Recording engineer
| Highest | $7,500 / mo · United States |
|---|---|
| Experience | 5+ yrs |
| Degree | Required |
| First paycheck | ~6 to 12 months |
Pay in the destination countries
Monthly, in US dollars. Each country is an Imora admission package — open one for that route's fees, language requirement and deadline.
| Country | Monthly |
|---|---|
| United StatesTOEFL 80–100 · $10–70k | $7,500max |
| Hong KongIELTS 6.0–6.5 · HK–200k | $6,400 |
| SingaporeIELTS 6.5 · SGD 18–35k | $6,400 |
| United KingdomIELTS 6.0–7.0 · £11–38k | $6,400 |
| CanadaIELTS 6.0–6.5 · CAD 20–40k | $5,850 |
| AustraliaIELTS 6.0–6.5 · AUD 30–50k | $5,400 |
What does the day look like?
A studio sound engineer works irregular shifts lasting 10 to 14 hours per day. Recording sessions routinely begin between 14:00 and 18:00 and run overnight until 02:00 to 06:00. Night shifts, weekend work, and short-notice on-call bookings are standard across the commercial sector.
While many imagine the job is creative mixing alongside famous artists, 65% of the day consists of routine technical maintenance: coiling cables, labeling tracks, cleaning session files, phase alignment, vocal tuning, hardware troubleshooting, running headphone lines, bouncing stems, and waiting during artist downtime. Another 25% is mechanical tracking operations such as pressing record, setting gain levels, and organizing takes. Only 10% is unconstrained creative mixing. Daily work relies on hardware like Neumann U87, Shure SM7B, and AKG C414 microphones, Neve 1073 preamps, Universal Audio 1176 compressors, and software including Avid Pro Tools Ultimate, Apple Logic Pro, Celemony Melodyne 5, and FabFilter Pro-Q3.
Where does this lead?
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