Hong Kong Salary Research 2026: Official Wage and Earnings Statistics

Salary research in Hong Kong starts with three official releases: the Annual Earnings and Hours Survey for wage levels, the quarterly wage and payroll statistics for movement, and the minimum wage for the legal floor. Each measure has its own reference period, covered population and definition of pay. Read the figure with its limits, or the figure will mislead you.

This page reports the figures as published, with their dates, and shows how to pick the right release for a question. It contains no forecast, no agency ranking and no pay range beyond what the cited releases state.

What the official statistics measure

The Census and Statistics Department published the 2025 Annual Earnings and Hours Survey results on 23 March 2026, from a sample of about 10,000 business undertakings. The survey measures the level and distribution of wages across employees in Hong Kong for the reference period May to June 2025.

The same department released wage and payroll statistics for March 2026 on 26 June 2026. These indices track how average wage rates and payroll per person moved year on year.

The Labour Department maintains the current statutory minimum wage rate and the review mechanism behind it.

All three are called wages, and all three count different money over different people. Here is what each one answers, over whom, and what its pay figure counts.

Wage levels and their spread: the Annual Earnings and Hours Survey

Use it to answer what people earn and how widely pay is spread. The 2025 survey reports May to June 2025. It covers employees under Minimum Wage Ordinance coverage in business undertakings outside agriculture, forestry and fishing; government employees, exempted student interns, work experience students and live-in domestic workers sit outside it, and so do employees with zero working hours in the reference period. Its pay figure counts basic wage, commission and tips not of a gratuitous nature, guaranteed bonuses and allowances, and overtime allowance, and leaves out bonuses and allowances of a gratuitous nature, end of year payment and payments in kind.

Whether pay is rising: the wage and payroll indices

Use these to answer whether pay is moving and how fast. The March 2026 release carries the wage index for March 2026 and payroll per person engaged for the first quarter of 2026, each against a year earlier. The wage index covers employees up to supervisory level only, while the payroll index covers employees at all levels plus proprietors actively engaged in the work of the establishment. The wage rate counts basic wages and other regular and guaranteed allowances and bonuses, and excludes earnings from overtime work and discretionary bonuses; payroll counts all of that plus those irregular payments.

The legal floor: the statutory minimum wage

Use it to answer what an employer may not go below. The Labour Department publishes the rate in force from 1 May 2026. It reaches every employee under the Minimum Wage Ordinance, with the exemptions the Labour Department lists. It is an hourly floor rather than a market rate, so it sets a bottom and says nothing about what a role pays.

The Annual Earnings and Hours Survey includes overtime allowance but excludes bonuses of a gratuitous nature. The payroll measure includes discretionary bonuses and overtime allowances. Read each figure using its own pay definition and reference period.

Median and percentile wages, May to June 2025

The 2025 Annual Earnings and Hours Survey put the median monthly wage of employees in Hong Kong at HK$21,200 for May to June 2025, 3.5% higher than the HK$20,500 median of May to June 2024.

Monthly wage, May to June 2025	Amount
10th percentile	HK$11,000
25th percentile	HK$15,300
Median, or 50th percentile	HK$21,200
75th percentile	HK$33,000
90th percentile	HK$51,300
Source: Survey results of 2025 Annual Earnings and Hours Survey, released 23 March 2026.

The median hourly wage for the same period was HK$85.7, 3.4% higher than the HK$82.9 median of May to June 2024. By sex, the median hourly wage of male employees was HK$96.8 and of female employees HK$75.8. By age, employees aged 35 to 44 recorded the highest median hourly wage at HK$100.0, per the same release.

Is this a median or a mean?

The wage levels on this page come from the Annual Earnings and Hours Survey, and that release publishes medians and percentiles rather than a mean. The quarterly wage and payroll release does work in averages, but it reports them as index movements against a year earlier rather than as a mean wage level, so it publishes no average wage figure to set beside these medians. The median is the cutpoint at the middle of the ranked distribution. It is not a promise that exactly half of covered employees sit on each side, because many employees share the same wage and a tie at the cutpoint puts several people on the line itself. A mean adds every wage and divides by the number of employees, and it answers a different question.

The five points in the table describe the distribution at five places. They do not tell you what the mean is, because that would need the whole distribution, which the release does not reproduce. So when someone quotes a Hong Kong pay figure, ask three things: is it a median or a mean, who does it cover, and which period does it describe. Those three answers are what tell you which other figures it can fairly be set beside.

Choosing the right comparison evidence

The percentile table is broad, historical and population-wide. It is good evidence for one narrow question and poor evidence for most others. Work down this list before deciding which release, or which other source, answers what you are asking.

1. Name the question first. The percentile table answers one thing: where a monthly wage sits in the spread of covered employees for May to June 2025. For what an occupation pays now, go to the occupation and industry tables in the full survey report. For how far pay has moved since that survey, use the wage and payroll indices and read their coverage first. For whether one offer is good, no official release answers that.
2. Build a figure the table can accept. Use the survey’s own definition, for one normal month in the reference period: count basic wage, commission and tips that are not gratuitous, guaranteed bonuses and allowances, and overtime allowance. Leave out bonuses and allowances of a gratuitous nature, end of year payment, and payments in kind.
3. Read a band, not a rank. The May to June 2025 cutpoints are HK$11,000 at the 10th percentile, HK$15,300 at the 25th, HK$21,200 at the median, HK$33,000 at the 75th and HK$51,300 at the 90th. A comparable monthly wage falling between two neighbouring cutpoints sits in that band, so a wage above HK$21,200 and below HK$33,000 sits between the median and the 75th percentile. Below HK$11,000 is under the 10th percentile, and above HK$51,300 is over the 90th. A wage landing exactly on a published cutpoint sits at that cutpoint with everyone else who shares the figure, rather than in the band above or below.
4. Write down what the band leaves open, then go to the occupation and industry tables for the part it cannot answer.

A band is not a rank. The table publishes five cutpoints, not the whole distribution, so it can say where a figure sits relative to those cutpoints and no finer. It cannot support a statement such as “I am at the 63rd percentile”. Wages tie, so a figure landing exactly on a published cutpoint sits at that cutpoint together with everyone else on it, rather than above or below, and a small difference in pay need not mean a different position.

The comparable figure is also not an offer total. It is built from one normal month in a past reference period under a survey definition, so it is not the annual package an employer proposes, and a total built from an offer should not be read against these bands.

Why the movement figures cannot update your position

It is tempting to take the wage index, up 3.4% in nominal terms in the year to March 2026, and work out where a May to June 2025 wage would sit today. That does not work, and the releases do not support it.

The two measures differ in all three respects at once. Their periods differ, May to June 2025 against a March 2026 year-on-year comparison. Their populations differ, because the wage index covers only employees up to supervisory level while the survey covers employees in scope under Minimum Wage Ordinance coverage at every level. Their measures differ, because the index tracks average wage rates with the occupational mix held constant rather than the position of one person in a distribution.

The index tells you the direction pay moved for the population it covers. It does not move a wage within the survey’s distribution, and nothing published establishes that it would.

Wage and payroll movement to March 2026

The March 2026 wage and payroll release reports that the average wage rate for all the selected industry sections surveyed, as measured by the wage index, rose 3.4% in nominal terms and 1.7% in real terms in March 2026 over a year earlier.

Index, year-on-year change	Nominal	Real
Wage index, March 2026	+3.4%	+1.7%
Payroll per person engaged, first quarter 2026	+3.4%	+1.8%
Source: Wage and payroll statistics for March 2026, released 26 June 2026.

The headline hides a spread. Per the same release, about 62% of companies reported an increase in average wage rates in March 2026 over a year earlier, 33% recorded a decrease, and the remaining 5% reported virtually no change. An average rise is not a rise for everyone, and a third of surveyed companies moved the other way.

Across the selected industry sections, nominal wage indices in March 2026 rose between 2.5% and 4.0% year on year, so the direction was shared while the pace differed by industry.

The two indices answer different questions and cover different people. The wage index tracks the price of labour for employees up to supervisory level with the occupational mix held constant. The payroll index covers employees at all levels plus proprietors actively engaged in the establishment’s work, and it moves with the hours worked and with the timing of bonuses and back pay as well as with wage rates, which is why payroll statistics tend to show larger quarter-to-quarter changes.

Nominal and real are not interchangeable. The nominal figure is the change in the money amount. The real figure is what remains after consumer price movement, and the release deflates the two measures with different price indices: the Consumer Price Index (A) for wages and the Composite Consumer Price Index for payroll, because their occupation coverage differs. A 3.4% nominal wage rise against a 1.7% real rise means about half of the increase was absorbed by prices.

Statutory minimum wage from 1 May 2026

The Labour Department states that the statutory minimum wage rate is raised to HK$43.1 per hour with effect from 1 May 2026. The monthly monetary cap on the requirement for employers to record employees’ total hours worked rises to HK$17,600 in tandem. The Government has implemented an annual review mechanism that applies a formula to the rate, as the Labour Department page records.

The minimum wage is a legal floor, not a market rate. The May to June 2025 survey medians sit well above it, but the floor still governs offers for hourly-paid roles and interacts with the record-keeping duty, per the Labour Department page.

The Labour Department also publishes its own minimum wage reference calculator and the guidelines behind it. For any question about whether a specific wage arrangement complies, that is the authoritative tool, and this page is not.

Occupation and industry limits

Each figure above carries coverage boundaries. Applying a figure outside them produces a wrong answer.

The Annual Earnings and Hours Survey covers business undertakings in every industry except agriculture, forestry and fishing, and within them the employees who are under Minimum Wage Ordinance coverage. Government employees, exempted student interns, work experience students and live-in domestic workers sit outside it, and so do employees with zero working hours in the reference period. Its wage definition counts guaranteed bonuses and allowances and overtime allowance, and leaves out bonuses and allowances of a gratuitous nature, end of year payment and payments in kind.

The wage index covers employees only up to supervisory level, so managerial and professional employees sit outside it. Its wage rate counts basic wages and other regular and guaranteed allowances and bonuses, and excludes earnings from overtime work and discretionary bonuses, which the payroll measure includes.

The payroll index in the same release covers employees at all levels plus actively engaged proprietors, and it counts discretionary bonuses and overtime allowances alongside regular pay.

The statutory minimum wage has exemptions, including specified student interns and work experience students, and the Labour Department page lists them.

Because the definitions differ, no single figure above is total compensation. Equity, and benefits that are not paid in money, sit outside all of them.

How to use these figures in salary research

Decide the question first, then pick the release that answers it, using the checklist above. Use the percentile table for the spread of covered employees in the survey period. Go to the occupation and industry tables in the full survey report before drawing any conclusion about one role. Use the wage and payroll indices to date-stamp movement between survey rounds, remembering that they cover different populations from the survey and from each other. Use the minimum wage as the current legal floor for hourly-paid work.

When you brief a recruitment partner, ask which evidence sits behind any pay figure they quote: the source, the reference period, the covered population, and whether it is a median or a mean. If the answer is a proprietary survey, ask who was surveyed and when, because a figure drawn from one firm’s own placements describes that firm’s placements. Our recruitment agency fee guide covers the parallel question on fees, and the Hong Kong recruitment market overview sets the wider context.

A statistical median is not an offer benchmark for a specific candidate. Pay for one role depends on the occupation, industry, seniority and the employer’s own structure, and the official releases do not publish a figure for your exact vacancy.

To find listed agencies, start from the recruitment directory. A directory entry records what is published about a firm; it is not a check of that firm’s current standing with the Labour Department, which our guide to checking an agency’s official standing covers separately.

Common questions

What is the median monthly wage in Hong Kong?

HK$21,200 for May to June 2025, per the 2025 Annual Earnings and Hours Survey released on 23 March 2026. The figure covers employees in scope under Minimum Wage Ordinance coverage, and leaves out government employees, exempted student and work experience placements, live-in domestic workers, and employees with zero working hours in the reference period.

Is my salary above average in Hong Kong?

Compare it against the published cutpoints rather than one figure. For May to June 2025, HK$33,000 was the 75th percentile cutpoint and HK$51,300 the 90th, so a comparable monthly wage above HK$33,000 sits above the 75th percentile cutpoint, and a wage exactly at it sits on that cutpoint with everyone else who shares the figure. Two cautions apply: the distribution covers every occupation and industry together, so it locates a wage among Hong Kong employees generally rather than among people doing your job, and the release publishes cutpoints rather than an exact rank.

What is a good salary in Hong Kong?

The official releases do not answer that, and neither does this page. They publish where wages sat: the median was HK$21,200 a month in May to June 2025, the 75th percentile HK$33,000 and the 90th HK$51,300. The survey does collect occupation and working hours, and its full report carries occupation and industry tables, so it can tell you what a group was paid. What it does not do is judge one offer: whether a particular figure is good for you depends on the whole package and your own circumstances, which no statistical release evaluates.

How much did Hong Kong wages rise in the year to March 2026?

The wage index rose 3.4% in nominal terms and 1.7% in real terms year on year. The index covers employees up to supervisory level only. The same release records that about 62% of surveyed companies reported an increase, 33% a decrease and 5% virtually no change.

What is the statutory minimum wage in Hong Kong in 2026?

HK$43.1 per hour with effect from 1 May 2026, per the Labour Department. The monthly cap on the hours-recording requirement rises to HK$17,600 alongside it.

Can I use these figures to set an offer for one role?

Use them as context, not as the number. The releases publish distribution and index figures with defined coverage, and none of them states pay for a specific vacancy. Check the occupation and industry tables in the full survey release and your own market evidence before setting an offer.

About this research

All information is compiled from sources available on the open internet. Figures are quoted from the cited government releases with their reference periods. Confirm the release dates above before reusing a number, and prefer the newest release for any decision.