It’s no secret that organizations everywhere are looking for data scientists and data analysts—and they’re more than happy to pay top dollar for specialists who can store, clean, and analyze data for crucial insights. As a result of that burgeoning demand, lots of people want to become data scientists and data analysts, and they often start by looking for an internship in these fields.
As you pursue your internship journey, a big question inevitably arises: which internships pay the most? Fortunately, levels.fyi has crowdsourced the top-paying data scientist and data analyst intern positions for summer 2023. As you might expect, the biggest intern paychecks come from the biggest finance and tech companies, with some surprises mixed in.
Let’s start out with the top-paying data scientist internships:
Here’s the good news: a variety of industries offer data scientist internships… but the internships at these top companies are highly competitive. For example, Netflix requires its prospective interns to endure a take-home assessment and three rounds of interviews, with questions focused not only on your technical skills, but also your “soft skills” such as empathy and communication. Exhibiting a strong passion for an organization’s mission is also important: you’ll need to explain why you want to work there.
A data science internship can set you up well for a data scientist career. If you do land a data scientist internship, pay close attention to the skills and tools utilized by the full-time data scientists around you; that will give you a good clue about what to spend your time and resources mastering.
Now let’s take a look at the highest-paying data analyst internships:
As with data scientist internships, the highest-paying data analyst internships are at a healthy mix of tech, gaming, finance, and communications companies, all of which are large enough to pay interns a very healthy per-hour rate.
If you’re interested in a career as a data analyst, you’ll have to master a variety of skills, including (but certainly not limited to):
- Data Analysis
- SQL
- Python
- Tableau
- Microsoft Power BI
- Data Science
- Data Visualization
- Business Intelligence
- Data Warehousing
- Extraction Transformation and Loading (ETL)
Data analyst interns, like junior data analysts, might be expected to analyze data and put together reports in different formats, usually under the watchful eye of mid- to senior-level data analysts. As with data scientists, it’s a position that demands a good deal of “soft skills,” as data analysts are expected to communicate their results to stakeholders throughout an organization, including senior management.
Whatever internship strategy you pursue, keep in mind that not all companies can pay these top rates. However, the skills you’ll learn at your internship will (hopefully) prove valuable for many years to come.
