SDETs are software engineers specialising in test infrastructure — writing production-quality code that exercises and validates other production code. The role goes beyond test automation to building test frameworks, mock services, deterministic infrastructure for testing distributed systems, and chaos engineering tooling.
Salary by Experience Level
Junior
$95,000 – $130,000
per year
Mid-Level
$135,000 – $190,000
per year
Senior
$200,000 – $290,000
per year
Required Skills
Strong programming (Python, Java, Go, or TS)Test framework designMock service infrastructure (WireMock, Mockoon)Distributed systems testing (deterministic, fault injection)Chaos engineering (Litmus, Gremlin)Performance testing at scaleTest data infrastructureCI/CD architecture