• Home
  • News
  • Fortune 500
  • Tech
  • Finance
  • Leadership
  • Lifestyle
  • Rankings
  • Multimedia
TechApple

Tech Interns Will Make Bundles of Cash This Summer

By
Don Reisinger
Don Reisinger
Down Arrow Button Icon
By
Don Reisinger
Don Reisinger
Down Arrow Button Icon
April 26, 2016, 2:07 PM ET
Snapchat Inc. Headquarters As Company Boasts 8 Billion Video Views A Day
The Snapchat Inc. application is displayed in the App Store on an Apple Inc. iPhone 6 in this arranged photograph taken in the Venice Beach neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, U.S., on Wednesday, March 2, 2016. People using the application for disappearing photos view 8 billion videos a day, the same number that Facebook reports, the CEO Evan Spiegel told an audience at the Morgan Stanley technology conference Photographer: Patrick T. Fallon/Bloomberg via Getty ImagesPatrick T. Fallon — Bloomberg via Getty Images

If you want to earn six figures, you may consider working at a technology company—as an intern.

Summer interns at Snapchat were offered $10,000 per month, plus $1,500 per month in housing, according to a survey released on Monday. Pinterest wasn’t far behind at $9,000 in monthly pay for interns, a $1,000 relocation budget, and $3,000 per month in housing. Twitter (TWTR) offered $8,400 per month plus $6,000 in benefits.

In other words, interns could make six figures, if their summer internship salaries were extended to a year.

The findings come from a Rodney Folz, a student a University of California at Berkeley who surveyed fellow students about the amount of money they will make this summer working as interns at prominent technology companies. The data, compiled from 510 respondents, clearly shows that being a tech intern is lucrative.

However, without seeing the employment letters directly, it’s impossible to know whether the salaries the UC Berkeley students claimed were accurate. The companies did not immediately respond to a request for confirmation about Folz’s data, which was reported earlier by Business Insider.

Get Data Sheet, Fortune’s technology newsletter.

Interestingly, bigger Silicon Valley companies, including Apple (AAPL) and Google (GOOGL), weren’t so willing to shell out all that cash to interns, respondents to Folz’s data claim. In fact, Apple is reportedly offering $6,700 per month plus a $1,000-per-month housing cap. Google keeps things simple with $6,600 per month and $9,000 in benefits over the summer, according to Folz’s data.

While Folz’s data may not be representative of every type of internship the companies offer, the pay was somewhat in line with what interns were getting in 2014. At that time, the National Association of Colleges and Employers reported that the average U.S. undergraduate earned $16 an hour, or $2,500 per month as interns. Technology interns made substantially more: Twitter interns at that time, for instance, made about $6,800 per month.

For more about Snapchat, watch:

Glassdoor, a site that tracks salaries and lets employees review their employers, also provides an intern-tracking tool. That company found that the national average annual salary for interns is about $33,120. Glassdoor, which also lists individual internship pay by company, says Amazon (AMZN) software development engineer interns make more than $6,200 per month. Meanwhile, Microsoft (MSFT) pays nearly $6,800 per month for software development engineering interns. Glassdoor’s data, which says software engineer interns at Google make $7,175 per month, was roughly similar to Folz’s findings.

Intern salaries, however, vary based on several factors including the business unit involved, the position, and an individual’s desirability. There are also a lot of interns making nothing—either because they’re working for school credit or their employers don’t pay interns. Still, working in the technology field in Silicon Valley seems like a great way to make some cash.

💰 state of top tech internship offers, 2016 #talkpaypic.twitter.com/Mkp5XWQyuE

— haute rod (@rodneyfolz) April 26, 2016

For his part, Folz says that he will release the raw data from his findings after he has anonymized the information he received from respondents. He told Fortune in an interview that he conducted the survey to help students get a leg up on employers.

“Knowing your market worth helps rebalance power away from employers to employees when negotiating,” Folz told Fortune. “And I think students should know their work has real value and be compensated accordingly.”

About the Author
By Don Reisinger
See full bioRight Arrow Button Icon

Latest in Tech

AITikTok
China’s ByteDance could be forced to sell TikTok U.S., but its quiet lead in AI will help it survive—and maybe even thrive
By Nicholas GordonDecember 2, 2025
36 minutes ago
United Nations
AIUnited Nations
UN warns about AI becoming another ‘Great Divergence’ between rich and poor countries like the Industrial Revolution
By Elaine Kurtenbach and The Associated PressDecember 2, 2025
2 hours ago
Anthropic cofounder and CEO Dario Amodei
AIEye on AI
How Anthropic’s safety first approach won over big business—and how its own engineers are using its Claude AI
By Jeremy KahnDecember 2, 2025
2 hours ago
Nvidia founder and CEO Jensen Huang reacts during a press conference at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) CEO Summit in Gyeongju on October 31, 2025.
AINvidia
Nvidia CFO admits the $100 billion OpenAI megadeal ‘still’ isn’t signed—two months after it helped fuel an AI rally
By Eva RoytburgDecember 2, 2025
4 hours ago
Big TechInstagram
Instagram CEO calls staff back to the office 5 days a week to build a ‘winning culture’—while canceling every recurring meeting
By Marco Quiroz-GutierrezDecember 2, 2025
4 hours ago
Elon Musk, standing with his arms crossed, looks down at Donald Trump sitting at his desk in the Oval Office
EconomyTariffs and trade
Elon Musk says he warned Trump against tariffs, which U.S. manufacturers blame for a turn to more offshoring and diminishing American factory jobs
By Sasha RogelbergDecember 2, 2025
4 hours ago

Most Popular

placeholder alt text
Economy
Ford workers told their CEO 'none of the young people want to work here.' So Jim Farley took a page out of the founder's playbook
By Sasha RogelbergNovember 28, 2025
4 days ago
placeholder alt text
Success
Warren Buffett used to give his family $10,000 each at Christmas—but when he saw how fast they were spending it, he started buying them shares instead
By Eleanor PringleDecember 2, 2025
11 hours ago
placeholder alt text
Success
Forget the four-day workweek, Elon Musk predicts you won't have to work at all in ‘less than 20 years'
By Jessica CoacciDecember 1, 2025
1 day ago
placeholder alt text
Innovation
Google CEO Sundar Pichai says we’re just a decade away from a new normal of extraterrestrial data centers
By Sasha RogelbergDecember 1, 2025
1 day ago
placeholder alt text
Personal Finance
Current price of gold as of December 1, 2025
By Danny BakstDecember 1, 2025
1 day ago
placeholder alt text
Economy
Elon Musk says he warned Trump against tariffs, which U.S. manufacturers blame for a turn to more offshoring and diminishing American factory jobs
By Sasha RogelbergDecember 2, 2025
4 hours ago
Rankings
  • 100 Best Companies
  • Fortune 500
  • Global 500
  • Fortune 500 Europe
  • Most Powerful Women
  • Future 50
  • World’s Most Admired Companies
  • See All Rankings
Sections
  • Finance
  • Leadership
  • Success
  • Tech
  • Asia
  • Europe
  • Environment
  • Fortune Crypto
  • Health
  • Retail
  • Lifestyle
  • Politics
  • Newsletters
  • Magazine
  • Features
  • Commentary
  • Mpw
  • CEO Initiative
  • Conferences
  • Personal Finance
  • Education
Customer Support
  • Frequently Asked Questions
  • Customer Service Portal
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms Of Use
  • Single Issues For Purchase
  • International Print
Commercial Services
  • Advertising
  • Fortune Brand Studio
  • Fortune Analytics
  • Fortune Conferences
  • Business Development
About Us
  • About Us
  • Editorial Calendar
  • Press Center
  • Work At Fortune
  • Diversity And Inclusion
  • Terms And Conditions
  • Site Map

© 2025 Fortune Media IP Limited. All Rights Reserved. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy | CA Notice at Collection and Privacy Notice | Do Not Sell/Share My Personal Information
FORTUNE is a trademark of Fortune Media IP Limited, registered in the U.S. and other countries. FORTUNE may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website. Offers may be subject to change without notice.