IT Classes San Francisco

San Francisco is a tech hub, home to Silicon Valley, a world-famous location for tech innovation, and major tech companies like Google, Apple, and Meta. It also has a thriving startup ecosystem. For ten years, this city has been at the top of CBRE’s Scoring Tech Talent report, which rates tech labor markets. IT experts are likely to find many different job opportunities there.

According to CBRE’s “Scoring Tech Talent 2024” report, there are more than 430,000 tech workers in San Francisco. The report reveals that software development and programming are the most common tech jobs, followed by roles related to computer support, databases, and systems. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (the BLS) also provides statistics about IT employment in San Francisco. It finds that the city employs more than 5,300 Computer Network Architects, making it the fourth-largest employer for this role in the country, and more than 76,000 Software Developers, the third highest number in the country. According to the BLS, San Francisco also employs more than 9,700 Computer User Support Specialists, 4,000 Information Security Analysts, and 3,700 Computer Programmers. 

Top San Francisco IT Employers

IT experts work in almost every industry in San Francisco. Some of the most prominent employers are tech companies, government agencies, healthcare companies, educational institutions, and financial businesses. 

• Tech: With its reputation as a tech leader, San Francisco continues to attract tech companies and funding and offers many different job options. According to the Silicon Valley Indicators website, which provides data about Silicon Valley trends, the biggest tech employers in Silicon Valley and San Francisco are Google, Apple, Meta, Amazon, Cisco, and Tesla, which together employ about 23% of the tech workforce. It finds that the rest of the top twenty employ 12% of the workforce, and the remaining 66% of workers are employed in smaller tech companies. Some people call this city an “AI capital” since it is home to well-known AI companies like OpenAI and Anthropic. In a San Francisco government website post titled “Why San Francisco?” the author maintains, “San Francisco has become the AI Capital of the World, with over 20 percent of all AI job postings in the United States and eight of the top 20 generative AI firms in the country.”
• Government: The government is another major employer in San Francisco, and like almost all other types of businesses, government agencies need a variety of IT employees. According to the Employment Development Department (EDD) of the State of California, the San Francisco Human Services Agency, the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, San Francisco Recreation & Parks, and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission are among the largest employers in the city.
• Healthcare: The EDD reports that the city’s largest employers also include several healthcare companies: Sutter Health, Kaiser Permanente, the Laguna Honda Hospital & Rehabilitation Center, and St. Francis Memorial Hospital. In recent years, the healthcare industry has embraced tech, for instance, utilizing data science and AI to improve healthcare, and it offers many IT job roles in San Francisco.
• Education: This city has one of the most highly educated populations in the United States and a large education system, with both public and private schools, including Stanford University, the University of California, Berkeley, and the University of San Francisco. In recent years, the education sector in San Francisco has integrated many digital learning tools, increasing the need for IT specialists within that industry.
• Finance: San Francisco is a financial hub, with many major banks and other financial institutions headquartered there. Its financial sector includes many FinTech companies like Alpaca, Adyen, and Block. The Bay Area Council Economic Institute estimates that the Bay Area employs more than 130,000 people in finance and insurance.

An Overview of San Francisco IT Salaries

IT salaries in San Francisco are some of the highest in the country. However, the cost of living in this city is also significantly higher than average, 70%, according to Payscale. The following salary estimates come from the BLS website. For all jobs, salaries in San Francisco are significantly higher than the national average.

• Computer User Support Specialist: $90,200 yearly, compared to a national average of $65,000
• Computer Network Architect $160,000, compared to $136,000
• Software Developer $188,000, compared to $145,000
• Information Security Analyst $166,000, compared to $128,000
• Computer Programmer, $130,000, compared to $98,000
• Database Architect $178,000, compared to $123,000

IT Job Trends in San Francisco

San Francisco has been a major tech hub for many years and has firmly established its dominance in this field. Most experts expect that IT roles will remain plentiful in the future. According to job projections published by the BLS, most IT roles will experience strong job growth all over the country in the next ten years. While the average U.S. job growth rate is only 4%, the BLS expects 17% growth for Software Developers, 33% for Information Security Analysts, 6% for Computer Support Specialists, and 13% for Computer Network Architects.