xAI's median filed base salary is $275,000. That is the midpoint of 79 certified labor condition applications filed by X.AI LLC and its related entities, decided between October 29, 2024 and June 26, 2026, as of the FY2026 Q3 disclosure file. It is the second highest median in the database, and it is falling faster than anyone else's.
Key takeaways
- 79 certified H-1B filings, median filed base $275,000, p25 to p75 of $205,000 to $335,000 (Visionary Talks analysis of DOL LCA disclosure data, FY2026 Q3).
- The median filed base fell from $300,000 in FY2025 to $240,000 in FY2026, a decline of 20.0%. That is the steepest genuine drop of any company tracked here.
- Member of Technical Staff accounts for 55 of 79 filings, at a $280,000 median, with individual filings from $150,000 to $500,000.
- xAI filed under four different spellings of its own name. Filings under the corporate form X.AI Corp. stop on August 18, 2025; everything after that is an LLC.
- 79.7% of filings are California worksites. One is in Tennessee, the state that houses the company's Colossus compute build.
This article is based on primary sources: the US Department of Labor Office of Foreign Labor Certification LCA disclosure files for FY2025 Q1 through Q4 and FY2026 Q3, which we processed in full. Every salary figure below is computed from those workbooks. Full source list at the bottom.
$275,000, And A Real 20% Drop
xAI's median filed base of $275,000 sits second only to Mistral AI in the AI Salary Database, and $75,000 above the pooled median of $200,000.
The more interesting number is the trend. In FY2025, across 34 certified filings, xAI's median filed base was $300,000. In the first three quarters of FY2026, across 45 filings, it was $240,000. A fall of 20.0%.
Most year-over-year moves in this dataset are noise created by companies changing how they fill in the form. Anthropic's apparent 36.8% decline is entirely that. xAI's is not: the share of its filings carrying a salary band moved 9.1 points between the two years, well inside the range where the comparison holds. The measurement stayed stable and the number moved.
A 20% fall in median filed base alongside a 32% rise in filing volume describes a company that stopped paying up for scarce senior hires and started hiring more people at lower bands.
Roles And What Each One Filed
| Job title | Filings | Median base | Range within title |
|---|---|---|---|
| Member of Technical Staff | 55 | $280,000 | $150,000 to $500,000 |
| Principal ML Engineer | 3 | $320,000 | $300,000 to $375,000 |
| Engineer | 2 | $270,000 | $240,000 to $300,000 |
| Sr. Engineer | 2 | $300,000 | $300,000 to $300,000 |
| Sr. Procurement Specialist | 2 | $170,000 | $170,000 to $170,000 |
| Expert Team Lead | 2 | $139,250 | $135,000 to $143,500 |
| Electrical Engineer | 1 | $215,000 | $215,000 to $215,000 |
| Applied AI Engineer | 1 | $210,000 | $210,000 to $210,000 |
| Enterprise Market Research Analyst | 1 | $175,000 | $175,000 to $175,000 |
| Lead Domain Expert, Safety | 1 | $175,000 | $175,000 to $175,000 |
Seventy percent of xAI's sponsored hiring is a single job title. Member of Technical Staff covers 55 filings spanning $150,000 to $500,000, a $350,000 spread inside one label, which tells you the title carries no information about level and the company prefers it that way.
The rest of the table is the interesting part, because it is not a research lab's shopping list. Sr. Procurement Specialist, Electrical Engineer, Expert Team Lead: these are the roles a company files when it is building physical infrastructure, not just training models. The single Tennessee worksite filing points the same direction.
Four Names For One Company
xAI filed under four distinct employer names across 21 months:
| Filed employer name | Filings | First decision | Last decision |
|---|---|---|---|
| X.AI LLC | 62 | December 30, 2024 | June 26, 2026 |
| X.AI Corp. | 10 | October 29, 2024 | August 18, 2025 |
| X. AI LLC | 6 | August 20, 2025 | September 5, 2025 |
| X.AI | 1 | November 5, 2025 | November 5, 2025 |
The variation matters for anyone trying to reproduce this analysis. A search for "X.AI Corp." alone finds 10 of 79 filings and undercounts the company by 87%. Most public H-1B salary sites match on exact employer strings, which is why their xAI numbers disagree with each other.
The corporate form is the substantive part: filings under X.AI Corp. stop on August 18, 2025, and every filing after that date uses an LLC form.
The Money Behind The Payroll
xAI is no longer independent. SpaceX acquired it in February 2026 and built its AI division, SpaceXAI, around it, a sequence we traced while reporting on Anysphere in who owns Cursor. SpaceX went on to buy Anysphere for $60 billion in an all-stock deal that closed on August 14, 2026, putting xAI and Cursor inside the same parent.
That makes the pay comparison between them unusually direct. xAI files a median base of $275,000; Anysphere files $187,574. Two AI companies, one owner, a $87,426 gap in filed base, and entirely different filing habits: xAI anchors 7.6% of filings at the legal wage floor, Anysphere 82.1%.
The 20% decline in xAI's median filed base runs through the period in which the SpaceX acquisition was negotiated and closed. The filings do not establish a causal link, and we are not asserting one.
FAQ
What is the average salary at xAI?
The median filed base is $275,000 across 79 certified filings decided between October 2024 and June 2026, with the middle half between $205,000 and $335,000. Individual filings run from $114,400 to $500,000. Base only, no equity.
Did xAI cut salaries?
Its median filed base fell 20.0% between FY2025 and FY2026, from $300,000 to $240,000. Unlike most year-over-year moves in this data, that one is measured consistently across both years. It reflects the mix of roles filed, and the filings cannot show whether any individual's pay was reduced.
What does a Member of Technical Staff earn at xAI?
The median filed base across 55 filings with that title is $280,000, with the range inside the title running from $150,000 to $500,000, as of the FY2026 Q3 file.
Is this total compensation?
No. Labor condition applications disclose base wage only. Equity, which after the February 2026 SpaceX acquisition means SpaceX stock rather than xAI stock, is not in this data.
Sources
1. LCA Disclosure Data, FY2026 Q3, US Department of Labor OFLC: dol.gov performance data. Decisions from October 1, 2025 to June 30, 2026.
2. LCA Disclosure Data, FY2025 Q1 to Q4, US Department of Labor OFLC: dol.gov performance data. Decisions from October 1, 2024 to September 30, 2025.
3. Visionary Talks, Who Owns Cursor: who owns Cursor. Establishes SpaceX's February 2026 acquisition of xAI and the August 14, 2026 close of the Anysphere deal, both cited above.