Labor Market Pulse · Information Technology · September 2026
Information Technology Labor Market Report: Nashville-Davidson-Murfreesboro-Franklin, TN MSA — September 2026
Nashville cybersecurity pay trails the nation by 19% — and it's starting to show.
Metro Cybersecurity Analyst pay sits at $90,000 against a $106,790 national median, while Systems Administrator pay jumped to $85,447 even as Network Engineer pay slid to $104,000 — a market sending mixed signals on where infrastructure talent should be priced.
Free archive edition. Published by WageScape as sent to subscribers; data as of September 2026.
Key indicators
- Nashville unemployment rate: 3.1% — Up from 3.0% in July; well below 4.1% national
- Cybersecurity Analyst pay gap: -$16,790 — Metro $90,000 vs national $106,790 median
- Systems Administrator pay shift: +significant — Metro $85,447, outpacing stable national trend
- Tennessee labor force change: -50,000 YoY — Shrinking bench despite low 3.4% state unemployment
Key takeaways
Cybersecurity pay gap with national market looks unsustainable.
Metro Cybersecurity Analyst pay trails the national median by nearly 19% ($90,000 vs $106,790) while national senior roles reach $400K, per Lorien Global. Remote-capable analysts have little reason to accept a Nashville discount, making this a retention blind spot rather than a savings opportunity.
Systems Administrator pay surge may signal role consolidation, not growth.
Advertised pay rose significantly to $85,447 even as Network Engineer pay fell to $104,000 locally against a national increase. This divergence is consistent with employers collapsing infrastructure roles into fewer, broader positions rather than expanding headcount — a build-vs-buy signal worth testing against actual req volume.
Statewide workforce shrinkage is quietly tightening the IT candidate pool.
Tennessee's labor force fell 50,000 year-over-year even as unemployment held near historic lows, meaning fewer passive candidates are available regardless of posted wage levels. Retention spending on cloud and security talent is increasingly a hedge against a shrinking bench, not just a competitive gesture.
Help Desk and entry-level IT pay has gone flat — and that's a warning, not stability.
Metro Help Desk pay sits stable at $52,000 while entry IT roles statewide average just $43,563, even as AI tooling compresses demand for tier-one support. Flat pay in a shrinking-demand role suggests this function is a better candidate for outsourcing than for continued internal investment.
Median advertised pay by role — Nashville-Davidson-Murfreesboro-Franklin, TN MSA
| Role | 25th percentile | Median advertised pay | 75th percentile | Metro trend | National median |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Data Scientist | $113,895 | $143,276 | $158,500 | Stable | $148,250 |
| Systems Administrator | $74,334 | $85,447 | $96,692 | Significant increase | $101,168 |
| Network Engineer | $77,031 | $104,000 | $119,218 | Moderate decline | $114,400 |
| Software Engineer | $123,243 | $151,000 | $170,487 | Stable | $153,652 |
| Help Desk/IT Support Specialist | $42,541 | $52,000 | $55,357 | Stable | $53,644 |
| Cybersecurity Analyst | $75,000 | $90,000 | $106,875 | Stable | $106,790 |
| IT Project Manager | $80,000 | $110,716 | $124,810 | Stable | $117,530 |
WageScape's median is calibrated to correct for spurious low-value postings (reported as the 60th percentile of raw advertised pay). Download: CSV · JSON
Local market conditions
Nashville's unemployment rate ticked up to 3.1% in August from 3.0% in July, even as the metro added more than 28,000 jobs over the past twelve months — a sign labor supply is tightening at the margins faster than headline growth suggests. Skilled-trades scarcity (76/100 on the WIL Institute index) and statewide labor force contraction are pulling compensation pressure into adjacent technical fields, compounding the TikTok Nashville office closure's modest addition of displaced tech-adjacent talent to the candidate pool ahead of its October 5 shutdown.
What it means
Metro-level wage divergence is now the story IT leaders need to plan around: Systems Administrator advertised pay jumped significantly to $85,447 while Network Engineer pay fell to $104,000, a signal that commodity infrastructure roles are being reclassified or absorbed into managed services rather than priced up. Cybersecurity Analyst pay sitting nearly $17,000 below the national median ($90,000 vs. $106,790) suggests Nashville employers are underpricing a function where national demand (346% above average growth per CompTIA) is accelerating, risking quiet attrition to remote national employers. Consider reviewing cybersecurity compensation against national — not metro — benchmarks before the next attrition cycle, particularly for mid-level analysts who can work remotely for better-paying employers elsewhere.
Looking ahead
Expected: TikTok's Nashville office closes October 5, releasing roughly 250 workers, some with transferable data and platform engineering skills. Watch whether these candidates surface in Nashville tech postings within 60 days or relocate, which will tell you whether local displacement actually eases hiring pressure.
Emerging pressure point: Tennessee's 7-9% year-over-year wage growth in constrained skilled trades (per WIL Institute) could spill into infrastructure and facilities-adjacent IT roles that compete for the same labor pool, particularly data center technicians and field engineers.
Worth watching: National Indeed Job Postings Index turned positive for the first time in nearly four years, trending to 103.5 in September. If Nashville tech postings follow the national uptick, expect renewed competition for cloud and security talent after a quiet hiring stretch.
Potential inflection point: Network Engineer advertised pay has moved in opposite directions locally (down) and nationally (up) this month. A continued split would suggest Nashville employers are structurally undervaluing network engineering talent relative to a national market now bidding it up — a gap that typically closes through attrition, not planning.
Methodology
Advertised pay from active employer job postings, not survey data. WageScape's median is calibrated to correct for spurious low-value postings: distribution analysis shows roughly the lowest 10% of raw values are erroneous entries, so the reported median is the 60th percentile of raw advertised pay. WageScape observes 98% of U.S. job openings daily.
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