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How to hire a quality assurance engineer

Quality assurance engineer hiring summary. Here are some key points about hiring quality assurance engineers in the United States:

  • There are currently 269,584 quality assurance engineers in the US, as well as 243,536 job openings.
  • Quality assurance engineers are in the highest demand in Austin, TX, with 90 current job openings.
  • The median cost to hire a quality assurance engineer is $1,633.
  • It takes between 36 and 42 days to fill the average role in the US.
  • Human Resources use 15% of their expenses on recruitment on average.
  • On average, it takes around 12 weeks for a new quality assurance engineer to become settled and show total productivity levels at work.

How to hire a quality assurance engineer, step by step

To hire a quality assurance engineer, consider the skills and experience you are looking for in a candidate, allocate a budget for the position, and post and promote the job opening to reach potential candidates. Follow these steps to hire a quality assurance engineer:

Here's a step-by-step quality assurance engineer hiring guide:

  • Step 1: Identify your hiring needs
  • Step 2: Create an ideal candidate profile
  • Step 3: Make a budget
  • Step 4: Write a quality assurance engineer job description
  • Step 5: Post your job
  • Step 6: Interview candidates
  • Step 7: Send a job offer and onboard your new quality assurance engineer
  • Step 8: Go through the hiring process checklist

What does a quality assurance engineer do?

A Quality Assurance Engineer's role is to oversee the overall production and ensure that the product is cost-efficient and aligns with the company's standards. The responsibility mainly revolves around conducting activities that examine and scrutinize the condition of a product or service to identify issues and come up with possible solutions to resolve the issue or attain stronger customer satisfaction. Furthermore, the Quality Assurance Engineer must also ensure that the product adheres to the government regulations and market guidelines.

Learn more about the specifics of what a quality assurance engineer does
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  1. Identify your hiring needs

    Before you start hiring a quality assurance engineer, identify what type of worker you actually need. Certain positions might call for a full-time employee, while others can be done by a part-time worker or contractor.

    Determine employee vs contractor status
    Is the person you're thinking of hiring a US citizen or green card holder?

    A quality assurance engineer's background is also an important factor in determining whether they'll be a good fit for the position. For example, quality assurance engineers from different industries or fields will have radically different experiences and will bring different viewpoints to the role. You also need to consider the candidate's previous level of experience to make sure they'll be comfortable with the job's level of seniority.

    This list presents quality assurance engineer salaries for various positions.

    Type of Quality Assurance EngineerDescriptionHourly rate
    Quality Assurance EngineerA Quality Assurance Engineer develops and executes exploratory and automated tests for new and existing products to meet client needs. They monitor the debugging process and track quality assurance metrics.$29-52
    Software TesterThe responsibility of software testers involves the quality assurance of software development and deployment. Software testers conduct manual and automated tests to make sure that the software is developed for its purpose... Show more$29-48
    Quality AnalystPumpers are individuals who take responsibility for setting the pumping system controls for product maximization. Their job requires them to set density, concentration, rate, and pressure... Show more$26-44
  2. Create an ideal candidate profile

    Common skills:
    • Java
    • Python
    • Regression
    • Jira
    • API
    • Scrum
    • Test Results
    • C++
    • C #
    • JavaScript
    • Test Scripts
    • UI
    • Jenkins
    • Manual Test Cases
    Check all skills
    Responsibilities:
    • Manage individual sprints user stories and tasks using TFS as tracking tool.
    • Create and maintain a test suite in ruby to automate a new events and notifications application.
    • Manage all ALM relate issues, user requests and customize the defect templates to cater to various project needs.
    • Provide overarching strategic recommendations for productivity improvements and achieve QMS - ISO certification.
    • Develop UI automation for PWM product using WinRunner, Java, PL/SQL, Transact-SQL and other technologies.
    • Review and approve the defects open by the testers for each regression and assign to the Dev.
    More quality assurance engineer duties
  3. Make a budget

    Including a salary range in your quality assurance engineer job description helps attract top candidates to the position. A quality assurance engineer salary can be affected by several factors, such as geography, experience, seniority, certifications, and the prestige of the hiring company.

    For example, the average salary for a quality assurance engineer in Montana may be lower than in California, and an entry-level quality assurance engineer usually earns less than a senior-level quality assurance engineer. Additionally, a quality assurance engineer with certifications may command a higher salary, and working for a well-known company or start-up may also impact an employee's pay.

    Average quality assurance engineer salary

    $82,215yearly

    $39.53 hourly rate

    Entry-level quality assurance engineer salary
    $61,000 yearly salary
    Updated December 20, 2025

    Average quality assurance engineer salary by state

    RankStateAvg. salaryHourly rate
    1California$106,268$51
    2Washington$91,326$44
    3District of Columbia$87,266$42
    4New Jersey$83,857$40
    5New York$82,303$40
    6Massachusetts$81,571$39
    7Pennsylvania$79,259$38
    8Arizona$76,913$37
    9North Carolina$75,675$36
    10Texas$74,361$36
    11Illinois$74,275$36
    12Ohio$73,460$35
    13Minnesota$72,582$35
    14Colorado$72,447$35
    15Nebraska$71,597$34
    16Georgia$70,869$34
    17Indiana$70,750$34
    18Missouri$70,149$34
    19Florida$66,902$32

    Average quality assurance engineer salary by company

    RankCompanyAverage salaryHourly rateJob openings
    1The Citadel$143,959$69.219
    2Apple$134,504$64.67604
    3Thrive Market$134,235$64.54
    4Meta$132,364$63.642,919
    5Zoox$130,160$62.5887
    6Pacific Investment Management Company LLC$129,392$62.213
    7Google$129,076$62.06458
    8Gilt$128,755$61.90
    9Lyft$128,461$61.769
    10PayPal$127,980$61.5310
    11Twitter$127,837$61.461
    12First Republic Bank$127,622$61.36
    13Chegg$127,475$61.29
    14Amazon$127,273$61.19946
    15Platfora$127,071$61.09
    16Stitch Fix$126,969$61.041
    17Flipboard$126,545$60.84
    18NVIDIA$126,537$60.84164
    19Brocade Services Corporation$125,506$60.34
    20Fungible$125,448$60.31
  4. Writing a quality assurance engineer job description

    A quality assurance engineer job description should include a summary of the role, required skills, and a list of responsibilities. It's also good to include a salary range and the first name of the hiring manager. To help get you started, here's an example of a quality assurance engineer job description:

    Quality assurance engineer job description example

    We are looking for an Accessibility Product Owner with experience working in a fast-paced, startup like environment. As the APO you'll work closely with the A11y Design and A11y Engineering teams to help manage and grow our digital platform and ecosystem by driving A11y into our integrated digital experiences. You will be an A11y champion across many teams, and will also partner with product owners, agile managers and leadership to mature the offering and ensure it exceeds the expectations of all customers and users.
    Responsibilities

    Lead A11y feature reviews and initiatives across Healthcare Digital's products and platforms as a member of the A11y Engineering Team.
    Help lead the team to success by working across groups to drive discussion & engagement, and create & track user stories in an agile software development life cycle.
    Act as liaison between the Product and A11y Engineering team
    Assist Product teams in conceptualizing, planning and embedding A11y into features
    Collect and interpret data on progress toward accessibility milestones and metrics
    Ensure internal product stakeholders A11y needs /expectations are met and promote transparency by helping communicate through SAFe/SCRUM practice.
    Assist with test plan iterations and management of improvements to the A11y process flow.

    Qualifications

    Ability to think from an end-user perspective
    Commitment to meeting high expectations of end users
    Ability to interpret and advise on standards, principles and techniques for meeting A11y success criteria (including WCAG 2.0 AA, WCAG 2.1 AA, and WAI-ARIA)
    Strong knowledge of assistive technologies (JAWS, NVDA, VoiceOver)
    Experience with Agile/Scrum practices (SAFe a plus).
    Experience leading cross functional project management initiatives.
    Advanced communication/presentation skills needed to represent your team with stakeholders and management.
    Provide leadership when necessary
    Familiarity with Responsive Web Design and mobile apps
    Strong understanding of the software development lifecycle
    Strong understanding of supporting products in a SAFe environment specifically how current/future work is scheduled to come through planning, design, engineering and 3rd-party validation efforts
    Knowledge of Rally, Teams, Confluence and other cooperation tools

    Preferred Skills

    Ability to train and coach colleagues on various A11y topics
    Ability to promote and share the importance of A11y
    Understanding the overlap between user experience and A11y
  5. Post your job

    To find quality assurance engineers for your business, try out a few different recruiting strategies:

    • Consider internal talent. One of the most important talent pools for any company is its current employees.
    • Ask for referrals. Reach out to friends, family members, and your current work to ask if they know any quality assurance engineers they would recommend.
    • Recruit at local colleges. Attend job fairs at local colleges to recruit entry-level quality assurance engineers with the right educational background.
    • Social media platforms. LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter have more than 3.5 billion users, and they're a great place for company branding and reaching potential job candidates.
    Post your job online:
    • Post your quality assurance engineer job on Zippia to find and recruit quality assurance engineer candidates who meet your exact specifications.
    • Use field-specific websites such as dice, engineering.com, stack overflow, it job pro.
    • Post a job on free websites.
  6. Interview candidates

    Recruiting quality assurance engineers requires you to bring your A-game to the interview process. The first interview should introduce the company and the role to the candidate as much as they present their background experience and reasons for applying for the job. During later interviews, you can go into more detail about the technical details of the job and ask behavioral questions to gauge how they'd fit into your current company culture.

    Remember to include a few questions that allow candidates to expand on their strengths in their own words. Asking about their unique skills might reveal things you'd miss otherwise. At this point, good candidates can move on to the technical interview.

    While interviews are great, you will only sometimes learn enough from a conversation with a quality assurance engineer applicant. In those cases, having candidates complete a test project can go a long way in figuring out who's the most likely to succeed in the role. If you aren't a technical person and don't know how to design an appropriate test, you can ask someone else on the team to create it or take a look at these websites to get a few ideas:

    • TestDome
    • CodeSignal
    • Testlify
    • BarRaiser
    • Coderbyte

    The right interview questions can help you assess a candidate's hard skills, behavioral intelligence, and soft skills.

  7. Send a job offer and onboard your new quality assurance engineer

    Once you've decided on a perfect quality assurance engineer candidate, it's time to write an offer letter. In addition to salary, it should include benefits and perks available to the employee. Qualified candidates may be considered for other positions, so make sure your offer is competitive. Candidates may wish to negotiate. Once you've settled on the details, formalize your agreement with a contract.

    You should also follow up with applicants who don't get the job with an email letting them know that you've filled the position.

    Once that's done, you can draft an onboarding schedule for the new quality assurance engineer. Human Resources should complete Employee Action Forms and ensure that onboarding paperwork is completed, including I-9s, benefits enrollment, federal and state tax forms, etc. They should also ensure that new employee files are created for internal recordkeeping.

  8. Go through the hiring process checklist

    • Determine employee type (full-time, part-time, contractor, etc.)
    • Submit a job requisition form to the HR department
    • Define job responsibilities and requirements
    • Establish budget and timeline
    • Determine hiring decision makers for the role
    • Write job description
    • Post job on job boards, company website, etc.
    • Promote the job internally
    • Process applications through applicant tracking system
    • Review resumes and cover letters
    • Shortlist candidates for screening
    • Hold phone/virtual interview screening with first round of candidates
    • Conduct in-person interviews with top candidates from first round
    • Score candidates based on weighted criteria (e.g., experience, education, background, cultural fit, skill set, etc.)
    • Conduct background checks on top candidates
    • Check references of top candidates
    • Consult with HR and hiring decision makers on job offer specifics
    • Extend offer to top candidate(s)
    • Receive formal job offer acceptance and signed employment contract
    • Inform other candidates that the position has been filled
    • Set and communicate onboarding schedule to new hire(s)
    • Complete new hire paperwork (i9, benefits enrollment, tax forms, etc.)
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How much does it cost to hire a quality assurance engineer?

There are different types of costs for hiring quality assurance engineers. One-time cost per hire for the recruitment process. Ongoing costs include employee salary, training, onboarding, benefits, insurance, and equipment. It is essential to consider all of these costs when evaluating hiring a new quality assurance engineer employee.

You can expect to pay around $82,215 per year for a quality assurance engineer, as this is the median yearly salary nationally. This can vary depending on what state or city you're hiring in. If you're hiring for contract work or on a per-project basis, hourly rates for quality assurance engineers in the US typically range between $29 and $52 an hour.

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