Tech Salaries in Dresden 2026: Silicon Saxony's Semiconductor Boom Is Reshaping Pay

Dresden is not Berlin. It's not Munich. It doesn't have the startup hype of one or the corporate prestige of the other.

What Dresden has is Europe's largest microelectronics cluster, a €10 billion TSMC fab under construction, three of the world's top semiconductor manufacturers within city limits, and rent that costs less than half of what you'd pay in Munich.

Silicon Saxony — the industry association representing the region's microelectronics and IT sector — counts over 600 member companies, approximately 76,000 employees across 3,600 businesses, and a pipeline of public and private investment exceeding €30 billion. Every third chip produced in Europe is "Made in Saxony."

For tech professionals, this translates into a job market that's growing faster than salaries have caught up with — which means opportunity. Here's what tech roles actually pay in Dresden in 2026, who's hiring, and why the salary-to-lifestyle ratio might be the best in Germany.

Why Dresden, Why Now

Dresden's tech story starts with semiconductors but doesn't end there.

The semiconductor foundation. Infineon has operated in Dresden since 1994, with over €12 billion in cumulative investment and 3,200 employees. GlobalFoundries runs Fab 1 Dresden with 3,000+ employees. Bosch opened a €1 billion IoT semiconductor fab in 2021. Jenoptik, X-FAB, and dozens of suppliers complete the cluster. The TSMC game-changer. In August 2024, ESMC — a joint venture between TSMC, Bosch, Infineon, and NXP — broke ground on a €10 billion fab in Dresden. Equipment move-in is scheduled for H2 2026, production for late 2027. The facility will produce on TSMC's 28/22nm and 16/12nm FinFET processes at 40,000 wafers per month, creating ~2,000 direct jobs and thousands more indirect positions. Beyond chips. SAP operates a major office in Dresden. T-Systems MMS (Deutsche Telekom's digital arm) is headquartered here. Wandelbots ($123M raised for no-code robotics), Sunfire (hydrogen tech), Cloud&Heat (sustainable cloud), and dozens of deep-tech startups build on TU Dresden's research infrastructure — one of Germany's 11 "Universities of Excellence." The talent pipeline. TU Dresden's ExciteLab accelerator focuses on semiconductors, robotics, and quantum tech. The boOst Startup Factory — a TU Dresden and Leipzig University collaboration — targets semiconductor and chip design startups. This is a city that produces tech talent, not just imports it.

Software Engineer — €48K-€88K

Software engineers in Dresden earn €48,000-€88,000 per year, with a median around €62,000. Glassdoor data shows the 25th-75th percentile at €49,625-€64,925, while Levels.fyi reports an average range of €55,862-€80,077 — the higher end reflecting senior roles at semiconductor companies and established tech firms. By experience level:

Dresden's software market divides into distinct segments:

Semiconductor software. Infineon, GlobalFoundries, and Bosch need engineers for manufacturing execution systems, process control, yield optimization, equipment automation, and chip design tools. Domain knowledge in semiconductor manufacturing earns 10-20% above generic software roles. C/C++, Python, and embedded systems command premiums. Enterprise and consulting. SAP, T-Systems MMS, Accenture, MHP Consulting, and Zeiss employ hundreds of engineers in enterprise software and industrial IoT. Mid-level roles pay €55,000-€75,000 with strong stability. Startups and deep tech. Wandelbots, Cloud&Heat, DevBoost, Kontron AIS, and Robotron offer €48,000-€65,000 for mid-level roles with equity potential. Many spin out of TU Dresden research.

For comparison across German cities, see the Software Engineer salary data or our Berlin breakdown.

Data Scientist — €47K-€85K

Data scientists in Dresden earn €47,000-€85,000 per year, with a median around €62,000. By experience level:

Data science in Dresden is shaped by the semiconductor industry's data-intensive manufacturing. Chip fabrication generates enormous process data — yield rates, defect patterns, equipment metrics — and extracting insights is directly tied to profitability.

Semiconductor data science. Infineon and GlobalFoundries employ data scientists for yield prediction, process optimization, and quality assurance. A 1% yield improvement at a 40,000 wafer/month fab is worth millions. Senior salaries reflect this: €75,000-€85,000 with strong job security. Research and industrial applications. TU Dresden's AI programs, the Barkhausen Institut, and Fraunhofer institutes create a pipeline that feeds the local ecosystem. SAP, T-Systems MMS, and automation companies apply analytics to manufacturing and enterprise processes.

For the Germany-wide view, see the Data Scientist salary guide.

DevOps Engineer — €50K-€90K

DevOps engineers in Dresden earn €50,000-€90,000 per year, with a median around €66,000. By experience level:

DevOps is one of Dresden's highest-paying specializations. When a fab runs 24/7 and downtime costs hundreds of thousands per hour, the engineers keeping infrastructure reliable earn accordingly.

Why Dresden DevOps pays well: Semiconductor fabs require 99.99%+ uptime. Enterprise employers (SAP, T-Systems) maintain large-scale cloud infrastructure. And senior talent is scarce — fewer experienced DevOps engineers choose Dresden over Berlin, creating supply-demand premiums. Skills commanding premiums: Kubernetes (+10-15%), AWS/Azure with semiconductor experience (+12-15%), Terraform/Ansible at scale (+8-12%), and CI/CD for embedded hardware-software integration — a specialty unique to Dresden's market.

For cross-city comparisons, see the DevOps Engineer salary guide.

Product Manager — €46K-€82K

Product managers in Dresden earn €46,000-€82,000 per year, with a median around €60,000. By experience level:

Product management in Dresden is a smaller market than Berlin's or Munich's, but it has a distinctive character. The PM role here often sits at the intersection of hardware and software — managing products that involve chip design tools, manufacturing automation platforms, or industrial IoT systems.

Hardware-software PMs. At Infineon, Bosch, and GlobalFoundries, PMs coordinate between hardware and software teams. These roles require depth beyond typical SaaS PM work — understanding fab processes, semiconductor supply chains, and embedded constraints. Salaries at €70,000-€82,000 reflect this. Software PMs. SAP, T-Systems MMS, Wandelbots, and Cloud&Heat offer traditional PM roles at €55,000-€68,000 for mid-level. This segment is growing as Dresden's software ecosystem matures. See the Product Manager salary guide for Germany-wide benchmarks.

Data Engineer — €50K-€88K

Data engineers in Dresden earn €50,000-€88,000 per year, with a median around €65,000. By experience level:

A single wafer lot generates gigabytes of process data across hundreds of processing steps. Building the pipelines that power yield analytics, real-time monitoring, and predictive maintenance is production-critical engineering — not dashboard work.

In-demand skills: Apache Spark and Kafka for streaming, time-series databases for manufacturing data, cloud platforms (AWS, Azure) integrated with on-premises factory systems, and ETL pipelines for high-volume sensor data. Domain knowledge in semiconductor manufacturing adds 10-15% to compensation.

The Data Engineer salary guide provides the full German market context.

ML Engineer — €52K-€95K

ML engineers in Dresden earn €52,000-€95,000 per year, with a median around €68,000. By experience level:

ML engineering is Dresden's fastest-growing and highest-ceiling salary category, driven by the convergence of semiconductor manufacturing and AI.

Semiconductor process optimization. ML models that predict yield, detect defects, and optimize fabrication parameters are directly tied to profitability. An ML engineer improving yield by 0.5% at a 40,000 wafer/month fab generates millions in value. Computer vision. Automated optical inspection of wafers relies on deep learning. Infineon, Bosch, and semiconductor equipment suppliers need engineers deploying CV models in production manufacturing. TU Dresden's AI pipeline. The Center for Advancing Electronics Dresden (cfaed) and ScaDS.AI produce talent at the intersection of AI and semiconductors — a combination increasingly valuable globally. The ESMC effect. TSMC's fab will bring Taiwan's AI-first fab operations practices to Dresden, spiking demand for ML engineers and the salary expectations that come with them.

Germany-wide context is in the ML Engineer salary guide.

How Dresden Compares: Leipzig, Berlin, Munich

The salary comparison requires cost-of-living context to be meaningful:

Rent data: ImmoScout24 2025 (Dresden €9.22/m²), GREIX Q2 2025. Cost of living: Numbeo, germany-visa.org 2025/2026. The purchasing power calculation:

A mid-level software engineer in Dresden earning €65,000 takes home approximately €3,850/month after tax and social contributions. After rent of €700 (good one-bedroom in Neustadt or Blasewitz), that leaves roughly €3,150 for everything else.

The same engineer in Berlin earning €72,000 takes home ~€4,200/month. After rent of €1,400, they have €2,800 remaining.

In Munich at €90,000, take-home is ~€5,100/month. After rent of €2,000, that's €3,100 remaining.

Dresden's €65,000 delivers more disposable income than Berlin's €72,000 and roughly matches Munich's €90,000. The math is similar to Leipzig's — but Dresden has the added advantage of higher-ceiling semiconductor salaries at the senior level.

Dresden vs. Leipzig: The Silicon Saxony Twins

Dresden and Leipzig are increasingly functioning as a combined labor market. The two cities are just 110km apart — roughly 1 hour by ICE train — and the "Silicon Saxony corridor" between them is becoming a unified tech region.

Dresden's edge: Higher salary ceiling due to semiconductor giants. More specialized, hardware-adjacent roles. TU Dresden's engineering research pipeline. Leipzig's edge: Slightly stronger startup ecosystem (SpinLab), more logistics tech (DHL hub), and a reputation as a more "lifestyle" city with a vibrant arts scene. The convergence: Remote and hybrid work is blurring the boundary. Some engineers live in Leipzig and work for Dresden semiconductor companies. Others live in Dresden and work for Leipzig's software companies. As the TSMC fab drives further investment, the corridor will tighten.

For Leipzig-specific salary data, see Tech Salaries in Leipzig 2026.

Dresden's Tech Ecosystem: Who's Hiring

Tier 1: Semiconductor Giants (€65K-€95K for mid-to-senior)

Infineon Technologies — 3,200 employees, €12B+ cumulative investment. Power semiconductors and automotive chips. Senior software engineers earn €78,000-€95,000. GlobalFoundries Fab 1 — 3,000+ employees, Europe's largest foundry. Manufacturing IT, equipment automation, and data analytics. Bosch Semiconductor — €1B IoT fab (2021), 700+ employees. One of the world's most automated chip factories. ESMC (TSMC JV) — Equipment move-in H2 2026, ~2,000 jobs at full capacity. Active hiring underway with competitive packages.

Tier 2: Software & Enterprise (€52K-€80K)

SAP Dresden — structured career paths, €55K-€78K for mid-level engineers. T-Systems MMS — headquartered in Dresden, one of the city's largest software employers. Zeiss SMT — lithography and inspection systems at the optics-semiconductor intersection. Qoniac (Onto Innovation) — semiconductor process control software.

Tier 3: Startups & Deep Tech (€48K-€70K + equity)

Wandelbots ($123M raised, no-code robotics), Sunfire (green hydrogen), Cloud&Heat (sustainable cloud), Heliatek (organic solar), plus a steady stream from TU Dresden's ExciteLab accelerator.

Cost of Living: Dresden's Hidden Advantage

Dresden is one of Germany's most affordable major cities — and this isn't code for "there's nothing to do." A city of 560,000 with a UNESCO-recognized historic center, world-class museums (Zwinger, Grünes Gewölbe), the Semperoper, and the Elbe river valley.

Data: ImmoScout24 2025, Numbeo Feb 2026, germany-visa.org. Rent is 37% cheaper than Stuttgart, comparable to Leipzig, and roughly half of Berlin. For engineers moving from Munich, the housing cost savings alone can offset a €20,000-€30,000 salary reduction. Lifestyle. Baroque architecture, the Elbe Sandstone Mountains 30 minutes away, Dresden Neustadt's cafes and creative scene, and a pace of life Munich workers envy. Housing market. Unlike Berlin's crisis, Dresden's rental market works. A quality apartment in Neustadt, Blasewitz, or Striesen takes 2-4 weeks to find — not months.

Job Market Trends for Dresden Tech (2026)

Growing fast:

Semiconductor roles — ESMC ramp-up is the biggest driver. Chip design, manufacturing IT, and fab automation will see steepest salary growth through 2027-2028

ML/AI for manufacturing — yield optimization, defect detection, and predictive maintenance becoming table-stakes

Data engineering — manufacturing data pipelines expanding at every major employer

Cybersecurity — semiconductor IP protection and OT security rising in priority

Stable: Software engineering (largest category), DevOps/SRE (modernizing legacy manufacturing IT), enterprise consulting (T-Systems MMS, SAP, Accenture) Watch:

ESMC hiring wave — active recruiting, major push in H2 2026 during equipment installation

Remote work from Dresden — Berlin companies hiring Dresden-based engineers at Berlin salaries minus 5-10%, creating a "best of both worlds"

€30B pipeline — public and private semiconductor investment planned for Saxony. Not a one-time splash — a structural economic shift

Getting Hired in Dresden

For German professionals: Dresden's tech community is tight-knit. Networking through Silicon Saxony events and TU Dresden meetups carries weight — many semiconductor roles fill through referrals before being posted. For EU nationals: Straightforward relocation. Lower moving costs than Munich or Berlin make it a lower-risk destination. For non-EU professionals: EU Blue Card works for roles above ~€47,000. ESMC and semiconductor companies have established international recruiting processes. German is more important for daily life than in Berlin, though engineering teams at multinationals operate in English. Best job channels: CareerCheck (salary benchmarking), LinkedIn, Silicon Saxony job board (silicon-saxony.de), StepStone/Indeed, TU Dresden career portal, and ESMC careers (esmc.eu).

Is Dresden Worth It?

Dresden is not a city you move to for startup fame or the highest possible salary. You move to Dresden because the math works.

A €65,000 software engineering salary in Dresden — firmly mid-range for the local market — buys you an apartment in one of Germany's most beautiful cities, a 15-minute bike commute along the Elbe, €3,000+ per month in disposable income after rent, and proximity to Europe's largest and fastest-growing semiconductor cluster.

If you're a senior ML engineer earning €90,000 at Infineon or GlobalFoundries, your purchasing power exceeds what a €120,000 salary delivers in Munich. If you're a junior engineer entering the workforce, Dresden's cost of living means you can build savings from day one rather than spending two years just keeping up with Berlin rent.

The city's trajectory is clear. The TSMC fab isn't just another factory — it's a signal that Dresden is where European semiconductor sovereignty is being built. The companies following TSMC's investment, the research funding flowing through TU Dresden, the ExciteLab accelerator producing deep-tech startups — all of it points in one direction.

The salary numbers will continue to rise as the investment pipeline materializes. Engineers who establish themselves in Dresden's ecosystem now will benefit from that growth. And they'll do it in a city where the Semperoper is around the corner, the Sächsische Schweiz mountains are a weekend trip, and a quality one-bedroom apartment doesn't require a six-figure salary to afford.

To see how your current offer compares to the Dresden market, check your salary fit. For the full German tech salary picture, see Tech Salaries in Germany 2026, or compare with the nearby Leipzig market.