Explore jobs
Find specific jobs
Explore careers
Explore professions
Best companies
Explore companies
The differences between junior networking engineers and network administrators can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. It typically takes 1-2 years to become both a junior networking engineer and a network administrator. Additionally, a junior networking engineer has an average salary of $84,480, which is higher than the $71,357 average annual salary of a network administrator.
The top three skills for a junior networking engineer include switches, troubleshoot and lan. The most important skills for a network administrator are switches, windows server, and troubleshoot.
| Junior Networking Engineer | Network Administrator | |
| Yearly salary | $84,480 | $71,357 |
| Hourly rate | $40.62 | $34.31 |
| Growth rate | 5% | 5% |
| Number of jobs | 44,165 | 106,886 |
| Job satisfaction | - | - |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 68% | Bachelor's Degree, 55% |
| Average age | 43 | 43 |
| Years of experience | 2 | 2 |
Junior networking engineers are entry-level information technology (IT) professionals who are responsible for managing the daily activities of local and wide area network systems of an IT organization. They must collaborate with senior network engineers to develop and implement network security procedures to safeguard the organization's networking systems. They are required to perform diagnostics and schedule preventive maintenance on the network system while responding to emergency work requests. Junior networking engineers must also manage network management programs and prepare network status reports for the management.
A network administrator is responsible for managing an organization's computer systems, ensuring its smooth operations and highest efficiency. Network administrators' duties include inspecting network malfunctions, troubleshooting unresponsive programs, improving system processes, analyzing client's specifications, upgrading existing applications, coordinating with the technology department, and creating a report of network issues resolutions. A network administrator should display a strong command of programming languages. Extensive knowledge in the technology industry and analytical and problem-solving skills to manage network problems immediately is also necessary.
Junior networking engineers and network administrators have different pay scales, as shown below.
| Junior Networking Engineer | Network Administrator | |
| Average salary | $84,480 | $71,357 |
| Salary range | Between $62,000 And $114,000 | Between $56,000 And $90,000 |
| Highest paying City | Mountain View, CA | San Francisco, CA |
| Highest paying state | Washington | Washington |
| Best paying company | Parsons | |
| Best paying industry | Technology | Finance |
There are a few differences between a junior networking engineer and a network administrator in terms of educational background:
| Junior Networking Engineer | Network Administrator | |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 68% | Bachelor's Degree, 55% |
| Most common major | Electrical Engineering | Computer Science |
| Most common college | University of Pennsylvania | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
Here are the differences between junior networking engineers' and network administrators' demographics:
| Junior Networking Engineer | Network Administrator | |
| Average age | 43 | 43 |
| Gender ratio | Male, 87.3% Female, 12.7% | Male, 88.6% Female, 11.4% |
| Race ratio | Black or African American, 7.9% Unknown, 5.0% Hispanic or Latino, 11.6% Asian, 13.7% White, 61.6% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.3% | Black or African American, 8.8% Unknown, 5.1% Hispanic or Latino, 12.5% Asian, 9.6% White, 63.7% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.3% |
| LGBT Percentage | 9% | 9% |