The skills employers ask for are visible in the postings, not in the course catalogues. Of 140,131 live AI-related postings, 63,380 name at least one specific tool, 13,131 tools in all. Python leads with 9,786 mentions. The top 20, counted this month, is below, with what each one means for an AI engineer.
The number this article rests on: 63,380 of 140,131 live postings name a specific AI tool, and the top 20 tools account for 57,914 of those mentions. Measured October 2026.
A skills list written by a school tells you what is teachable. A skills list counted from postings tells you what is hired. This page is the second kind. Level reads every live posting for the tools it names, keeps the ones that appear in at least one posting, and ranks them by frequency. The ranking is re-counted monthly, so a tool that fades from postings fades from this page.
What tools do AI engineer jobs ask for?
The 20 most named tools across 63,380 live postings are led by Python (9,786), Aws (6,341), and Excel (4,242). Model providers and coding assistants outrank training frameworks: Python appears 3.8 times as often as PyTorch. The market hires people who build on models more than people who train them. Measured October 2026.
- Python: 9,786 live postings.
- Aws: 6,341 live postings.
- Excel: 4,242 live postings.
- Sql: 3,414 live postings.
- Kubernetes: 3,106 live postings.
- C: 3,009 live postings.
- Java: 2,744 live postings.
- Claude: 2,673 live postings.
- Salesforce: 2,648 live postings.
- PyTorch: 2,547 live postings.
- Microsoft Office: 2,342 live postings.
- Copilot: 1,939 live postings.
- Linux: 1,917 live postings.
- OpenAI: 1,778 live postings.
- Databricks: 1,725 live postings.
- Docker: 1,612 live postings.
- Cursor: 1,584 live postings.
- Crm: 1,528 live postings.
- Typescript: 1,511 live postings.
- Sap: 1,468 live postings.
Each link opens the live list of postings naming that tool, so you can check the count against the jobs behind it.
Do AI engineers need to know machine learning frameworks?
Less often than the title suggests. The training-side tools, PyTorch (2,547) and Databricks (1,725), are named less often than the model APIs and coding assistants, Claude (2,673), Copilot (1,939), OpenAI (1,778), and Cursor (1,584). Framework skills still matter for the 634 machine learning engineer postings and the 7,176 roles rated Builds AI. Measured October 2026.
The practical split, from the postings:
- Applied AI engineer. Builds products on top of hosted models. Postings name Claude, Copilot, an orchestration layer such as LangChain or LangGraph, and a coding assistant. 621 postings carry the title AI engineer.
- Machine learning engineer. Trains, evaluates, and serves models. Postings name PyTorch, TensorFlow, Databricks, MLflow, or Vertex AI. 634 postings carry the title.
- LLM engineer. Sits between the two: fine-tuning, evaluation, retrieval. 482 postings carry the title.
Pay is close across the split. Median maximum salary is $250,000 for AI engineer postings (169 with a USD range) and $265,160 for machine learning engineers (274). Pick the side by the work you want, not the pay.
Do I need a degree to be an AI engineer?
Mostly no, by what employers write. Only 270 of 621 live AI engineer postings state a degree requirement, and across the whole catalogue 55,023 postings do (39.3%). What postings ask for instead is named tools and shipped work. Measured October 2026.
That does not make the job easy to enter. Seniority is known on 132,133 postings, and among those 67,609 are senior or lead against 14,096 junior or intern. The skills list above is the shortest path in: one hosted model API, one orchestration library, one coding assistant, and something you built with them that a hiring manager can open. The step-by-step route, from a first engineering job to a role that builds AI, is in how to become an AI engineer.
Are AI engineers still in demand?
Yes, on the numbers. 621 live postings carry the AI engineer title, 634 machine learning engineer, and 482 LLM engineer. Counting by work rather than title, 7,176 postings are rated Builds AI, where building AI systems is the job, at 967 companies in the catalogue. Measured October 2026.
Demand is concentrated where the models are built and served: Software Engineering (3,568 rated Builds AI), Data (1,460 rated Builds AI), and Research (1,133 rated Builds AI). The rest of the catalogue hires people who use AI rather than build it, which is a different skills list and a different article: What type of jobs are in AI?.
The jobs right now
Generated from the live catalogue: postings rated Builds AI, where building AI systems is the job. Newest first, refreshed every six hours.
