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Reality check

~5 min

In short

This section answers three questions before you spend months on preparation: what a good software job pays, how realistic the top numbers are, and how hiring actually moves. It does not promise you a job, a salary or a timeline. Read it before you commit to a plan, and read it again after three months, when you have better information about your own situation.

What this section covers

  1. What a good job means. Pay ranges by type of company, with the difference between total compensation and base explained.
  2. 50 LPA in two years. Where very high offers come from, what companies usually look for, and what other good outcomes look like.
  3. How hiring works. Campus and off-campus routes, interview stages, online assessments, and what varies by branch.

What it does not promise

  • No job offer. No one can promise one, and effort does not map cleanly to an offer.
  • No timeline. None of the sources I checked gives a reliable number of months from start to offer. Be wary of any course that gives you one.
  • No single "right" salary. Pay depends on city, company type, level, and the offer you happen to get on the day.

Who this is for

This section is for you if you are still deciding how much time and money to put into a software career, or if you have a target number in mind and want to know whether it is realistic. It is also useful if you have already started and feel that offers from friends or social media are not matching what you see in your own applications. Those gaps are normal, because pay in software varies widely by company type, level and city, as the pay page shows.

If you are looking for a plan rather than a reality check, go to the starting points page and pick your row. You can come back here once you have a few months of practice behind you, and the numbers will mean more.

How to read the numbers here

  • LPA means lakh per annum. 1 LPA is INR 1 lakh a year, so 50 LPA is INR 50 lakh, or 5.0M.
  • Total compensation is base salary plus stock and bonus per year. Base is only the fixed salary. Always check which one a number refers to. A headline offer can be mostly stock that vests over several years.
  • Pay numbers from Levels.fyi are self-reported by people who chose to submit them. They are useful for ranges, not for a single exact figure.
  • Anything labelled inference is my reasoning from the sourced numbers, not something a source states.

Read in this order

Start with the pay page, then the 50 LPA page, then the hiring page. If you are short on time, read the 50 LPA page first. It is the one most likely to change your expectations.

Try this

Write down two numbers: the total compensation you would call a good first offer, and the base salary you need to cover your costs. Then open the pay page and find where each number sits in the ranges.

Sources

  • Levels.fyi, India software engineer pay, checked 18 Oct 2026: https://www.levels.fyi/t/software-engineer/locations/india
  • Amazon, how we hire, checked 18 Oct 2026: https://www.amazon.jobs/content/en/how-we-hire