Explore jobs
Find specific jobs
Explore careers
Explore professions
Best companies
Explore companies
The differences between design engineers and designers can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. While it typically takes 4-6 years to become a design engineer, becoming a designer takes usually requires 6-12 months. Additionally, a design engineer has an average salary of $77,134, which is higher than the $66,347 average annual salary of a designer.
The top three skills for a design engineer include C++, UL and project management. The most important skills for a designer are sketch, customer service, and graphic design.
| Design Engineer | Designer | |
| Yearly salary | $77,134 | $66,347 |
| Hourly rate | $37.08 | $31.90 |
| Growth rate | 2% | 3% |
| Number of jobs | 138,173 | 52,433 |
| Job satisfaction | 5 | 5 |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 72% | Bachelor's Degree, 61% |
| Average age | 41 | 38 |
| Years of experience | 6 | 12 |
A design engineer is responsible for creating systems and applications based on their expertise. Design engineers work through client specifications based on business needs. A design engineer also provides recommendations on improving existing systems to boost its performance and increase efficiency. Design engineers must have an excellent command of computer systems, programming codes, and technical data to ensure the system's stability and high-quality processes. A design engineer should also have strong analytical and time-management skills to perform tasks and meet deadlines.
A designer is someone who creates a master plan of the look or workings of something before it will be made. It could be tangible or intangible objects, products, procedures, laws, events, games, graphics, services, and even experiences. Designers are creative thinkers with a great eye to configure the skeletal and structural properties of the targeted output. They work in several fields, such as fashion, architecture, web graphics, and user experience. In spite of the variety of professionals in the design industry, all of them are artistic, passionate, inspiring, and emotionally connected to their projects and brands.
Design engineers and designers have different pay scales, as shown below.
| Design Engineer | Designer | |
| Average salary | $77,134 | $66,347 |
| Salary range | Between $57,000 And $102,000 | Between $45,000 And $97,000 |
| Highest paying City | San Francisco, CA | Seattle, WA |
| Highest paying state | California | Washington |
| Best paying company | Meta | Meta |
| Best paying industry | Technology | Technology |
There are a few differences between a design engineer and a designer in terms of educational background:
| Design Engineer | Designer | |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 72% | Bachelor's Degree, 61% |
| Most common major | Mechanical Engineering | Graphic Design |
| Most common college | Michigan Technological University | University of Pennsylvania |
Here are the differences between design engineers' and designers' demographics:
| Design Engineer | Designer | |
| Average age | 41 | 38 |
| Gender ratio | Male, 88.9% Female, 11.1% | Male, 56.9% Female, 43.1% |
| Race ratio | Black or African American, 3.2% Unknown, 4.5% Hispanic or Latino, 8.2% Asian, 16.8% White, 67.2% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.1% | Black or African American, 3.4% Unknown, 5.0% Hispanic or Latino, 10.6% Asian, 10.4% White, 70.2% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.4% |
| LGBT Percentage | 5% | 13% |