annotation jobs in 2026 — demand, top roles hiring, and related skills
As of 2026-09-30, annotation appears in 172 job postings indexed by Skillenai over the past 90 days — AI Quality Evaluator has the most postings mentioning annotation.
Last updated · 90d ending 2026-09-30
Which roles want annotation?
Upload your resume and Skillenai will show which roles your annotation experience fits, which skills you already cover, and what is missing.
Prepare to discuss annotation in your interview
We’re building mock interviews informed by job postings and career profiles, to help you explain how you’ve used annotation.
Frequently asked questions about annotation
+Is annotation in demand in 2026?
Yes. annotation appears in 172 job postings indexed by Skillenai over the 90 days ending 2026-09-30. AI Quality Evaluator accounts for the most postings mentioning annotation (7.0% of all postings mentioning annotation).
+What jobs require annotation?
According to the Skillenai jobs index over the 90 days ending 2026-09-30, among roles with at least 20 postings, the highest shares mentioning annotation are AI Data Annotator (9.1% of that role’s postings mention annotation), AI Evaluator (7.4% of that role’s postings mention annotation), Quality Assurance Lead (6.6% of that role’s postings mention annotation).
+What skills are commonly paired with annotation?
Across job postings indexed by Skillenai (90 days ending 2026-09-30), annotation most often appears alongside data labeling, Python, RLHF, model evaluation, evaluation.
+Where is annotation most in demand?
As of 2026-09-30, the metro areas posting the most jobs requiring annotation are New York City, Seattle, San Francisco, Berlin, London, according to the Skillenai jobs index.
+How can I keep up with new annotation content and jobs?
Skillenai indexes news, blog posts, and research papers mentioning annotation alongside the jobs index. You can subscribe to a daily email digest of new annotation content from your Skillenai account.
+Which skills come before and after annotation?
The skill-flow chart shows skills documented in adjacent positions across observed employer changes. An outgoing skill is documented in the following position but not the preceding one. These are ideas to explore, not proven prerequisites, acquisition dates, or levels of mastery. Each ribbon counts employer moves with that skill pair; one move can contribute several pairs.
Weekly indexed postings requiring annotation — last 90 days
Career paths around annotation
Skills documented before and after this skill across employer changes.
Historical career profiles · all locations
Skills before annotation
Skills after annotation
How to read this chart · view counts
Each side is an independent set of observed employer moves, not the same people followed through three stages. Ribbon widths compare move counts within that side. Internal moves are not included.
The following position documents a skill that the preceding position does not. Skills must be linked to both positions, with clear dates and no overlap. One move can connect several skill pairs. These patterns suggest skills to explore; they do not establish prerequisites, when a skill was learned, or a higher skill level.
Source: Skillenai talent graph, historical career profiles. Historical descriptions and coverage can change. Only the leading published connections are shown.
| Connection | Moves |
|---|---|
| Before: Object Injection | 1 |
| Before: particle detectors | 1 |
| Before: python | 1 |
| Before: information architecture | 1 |
| Before: particles | 1 |
| Before: on-call rotations | 1 |
| Before: Portuguese language | 1 |
| Before: implementation | 1 |
| After: online tools | 1 |
| After: text annotation | 1 |
Roles most likely to require annotation
Among roles with at least 20 postings in the same period.
| Role | Postings mentioning skill | % of role postings mentioning skill |
|---|---|---|
| AI Data Annotator | 2 | 9.1% |
| AI Evaluator | 2 | 7.4% |
| Quality Assurance Lead | 6 | 6.6% |
| Deep Learning Engineer | 2 | 6.1% |
| AI Training Specialist | 2 | 5.1% |
| AI Data Scientist | 1 | 5.0% |
| Bioinformatics Scientist | 1 | 5.0% |
| Generative AI Analyst | 1 | 4.8% |
| AI Quality Analyst | 1 | 4.2% |
| Data Labeling Analyst | 1 | 3.8% |
Roles with the most annotation postings
| Role | Postings mentioning skill | Share of skill postings |
|---|---|---|
| AI Quality Evaluator | 12 | 7.0% |
| Software Engineer | 12 | 7.0% |
| Product Manager | 8 | 4.7% |
| QA Expert | 8 | 4.7% |
| AI Data Contributor | 6 | 3.5% |
| Quality Assurance Lead | 6 | 3.5% |
| AI Narration Reviewer | 3 | 1.7% |
| Creative Design Specialist | 3 | 1.7% |
| Machine Learning Engineer | 3 | 1.7% |
| AI Agent LLM Engineer | 2 | 1.2% |
Top companies posting jobs requiring annotation
Employers ranked by indexed job postings in the last 90 days.
| Company | Postings · 90 days |
|---|---|
| OpenBrain | 70 |
| Canva | 16 |
| Mercor | 12 |
| Weloglobal | 6 |
| Welo Data | 4 |
| Anthropic | 4 |
| Thealleninstitute | 4 |
| Scale AI | 3 |
| Allen Institute for AI | 2 |
| Wayve | 2 |
Job postings indexed over the past 90 days, grouped by resolved employer. Counts are postings, not hires. Companies without a published page appear without a link.
Top metros hiring for annotation
| Name | Postings | Share |
|---|---|---|
| New York City | 8 | 4.7% |
| Seattle | 6 | 3.5% |
| San Francisco | 4 | 2.3% |
| Berlin | 3 | 1.7% |
| London | 3 | 1.7% |
| Sunnyvale | 3 | 1.7% |
| Sydney | 3 | 1.7% |
| Amsterdam | 2 | 1.2% |
| Bengaluru | 2 | 1.2% |
Skills commonly paired with annotation
Get a daily email digest of new annotation content
Skillenai indexes news articles, blog posts, and research papers that mention annotation. Click below and we'll open a pre-filled daily digest — change the cadence to hourly or weekly if you prefer, then save. Free account required (~30 seconds).
Explore related pages
How this was computed
Counts derive from the Skillenai jobs index over the 90 days ending 2026-09-30. Skills are resolved against the Skillenai canonical taxonomy, so the same entity is counted whether a posting writes 'Python', 'Python 3', or 'python'. Role prevalence divides postings mentioning annotation by all postings for each role in the same window, ranking roles with at least 20 postings. Role distribution divides each role’s annotation postings by all annotation postings, including postings without a role. Shares need not sum to 100% for the displayed roles. Pages refresh weekly (or daily for the top-50 most-requested skills). An adjusted trend is not shown because comparable posting coverage is insufficient.
- source
- Skillenai jobs index, deduplicated daily
- entity_id
- ce1fc745e694372c
- data_as_of
- 2026-09-30
- window_days
- 90
The demand, skills, and geo numbers on this page come from the same Skillenai labor market index that powers our API. Use it for compensation benchmarking, hiring-competition analysis, and skill-adoption tracking.
Skillenai for recruiters →