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Germany is home to Europe’s third and fourth largest tech hubs, Berlin and Munich. This makes it one of the best countries for software developers. Here, we’ll look at average salaries for PHP developers at each stage of their careers and how they compare to Java and Python developer salaries.
Average junior PHP developer salary trends
PHP developers in Germany start their careers on an average annual salary of €30 731, while rookie Java developers earn 22.6% (€8 994) more and Python developers 18.5% (€6 273) more.
After two years on the job, PHP devs can expect their earnings to rise generously by 27.9% (€8 583) to €39 314. At this level, Java developers earn 10.1% (€4 419) more, and those working in Python 16.4% (€7 732) more.
At the four-year mark, PHP devs see another respectable increase of 21.3% (€8 377) to €47 691, putting them 12.1% (€6 580) behind Java and 19.9% (€11 839) behind Python.
With marketable skills, junior PHP developers tend to switch jobs more frequently. As a result, they gain experience at different companies while also engaging in fresh salary negotiations that result in greater increases than those working at one company. This explains the rapid rise in their remuneration in the early years of their careers.
Average PHP Developer Salaries by Experience
Average Salary by Years Experience, showing 25th and 75th percentiles
| Years of Experience | 25th Percentile | Average | 75th Percentile |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0-2 | €12,780 | €30,731 | €43,750 |
| 2-4 | €26,850 | €39,314 | €51,750 |
| 4-6 | €39,700 | €47,691 | €59,500 |
| 6-10 | €45,275 | €56,991 | €68,700 |
| 10-15 | €48,000 | €63,857 | €76,000 |
Average senior PHP developer salary trends
Salaries for senior PHP developers rise slower than for juniors. Nevertheless, with more experienced developers likely involved in whole product life cycles – including designing, developing and deploying features and maintaining them – their raises reflect their growing responsibilities.
With six years under their belts, PHP developers in Germany can expect a raise of 19.5% (€9 300) to an average of €56 991. This puts them just 6% (€3 672) behind Java developers but 18.6% (€12 993) behind Python.
Highly experienced PHP developers with ten years or more on the job see their salaries increase by 12% (€6 866) to €63 857. Java devs at this stage earn 11.8% (€8 564) more, and Python devs 18.7% (€14 702) more.
Keep in mind
The data in this article is taken from StackOverflow’s 2022 Developer Survey open data. In this article, ‘salary’ refers to the gross annual salary (before tax) provided by 2060 survey respondents from Germany who identified as PHP developers.
We only included salary insights for experience levels with enough data points to ensure that the amounts represent PHP developers in the country. That’s why we’ve developers with 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 PHP developers in Germany. 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 significantly less than these averages. However, we aim 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 PHP developers and find PHP developer jobs.
Related resources
- How to Negotiate a Job Offer That’s More Than Just the Money
- How to Negotiate when Hiring Developers
- Full Stack Developer Salary Trends in the Netherlands
- Munich: City Guide for Software Developers
- Securing a Developer Work Visa for Germany: The Blue Card
- Berlin: City Guide for Software Developers
- Front End Developer Salary Trends in Germany
- Python Developer Salary Trends in Germany
- Node.js Developer Salary Trends in Germany
- JavaScript Developer Salary Trends in Germany
- Java Developer Salary Trends in Germany
