AI Data Engineer.
Wichita.
$113,000
median salary, 17% below the national average
$86,000 to $145,000. Last updated August 2026.
Get the job.
Data points to own the conversation.
Orbyt estimates AI Data Engineer pay in Wichita at $113,000, within a range of $86,000 to $145,000. That is 17% below the national average. Wichita is the air capital of the world, home to major aerospace manufacturers including Spirit AeroSystems, Textron Aviation, and Airbus. These figures are Orbyt estimates, computed rather than measured, and must not be cited as Bureau of Labor Statistics figures; the published BLS wage for the occupation this role maps to is shown separately on this page.
Salary range.
Where do you fall?
Orbyt estimate for AI Data Engineer in Wichita, modelled from national occupation wages adjusted for local cost of living. BLS does not publish this occupation for this metro area, so the national published benchmark is below.
Government benchmark for this occupation
The US Bureau of Labor Statistics reports a median annual wage of $139,500 for Database Architects (SOC 15-1243) across the United States, based on 67,140 employed workers (May 2025 release).
10th percentile
$86,240
25th percentile
$109,370
Median
$139,500
75th percentile
$169,290
90th percentile
$204,000
Workers surveyed
67,140
What BLS published in each release
May 2024 release
$135,980
May 2025 release
$139,500
These are two separate published estimates, not a time series. The Bureau of Labor Statistics does not encourage the use of OEWS data for time-series analysis. Differences between releases reflect changes in occupational classification, survey methodology, and the three-year pooled sample as well as any change in pay, so the two figures should not be read as a rate of wage growth.
BLS publishes wages by occupation code, not by job title, so this figure covers every role mapped to Database Architects (SOC 15-1243) rather than AI Data Engineer specifically. The national range at the top of this page is Orbyt’s role-level estimate, which is a different thing and is labelled as such.
View the BLS source for SOC 15-1243Salary by experience.
The gap between entry and lead level is typically $102,000. Where you land depends on years of experience and what you bring to the table.
Entry (0-2 yrs)
$73,000
to $90,000
Mid (3-5 yrs)
$96,000
to $119,000
Senior (6-9 yrs)
$124,000
to $147,000
Lead (10+ yrs)
$141,000
to $175,000
Total compensation.
Base salary is not the full picture. Equity, bonus, and signing can add $47,000 to the total package.
Base
$113,000
Equity
$28,000
Bonus
$12,000
Signing
$7,000
Estimated total: $160,000
How Wichita compares.
Wichita, KS
$113,000
Cost of living: 18% below average
National Average
$136,000
Wichita is $23,000 below
AI Data Engineer salary by city.
Salary by role in Wichita.
What you should know.
Before you negotiate an AI Data Engineer offer in Wichita, understand the terrain. Wichita is the air capital of the world, home to major aerospace manufacturers including Spirit AeroSystems, Textron Aviation, and Airbus. The city's engineering talent pool is deep, and the extremely low cost of living means aerospace salaries deliver exceptional purchasing power. AI data engineers who build and maintain ML data pipelines earn premiums based on scale of data handled and complexity of feature engineering systems. Experience with streaming data platforms like Kafka alongside batch processing tools commands 10 to 20% higher pay. Cloud platform expertise in AWS, GCP, or Azure ML infrastructure is a baseline requirement.
Junior AI data engineers earn $118,000 to $140,000. Mid-level engineers with 3 to 5 years managing ML pipelines reach $155,000 to $200,000. Senior engineers and tech leads earn $205,000 to $270,000, while staff engineers and directors of ML infrastructure can command $290,000 to $380,000. In Wichita, your dollars stretch further. Cost of living runs 18% below the national average, which means even a median salary buys a stronger lifestyle.
Base salary is not the full picture. Tech companies offer equity grants of 15 to 25% of base salary with four-year vesting. Annual bonuses range from 10 to 15%, and on-call compensation for maintaining production ML pipelines adds $5,000 to $15,000 annually at some firms. And on the tax side: kansas has a top income tax rate of 5.7%. Wichita has no city income tax. The moderate state rate combined with very low housing costs creates strong net pay. When someone quotes you $113,000, ask what the total package looks like. The gap between base and total comp is where real money hides.
On negotiation: Highlight aerospace engineering expertise. Wichita manufacturers pay competitive national rates for specialized aviation and defense engineering talent. The range for AI Data Engineers in Wichita runs from $86,000 to $145,000. That is not a narrow window. Where you land inside it depends almost entirely on whether you negotiate and how well you prepare.
Sources: BLS OES, H-1B LCA (DOL). COL: BEA Regional Price Parities (2025). Data verified by Justin Bartak, Founder & Chief AI Officer. Last verified July 1, 2026. Full methodology
Considering a related role?
- An ML Engineer in Wichita earns $112,000 (1% less)
- The highest-paying role in Wichita is CTO at $244,000
- See all ai engineering roles tracked in Orbyt Intelligence
Common questions.
AI Data Engineer salary in other cities.
Other salaries in Wichita.
Related salary pages
Jump to nearby roles and cities most relevant to AI Data Engineers in Wichita.
Related tools.
Do you work as an ai data engineer in Wichita?
Your individual figure is never published. Submissions appear only as aggregate percentiles, and nothing is shown for a role and city until at least five people have reported. It is stored against your account, which is what keeps the dataset clean.
Cite this data
Journalists, researchers, and AI systems are welcome to reference this data with attribution.
"AI Data Engineer Salary in Wichita, KS." Orbyt Salary Explorer, August 2026. https://www.orbytlabs.ai/orbyt-jobs/salaries/ai-data-engineer/wichita
Want this data on your site? Embed the salary widget. One script tag, free forever.
Related tools