I am Sajan Acharya, a Lead Software Engineer based in Kathmandu with 6+ years across service companies, product teams, and international clients. The question I get most from juniors and career switchers is not about React or Node.js. It is “How much should I ask for?” Nepal’s IT market has almost no public salary data, so people either undersell themselves by half or quote a number they saw in a Facebook group and lose the offer. This guide shares role-wise salary ranges I have seen through hiring, interviewing, mentoring, and conversations with engineers and HR teams across Kathmandu.
Treat these numbers as a map, not a contract. They are indicative monthly gross ranges for 2026, drawn from job postings, offers I have seen candidates receive, and salaries I have helped benchmark when building teams. They are not a statistical survey. Your actual number depends on company type, the quality of your proof of work, how you interview, and timing. If you are still at the start of the journey, read how to become a software developer in Nepal first—salary follows skill, not the other way around.
A quick note on what “senior” and “best” mean in these numbers. When companies search for the best software developer in Nepal, they are not paying for years on a CV; they are paying for judgment, ownership, and reliability under pressure. That is the standard I hold myself to in my own software developer services, and it is exactly what moves engineers from the middle of these bands to the top. You can read more about my journey to becoming a lead software engineer in Nepal on the about page.
How to read the numbers in this guide
All figures are monthly gross salary in Nepali rupees before tax and Social Security Fund (SSF) deductions, for full-time roles in the Kathmandu valley. Numbers use the lakh system common in Nepal: 1,00,000 is one lakh (one hundred thousand) and 2,50,000 is two and a half lakh. Experience bands are rough: junior is roughly 0–2 years, mid-level 2–4 years, and senior 4–7 years of real production experience. Years alone do not make you senior; ownership, debugging depth, and the ability to guide others do.
- Gross salary: the total monthly amount on your offer letter, including basic salary and allowances
- Basic salary: usually around 60% of gross; SSF, provident fund, gratuity, and the Dashain allowance are calculated on basic, not gross
- In-hand (net) salary: what reaches your bank after SSF and income tax deductions
- CTC (cost to company): gross plus the employer’s contributions such as the 20% employer share of SSF; always ask whether an offer is quoted as CTC or gross
Entry level: internships and trainee roles
Most people enter Nepal’s IT industry through a three-to-six month internship or trainee program. Stipends vary widely: some companies pay nothing, many pay NPR 10,000–20,000, and stronger product and outsourcing companies pay NPR 20,000–35,000 for interns who already have solid projects. Unpaid internships are common but not something you should accept for long; if a company is shipping your code to clients, you deserve a stipend. After the internship, a typical first full-time offer lands between NPR 25,000 and 50,000 depending on the role and how much you proved during the internship.
Entry-level (Kathmandu, monthly, 2026 — indicative)
Stage Typical range (NPR)
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Internship (3–6 months) 0 – 35,000 (stipend)
Trainee / Associate 20,000 – 40,000
First full-time offer 25,000 – 50,000
Strong fresher (great projects,
open source, good interview) 45,000 – 70,000Role-wise salary ranges for developers and IT roles
Here is the table I share with mentees. Backend, full stack, DevOps, and data roles generally sit at the top of each band because they touch infrastructure, money, and data—where mistakes are expensive. Manual QA and junior design roles start lower but grow well once you add automation or strong product thinking. If you are deciding which direction to take, my comparison of frontend vs backend vs full stack explains the day-to-day differences beyond salary.
Monthly gross salary in NPR — Kathmandu, local & outsourcing companies, 2026 (indicative)
Role Junior (0–2 yrs) Mid (2–4 yrs) Senior (4–7 yrs)
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Frontend (React / Next.js) 35,000 – 70,000 70,000 – 1,40,000 1,40,000 – 2,50,000
Backend (Node / Python /
Java / .NET / PHP) 40,000 – 75,000 80,000 – 1,50,000 1,50,000 – 2,80,000
Full Stack / MERN 40,000 – 80,000 80,000 – 1,60,000 1,60,000 – 3,00,000
Mobile (Flutter / RN /
Native) 35,000 – 70,000 75,000 – 1,40,000 1,40,000 – 2,60,000
DevOps / Cloud (AWS) 45,000 – 80,000 90,000 – 1,70,000 1,70,000 – 3,20,000
QA – Manual 25,000 – 45,000 45,000 – 80,000 80,000 – 1,40,000
QA – Automation 35,000 – 60,000 60,000 – 1,10,000 1,10,000 – 2,00,000
UI/UX Designer 30,000 – 60,000 60,000 – 1,20,000 1,20,000 – 2,20,000
Data / AI / ML Engineer 45,000 – 85,000 90,000 – 1,80,000 1,80,000 – 3,50,000
Business Analyst / Project
Manager 40,000 – 70,000 80,000 – 1,50,000 1,50,000 – 3,00,000Ranges overlap on purpose. A mid-level backend engineer who owns production incidents, writes clean APIs, and communicates well with foreign clients will out-earn a “senior” who has spent five years copying CRUD screens. The top of each band is usually reserved for engineers who can work independently with international clients and review other people’s code.
Leadership and senior-most roles
Beyond senior, compensation depends more on responsibility than on years. A tech lead is paid for technical decisions across a project and for the output of the people they guide. Engineering managers are paid for delivery, hiring, and team health. Architects and principal engineers are paid for decisions that are expensive to reverse. In Nepal these roles are still relatively few, so negotiation power is high once you have a track record of shipping and leading.
Leadership roles — monthly gross in NPR, Kathmandu, 2026 (indicative)
Role Typical range (NPR)
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Tech Lead / Lead Engineer (6+ yrs) 2,50,000 – 4,50,000
Engineering Manager 3,00,000 – 5,50,000
Solution Architect / Principal Eng. 3,50,000 – 6,00,000+
Head of Engineering / CTO (startups) highly variable; equity and
profit share are commonWhy the same role pays differently across companies
Two engineers with the same title and experience can differ by 2x in Nepal. The biggest factor is where the company’s revenue comes from. Companies billing foreign clients in dollars, euros, or pounds can pay more than companies selling to the local market in rupees. After that, the type of work, the maturity of the engineering team, and the city matter.
- Outsourcing and offshore development centers with US, EU, UK, or Australian clients usually pay at the top of the bands above
- Local product companies, fintech, and payment companies pay well for backend, security, and DevOps skills because downtime is costly
- Early-stage startups may pay less in cash but offer faster ownership, broader responsibility, and sometimes equity
- Agencies building websites for the local market tend to pay at the lower end but can be a fast place to learn delivery
- Banks, telecoms, and large corporates offer stability, SSF compliance, and benefits, with slower growth on the engineering side
- Pokhara, Butwal, Chitwan, and other cities often pay 20–30% less than Kathmandu for similar roles, though remote work is narrowing that gap
Remote jobs and foreign clients
Remote work for foreign companies is the fastest-growing salary lever for Nepali engineers. Pay is usually quoted in USD per month or per hour, either through direct contracts, employer-of-record platforms, or freelance marketplaces. Competition is global, so the bar is higher: excellent written English, overlapping hours with the client’s time zone, and proof that you can work without being micromanaged.
Remote / foreign client roles (USD per month, indicative)
Level Typical range
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Junior USD 600 – 1,200
Mid-level USD 1,200 – 2,500
Senior USD 2,500 – 5,000
Lead / Architect USD 4,000 – 8,000+
Notes:
- Contract roles rarely include SSF, Dashain allowance, or paid leave; price that in
- Foreign-currency income must come through proper banking channels
- Nepal has concessional tax provisions for IT service exports; confirm current
rules with a tax advisor before you fileFrom gross to in-hand: tax, SSF, and benefits
Many first-time employees are surprised when the first salary is lower than the offer letter. Two deductions explain most of the gap. First, if your company is enrolled in the Social Security Fund, 11% of your basic salary is deducted as your contribution, and the employer adds 20% of basic on top (together 31%). Second, income tax is withheld monthly according to the annual slabs in the Finance Act. Retirement contributions such as SSF, provident fund, and CIT reduce your taxable income within the legal limits.
Individual income tax slabs (FY 2081/82 — verify the latest Finance Act)
Annual taxable income (NPR) Rate
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Up to 5,00,000 1% (social security tax; waived for
SSF contributors)
5,00,001 – 7,00,000 10%
7,00,001 – 10,00,000 20%
10,00,001 – 20,00,000 30%
20,00,001 – 50,00,000 36%
Above 50,00,000 39%
Married couples filing as a couple get a higher first slab (6,00,000).
Women with only employment income get an additional tax rebate.- Dashain (festival) allowance: under the Labour Act 2074, employees receive one month’s basic salary as a festival allowance each year
- Gratuity: employers set aside 8.33% of basic salary; for SSF-enrolled companies it is deposited into your SSF account
- Leave: the Labour Act provides home leave, sick leave, and public holidays; many IT companies add extra leave or work-from-home days
- Ask HR for a salary breakdown (basic, allowances, SSF, estimated tax) before you accept, so you know your real in-hand amount
How to negotiate your salary in Nepal
Negotiation in Nepal is often awkward because candidates fear sounding greedy. HR teams expect it. The worst approach is saying “as per company norms” when asked for your expected salary—it signals you do not know your value and usually results in the lowest number in the band. Research the range for your role, decide your walk-away number, and give a specific figure backed by evidence: projects shipped, systems owned, and the value you bring from day one.
- Annual increments at the same company typically range from about 5% to 20%; switching jobs commonly brings a 20–50% jump for strong candidates
- Quote a number slightly above your target so there is room to meet in the middle
- Negotiate the whole package: basic vs allowances split, SSF enrollment, laptop, learning budget, work-from-home days, and review cycle
- Get the final numbers, probation period, notice period, and benefits in the written offer letter before resigning from your current job
- Never hand over original academic certificates as a “guarantee”; it is a red flag, not standard practice
If you want to prepare for the rounds that come before the offer, read how to crack a software engineer interview in Nepal. And remember that the highest offer is not always the best one; a company that makes you twice as skilled in two years will pay back far more. I break that decision down in how to choose the best IT company in Nepal for career growth.
How to move up the salary ladder faster
The engineers I have seen double their salary within two years share a pattern. They go deep in one stack instead of collecting tutorials. They take ownership of something that matters in production—payments, authentication, deployments, performance—and learn to debug it at 2 a.m. They write clearly, because communication with foreign clients is where most Nepali engineers lose money. And they build a visible portfolio: GitHub, technical blog posts, and case studies that prove what they can do before the interview starts.
Salary is a lagging indicator of skill and trust. Build both deliberately and the numbers above become a floor, not a ceiling. If you are a company benchmarking engineering salaries or a developer who wants a second opinion on an offer, get in touch. From Kathmandu I help teams hire and structure engineering careers, and I am always happy to help engineers in Nepal price their skills fairly.