Audio engineers are one of the happiest careers in the United States.
At CareerExplorer, we conduct an ongoing survey with millions of people and ask them how satisfied they are with their careers. As it turns out, audio engineers rate their career happiness 3.9 out of 5 stars which puts them in the top 12% of careers.
To put this into perspective, we compared how happy audio engineers are to similar careers in the industry. Take a look at the results below:
Salaries and satisfaction ratings in similar careers
| Career | Satisfaction | Avg Salary |
|---|---|---|
| Composer | 4.2 | $33k |
| DJ | 4.1 | $27k |
| Musician | 4.1 | $9k |
| Audio engineer | 3.9 | $28k |
| Recording engineer | 3.9 | $34k |
| Music promoter | 3.8 | $31k |
So what does it mean to be happy in your career? Let’s break it down into different dimensions:
- Salary: Are audio engineers happy with their salary?
- Meaning: Do audio engineers find their jobs meaningful?
- Personality fit: How well suited are people’s personalities to their everyday tasks as audio engineers?
- Work environment: How enjoyable are audio engineer’s work environments?
- Skills utilization: Are audio engineers making the best use of their abilities?
Are audio engineers happy with their salary?
Audio engineers rated their satisfaction with their salaries 2.8/5. Audio engineers tend to be quite unhappy with their salary, with very few reporting satisfaction with their pay.
We asked audio engineers how fairly compensated they are for their work.
Their response was:
2.8 out of 5 stars
666 audio engineers
13% of audio engineers rated their compensation 5 stars
16% of audio engineers rated their compensation 4 stars
29% of audio engineers rated their compensation 3 stars
23% of audio engineers rated their compensation 2 stars
19% of audio engineers rated their compensation 1 stars
Do audio engineers find their jobs meaningful?
On average, audio engineers rate the meaningfulness of their work a 3.5/5. Unlike many careers, audio engineers have little difficulty finding meaning in their work, and it likely constitutes one of the main reasons people become audio engineers.
We asked audio engineers how meaningful they found their work.
Their response was:
3.5 out of 5 stars
673 audio engineers
29% of audio engineers rated how meaningful they found their career 5 stars
25% of audio engineers rated how meaningful they found their career 4 stars
23% of audio engineers rated how meaningful they found their career 3 stars
14% of audio engineers rated how meaningful they found their career 2 stars
8% of audio engineers rated how meaningful they found their career 1 stars
How well are people’s personalities suited to everyday tasks as audio engineers?
Audio engineers rated their personality fit with their work an average of 4.1/5. The majority of audio engineers find their personalities quite well suited to their work, with relatively few having complaints about their fit.
We asked audio engineers how well their personalities fit into their careers.
Their response was:
4.1 out of 5 stars
755 audio engineers
42% of audio engineers rated their career fit 5 stars
37% of audio engineers rated their career fit 4 stars
16% of audio engineers rated their career fit 3 stars
4% of audio engineers rated their career fit 2 stars
2% of audio engineers rated their career fit 1 stars
How enjoyable is an audio engineer’s work environment?
As a whole, audio engineers rated their enjoyment of their work environment 3.9/5. A solid majority of audio engineers enjoy their work environment, probably contributing to overall higher satisfaction with working as an audio engineer.
We asked audio engineers how much they enjoyed their work environment.
Their response was:
3.9 out of 5 stars
754 audio engineers
37% of audio engineers rated their work environment 5 stars
34% of audio engineers rated their work environment 4 stars
17% of audio engineers rated their work environment 3 stars
9% of audio engineers rated their work environment 2 stars
3% of audio engineers rated their work environment 1 stars
Are audio engineers making the best use of their abilities?
Former audio engineers on CareerExplorer have rated their skills utilization 3.7/5. Most audio engineers surveyed find that they manage to use their abilities to their fullest as an audio engineer, which helps contribute to higher career satisfaction in the long term.
We asked audio engineers how well their abilities were used in their careers.
Their response was:
3.7 out of 5 stars
756 audio engineers
31% of audio engineers rated their how well their skills were utilized in their career 5 stars
28% of audio engineers rated their how well their skills were utilized in their career 4 stars
23% of audio engineers rated their how well their skills were utilized in their career 3 stars
13% of audio engineers rated their how well their skills were utilized in their career 2 stars
5% of audio engineers rated their how well their skills were utilized in their career 1 stars