City ProfileChicago · Illinois · US

Chicago

Chicago hiring activity from Hacker News "Who's Hiring" threads. Located in Illinois.

Postings · Sep 2026−42%3-mo momentum
10
postings
this month
12-Mo Trend · 3-mo rollingOct '25 → Sep '26
5.6667 low3-mo avg · 811.3333 high
Rank · US
#6of 30 US cities
Remote-friendly · This month
60%−9 pts vs US
Share of US postings
3.4%10 of 372
3-Mo momentum
Falling−42% vs prior 3 mo
§ 00Hiring Volume

Lagging the US baseline this cycle.

Annual totals for the last five years — every year shown is complete except 2026, hatched because it is still in progress.

Full yearPartial yearAll-time peak
All-time postings
5,703since 2011 · 186 months
−14% YoY2025 vs 2024
469
'22
176
'23
135
'24
116
'25
66
'26
All-time total
5,703186 months
↑ Best year
2016736
↓ Worst full year
201285
Latest full year
2025−14% YoY
§ 01Compensation

Pays 6% under Atlanta for senior eng — and 7% over Denver.

Median bands from the 24 Chicago postings that disclosed USD pay across 2023–Present.

Senior eng · median · 2023–Present
USD171K
−6%vs Atlanta+7%vs Denver
Range by seniority · 2023–Present
Junior— n=3
Senior$150k – $188k n=12
Staff+— n=3

Bar = p25 to p75 · tick on Senior = median. Junior & Staff+ shown hatched below the 10-sample floor.

Senior eng median · US peer cities · 2023–Present
Where Chicago sits in the US distribution
CityMedianvs Chicago
01
Atlanta
$183k+6.6%
02
Seattle
$182k+6.0%
03
Washington DC
$180k+5.1%
04
Chicagoyou are here
$171k—
05
Boston
$167k−2.5%
06
Denver
$160k−6.6%

2023–Present disclosed pay only

§ 02Work Model

11 points more remote-friendly than the US baseline.

Trailing-12-month split, plus the yearly remote / hybrid / onsite mix all the way back.

Remote-friendly · Trailing 12 months
81%
+11 ptsvs US · 69%
Remote
36%
Hybrid
45%
Onsite-only
19%
Work-model mix · by year
Remote share is climbing back in '26
RemoteHybridOnsite
'11
65% rem.
'12
59% rem.
'13
75% rem.
'14
71% rem.
'15
31% rem.
'16
42% rem.
'17
47% rem.
'18
33% rem.
'19
39% rem.
'20
69% rem.
'21
92% rem.
'22
90% rem.
'23
74% rem.
'24
84% rem.
'25
74% rem.
'26
86% rem.
Trailing 12 months · Chicago vs US
Chicago81% remote-friendly
US average69% remote-friendly
§ 03City Signature

Python tops Chicago's skill mentions over the last 12 months.

Keywords counted across 91 Chicago hiring posts. Posts frequently list multiple skills.

#01
Top SkillPython
29mentions↑ 22%
Mentions · Last 12 Months
OCT '2532% of postingsSEP '26
Leaderboardlast 12 mo
01Python+22%29
02PostgreSQL+55%26
03Rust+105%23
04Go+126%19
05React−22%19
06TypeScript−24%18
07PyTorch+2043%15
08Apache Kafka+1900%14
09Redis—14
10Terraform+5%14
Movers · 12-month change
What’s moving
Trending↗
  • 01PyTorch+2043%
  • 02Apache Kafka+1900%
  • 03Google Cloud+614%
  • 04Make+329%
Cooling↘
  • 01Ruby on Rails−29%
  • 02TypeScript−24%
  • 03HTML/CSS−23%
  • 04React−22%

80% of jobs include at least one technical skill · share of postings mentioning the skill (12 months through Sep 2026)

Role mix · Chicago vs USShare of postings by role category, past 3 years
ChicagoUS baseline
Data Ml
match
16%
13%
+3 pts1.3×
Design
match
3%
3%
−0 pts1.0×
Engineering
match
68%
69%
−1 pts1.0×
Executive
match
1%
2%
−0 pts0.7×
Finance Accounting
match
1%
0%
+1 pts5.1×
Healthcare
match
0%
0%
−0 pts0.0×
Legal Compliance
match
0%
0%
−0 pts0.0×
Marketing
match
2%
3%
−0 pts0.8×
Operations
match
0%
1%
−1 pts0.3×
Other
match
2%
3%
−1 pts0.8×
Product
match
6%
4%
+1 pts1.3×
Sales
match
1%
3%
−2 pts0.3×