#32 of 122
North America
Chicago
IL, United States
Salary & Cost of Living
How do salaries and expenses in Chicago compare to Boston?
Purchasing Power Comparison
An engineer in Chicago is 4% better off vs in Boston
This shows how far a software engineer's salary goes in Chicago compared to Boston, taking into account both salary differences and cost of living.
Net Salary
$93,100
-$18,634 (-17%) vs Boston
Tax Rate: 34%
Weather
How does the weather in Chicago compare to Boston?
Boston has better overall weather
4.2/10(vs 5.2/10 in Boston)
Overall weather score based on temperature, sunshine, precipitation, and humidity. Learn how it's calculated
Average High
15°C(same as Boston)
Average Low
8°C(vs 7°C in Boston)
Sunshine Hours
2,508h/yr-125h/yr
Average High in hottest month
28°C(same as Boston)
Average Low in coldest month
-5°C(same as Boston)
Rainy Days
91/yr(same as Boston)
Muggy Days
42/yr+14/yr(+48%)
Cloud Cover
47%(same as Boston)
Quality of Life
How does quality of life in Chicago compare to Boston?
Housing Affordability
How affordable is housing for a software engineer in Chicago compared to Boston?
SWE Affordability
2.5 years
2.9 years quicker than Boston
Community & Events
Events listed on lu.ma, a popular Meetup alternative in tech circles, can indicate local community engagement.
Chicago has around 25 Luma events listed.
That's 178% more events than Boston.
Salary Converter
Enter your annual gross salary (before taxes) to see what you would need to earn in Chicago to maintain the same standard of living.
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