$142,000 in the US, ₩129 Million in Pangyo: What Game Developers Earn Now

Ask most players what game developers earn and they will guess too low. The industry's reputation, built on crunch stories and layoffs, is of passion projects paid in pizza. The latest numbers from the United States and Korea tell a more complicated story: good salaries at established companies, sharp gaps between groups, and enormous rewards at the very top.

The American picture

GDC's 2025 Game Industry Salary Report, based on a survey of 562 US-based game professionals in July 2025, put the average salary at $142,000 and the median at $129,000, slightly up on the previous year. Pay was higher at AAA studios and large companies, for people hired through referrals, for those with more experience or senior titles, and for those with master's degrees or doctorates.

The gaps were large. Women reported earning about 24% less than men, against a gap of about 15% across the US economy as a whole. Non-white workers reported earning about 27% less than white colleagues. Among designers with six or more years of experience, 68% of men earned at least $125,000, compared with 38% of women and non-binary respondents.

Feelings about pay were mixed. About 80% said their salary met or exceeded their basic needs, but 53% felt undercompensated, rising to 69% among contractors and part-timers. Only about a third felt fairly paid.

Layoffs shape everything

The same survey found 24% of respondents had been laid off in the previous two years, rising to 28% in audio, game design and visual arts. Almost half of those laid off were still looking for work, and 40% of the unemployed had sent more than 100 applications. Still, 82% of employed respondents said they were likely to be working in games in five years.

The Korean picture

Korea's big listed game companies publish average pay in their annual business reports, and the latest figures, for 2025, show salaries climbing fast at the top firms even as staff numbers fell. Average pay per employee:

• Krafton: ₩129 million, up from ₩109 million
• Pearl Abyss: ₩134.05 million, up from ₩98.48 million
• NCSOFT: ₩117 million, up from ₩108 million
• Kakao Games: ₩90 million, up from ₩88 million
• Netmarble: ₩87 million, up from ₩77 million

For 2024, Shift Up, the Stellar Blade studio, had the highest average among major game companies at about ₩131.65 million, across about 308 employees. These averages include unregistered executives and are pushed up by bonuses in hit years, so a typical developer's pay can be well below the headline.

There is a catch hiding in the numbers. At NCSOFT, average pay rose while headcount fell from 4,886 in 2024 to 3,170 at the end of 2025, after voluntary retirement and spin-offs. Higher averages partly reflect fewer, more senior people.

The top of the ladder

The best-paid people in Korean games earn sums that dwarf any salary survey. For 2025, Krafton chief executive Kim Chang-han received about ₩8.04 billion, NCSOFT founder Kim Taek-jin about ₩5.30 billion and Netmarble chairman Bang Jun-hyuk about ₩2.07 billion. Much of this comes from bonuses tied to company performance.

That structure, with modest base pay and large bonuses when a game hits, is why pay fights in Korean games are usually about bonuses. The five-month strike at Neople in 2025 was about sharing a slice of record profits; we tell that story in our Neople strike report.

Why it matters

The industry's pay story has two halves. For people with a job at an established studio, game development now pays like the rest of tech. For students, contractors and the recently laid off, the market is harsh. The rise in Korean averages since the 2021 pay war, which we cover in our story on that year's raises, has come with fewer jobs.

WGC's take: if you are trying to get into games, the numbers say the big studios still pay well, but the door is narrow. Build a portfolio, look at QA and live-ops roles as entry points, and treat bonuses as a pleasant surprise rather than a plan.