Business & site selection
Cheapest US cities for software talent
The lowest software-developer wages in markets that still have a degreed workforce.
Remote-friendly engineering budgets stretch furthest here: the lowest software-developer wages among metros with a real college-educated base.
Published by WhereToHQ research. Calculated from committed source data with no generated editorial text.
What the ranking shows
- Clarksville, TN leads this list at $96,650 for wage: software developer.
- Across the 15 published entries, wage: software developer ranges from $96,650 to $104,030. The other columns show tradeoffs that the headline order cannot capture.
| # | City | Wage: Software developer | Bachelor's degree or higher | Cost of living index |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Clarksville, TN176k | $96,650 | 29.9% | 86 |
| 2 | Shreveport, LA181k | $96,680 | 28.5% | 79 |
| 3 | Jackson, MS147k | $96,990 | 28.8% | 73 |
| 4 | Lansing, MI113k | $97,120 | 30.2% | 78 |
| 5 | Billings, MT119k | $100,440 | 36.9% | 93 |
| 6 | Columbia, MO129k | $101,020 | 56.7% | 85 |
| 7 | Sioux Falls, SD201k | $101,040 | 38.1% | 85 |
| 8 | Fort Wayne, IN269k | $101,560 | 29% | 80 |
| 9 | Lincoln, NE295k | $101,690 | 41.8% | 84 |
| 10 | Baton Rouge, LA223k | $101,900 | 36.6% | 83 |
| 11 | College Station, TX125k | $101,910 | 56.5% | 92 |
| 12 | Springfield, MO170k | $102,350 | 31.4% | 78 |
| 13 | Green Bay, WI106k | $103,160 | 26.7% | 82 |
| 14 | Abilene, TX128k | $103,760 | 27.3% | 83 |
| 15 | Anchorage, AK289k | $104,030 | 38.7% | 124 |
Ranked from public data we track (US Census/ACS, BLS, EIA, FEMA, NOAA, Tax Foundation) and recomputed on every data refresh. Figures are estimates for comparison, not advice; open any city to see all facets.
Candidate rules: 100,000 or more residents; Bachelor's degree or higher at or above 25%. Ranking rule: Wage: Software developer, lowest first.
WhereToHQ loads at most the 500 largest eligible national candidates, or 300 candidates for a state list, before applying the published rules. Missing values are excluded from a direct sort or hard filter. In a weighted score, an unknown value is neutral rather than favorable.