💡 Why it matters: Every bank, school, hospital and startup now runs on software, and companies often struggle to hire enough people who can build it.
🌍 Around the world
- Nigeria: Nigeria's tech companies hire faster than universities can train people.
- United States: Jobs are projected to grow 10% from 2025 to 2035, much faster than average (US Bureau of Labor Statistics).
💰 What it can pay
🇳🇬 Nigeria
- Starting out
- ₦1.8M – ₦4.5M
- Mid-career
- ₦5M – ₦12M
- Senior
- ₦12M – ₦30M
≈ ₦417k – ₦1M a month mid-career. Indicative estimate by Incusim.
🇬🇧 United Kingdom
Typical starter to experienced salary (closest profile: Software developer). National Careers Service, 2026
🇺🇸 United States
Closest US category: Software developers. Median pay; low and high are the 10th and 90th percentiles. US Bureau of Labor Statistics, May 2025
🇨🇦 Canada
Closest Canadian occupation: Computer software engineer. Hourly wage low/median/high x 2,080 hours. Job Bank (Government of Canada), 2023-2024
Yearly pay before tax. UK, US and Canada figures come from the official sources named on each card. Nigeria has no official salary survey, so those are our indicative estimates. Real pay depends on the employer, the place, your skills and experience.
🛠️ What you actually do
- Build and maintain apps and websites
- Work with designers and product managers
- Write and test code
- Find and fix bugs
- Review other developers' code
⚡ Skills you'll need
- Problem solving
- Logic
- Teamwork
- Creativity
- Patience
Get ready at school
🇳🇬 Nigeria
- Coding bootcamp followed by a junior developer role
- Self-taught with a strong project portfolio
🇬🇧 United Kingdom
- Level 3 or 4 digital apprenticeship, where you earn while you learn
- Coding bootcamp or self-taught with a portfolio of projects
🇺🇸 United States
- Coding bootcamp with a strong project portfolio
- Internship or apprenticeship at a tech company
🇨🇦 Canada
- Co-op programmes that alternate study with paid work terms
- Bootcamp or self-taught with a project portfolio
🗺️ Your path to this career
- 1Study Maths and Computer Studies in school
- 2Learn to code online and build small projects
- 3Take a Computer Science degree or a bootcamp
- 4Land an internship or junior developer role
- 5Specialise in web, mobile, AI or cloud
⏰ A day in the life
You start with a short team meeting, then spend the morning writing a new feature. After lunch you fix a bug a user reported, review a teammate's code and test everything before it goes live.