What is the Average Video Game Tester Salary?

[Jason Reeves]

Being a professional video game tester is obviously great. You get to
play the newest video games and you get paid to do so. Honestly, what
more could any gamer ask for? However, the big questions is: how much
does a video game tester get paid? After all, if the pay isn't any
good, why would a person continue in that line of work?
The average video game tester salary can range from 15-20 thousand
dollars per year all the way up to 80-100+ thousand per year. How much
a game tester makes is directly related to how many jobs he gets as
well as what developers hire him. However, since most game testers
work on a job by job basis and not on a contractual salary, let's
break down the yearly figure into an hourly and a weekly figure.
Game testers are typically paid $8-20 per hour, depending on their
level of experience. For this example, let's take the middle ground
and go with $15 per hour for a mid-level tester. Game testers tend to
put in a lot of hours each week (40 to 50+), which is usually due to a
developer's inflexible deadlines. With that being said, let's say the
tester works the typically minimum (40 hours) and is paid the
aforementioned $15 per hour of testing work. 40 hours x $15 is a
weekly paycheck of $600 dollars, assuming the tester were to work that
many hours each week. Sounds like a nice paycheck, right? You bet it
does, and most gamers would be thrilled to cash a check like that
every week.
The big downside to being a video game tester, as mentioned above, is
that your career progresses on a per job basis. You won't get a
testing job every month, nor will you get one every week. As a matter
of fact, it is fairly common to have a long wait in between many of
your testing jobs. So, unless you are at the top of your game and tons
of game developers know of you, be prepared to wait in line like all
the rest. Fortunately for you though, there is a way to increase the
amount of job openings that are available to you, and it's known as
networking. To read an article about video game tester networking,
click here
Does a career as a professional video game tester peek your interest?
Well, it should. Game testing is a great job and anyone who does it
will say the same thing. The few drawbacks that come with video game
testing don't even come close to making it an "iffy" decision, and
that's simply because this career is genuinely fun!