2023/2024 Creative Earners National Salary Survey results released

The RGD released the results of the 11th Creative Earners National Salary Survey on December 13. 

Over 3,300 Canadian graphic design and communications professionals participated in the survey, providing insights on where and who they work for and what they get paid.

Download the 2022/2023 survey results.

The survey results are available for FREE download. If you would like to contribute to the development of future surveys, please do so in the download form.  

Through the Creative Earners National Salary Survey, the RGD, in association with DesCan, raises awareness about the country’s creative industry and provides an economic profile of the field.

Below are some highlights from the latest survey results: 

• Median salaries from 2020 to 2022 have increased over time, with Creative/Design Directors (+77%), Design Educators (+66%) and Junior Designers (+67%) seeing the highest overall increase. 
• UX Designers are also down slightly by 3%, but this may relate to the separate classification of production designers, who have an average salary significantly higher by 21% than UX Designers. 
• Women are still generally paid less than men in all job titles. Full-time Freelancers show the largest pay gap, with women earning approximately 82% of what men earn.
• LGBTQ2S+ respondents generally earn less than heterosexual respondents, with the largest pay gap being for Design/Creative Services Managers (25%), Art Directors (17%) and Creative Directors (16%). 
• BIPOC respondents are paid 10% less than the white respondents, but the gap wasn’t as big as we anticipated. The pay gap for BIPOC respondents decreased from 2021-2022 from 10% to 2.5%, with the same number of respondents in both years.
• Solo designers most commonly work with clients in the non-profit (44%), design and advertising (38%) and arts and culture (38%) sectors. Top-billed services include graphic design (82.5%), branding and brand strategy (60%) and web design (44%). Least billed services include motion graphics (12%), digital accessibility (9%) and AR/VR (<1%).
• Hybrid work models are the way forward for most of the industry. 

Thanks to our 2023 Partners: Clear Space and Moveable

2023 Sponsors: Applied Arts, Creative Niche, Mitchell Sandham and York University School of Continuing Studies