly pay ranges across the 9 platforms hiring most actively for contract and AI training work in 2026. Sourced from public job listings, ATS feeds, and contractor self-reports. Updated every quarter.
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Hourly ranges live in one place. To keep every figure consistent and dated, rates are published only in the HireFeed Pay Index — typical range, top decile and 90-day trend by domain.
| Role | Platform | Typical hrs/wk | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Coding Evaluator (Python) | Outlier | 10–25 | Senior and mid tiers are rated separately. |
| Coding Evaluator (TS/JS) | Outlier | 10–25 | JS pays slightly below Python. |
| Coding Evaluator (Rust/C++) | Mercor | 5–15 | Niche; demand outpaces supply. |
| RLHF Annotator · LLM reasoning | Mercor | 10–25 | Volume work; pay scales with quality streak. |
| RLHF Eval · Multimodal | Surge AI | 5–15 | Image + text. Higher bar. |
| RLHF · Code reasoning | Outlier | 10–20 | Combine code + RLHF; top tier. |
| Math Reasoning Expert · PhD | Outlier | 5–15 | PhD or MS + research required. |
| Math Reasoning Expert · PhD | Turing | 10–20 | Long-form proof writing. |
| Domain Expert · Law (US JD) | Mercor | 5–15 | JD or 5+ yrs practice. |
| Domain Expert · Medical (MD/DO) | Surge AI | 3–10 | Active license + board cert. |
| Domain Expert · Finance | Micro1 | 5–15 | CPA / CFA preferred. |
| Domain Expert · Engineering | Mercor | 5–20 | PE license adds 30%. |
| Multilingual Annotator (Ja/Zh/Ko) | Surge AI | 10–25 | CJK pays premium. |
| Multilingual Annotator (low-resource) | Outlier | 5–15 | Yoruba, Tamil, Vietnamese command higher rates. |
| Translator · QA pass | Toloka | 10–25 | Entry point; TR/ES/PT. |
| Senior Software Engineer · Contract | Turing | 20–40 | FTE-equivalent; 3+ month engagements. |
| Senior Software Engineer · Contract | Mercor | 20–40 | Higher bar; project-based. |
| Senior ML Engineer · Contract | Micro1 | 15–30 | Hands-on training infra preferred. |
| AI Research Contractor · PhD | Mercor | 10–25 | Publications required. |
| AI Research Contractor · PhD | Turing | 10–25 | Top-tier conference history preferred. |
| Creative Writing Trainer · Fiction | Outlier | 10–20 | Published fiction or MFA preferred. |
| Creative Writing Trainer · Long-form | Surge AI | 5–15 | 10K+ word capability. |
How we calculate ranges: We aggregate posted ranges from public job listings and ATS feeds, then validate against contractor self-reports submitted via joblet.ai applications and direct outreach to contractors on each platform. Numbers are 10th–90th percentile; outliers in either direction are excluded. What's not included: referral bonuses, completion bonuses, or revenue-share arrangements. Pay reflects base hourly rate at time of work.