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Lin Xiaoyu, Mandarin AI Trainer Lin Xiaoyu Mandarin AI Trainer · 6+ Years Working remotely at a US Healthtech
4.9/5 4.9/5 4.9/5

Hire Developers in China

Want engineering capacity without outsourcing the whole project? Developers in China join your repo directly, build with AI agents like Claude Code, and report to your US leads at 50-70% below US salaries.

Hire Developer $0 cost until you hire
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24 Hours

to get matched

50-70 %

payroll savings

92 %

talent retention rate

4.9

avg client rating

200 +

teams building with us

Outcomes That Matter

Results our clients achieved.

Anketa

$200K

saved in hiring costs

24 d Avg time to hire 2 Engineers hired

A social polling platform that needed two senior engineers in place within weeks of launch.
Maneva

$27M

Series A raised

6 Specialists hired 27 d To fill AI brief

An industrial AI company that filled three briefs from one pipeline, then raised a $27M Series A.
Truckstop

8

engineers hired

22 d Avg to hire 3 Disciplines

The freight company behind the internet's first load board, adding capacity outside the US.
Tom Ferry

14

developers hired

60-70% Cost saved 5+ Role types

A global real-estate coaching company that built its first engineering function from zero.
Open Campus

70%

productivity boost

10 Engineers 2 mo To scale

A Web3 education platform that hired ten engineers to accelerate its product roadmap.
Beyond Cars

$1.5B

acquisition outcome

70% Growth 4 mo To scale

A machine-learning car marketplace that grew its Taiwan team and was acquired by Carro.
Chow Sang Sang

70%

labor cost saved

30% Revenue up 14 d To hire

A luxury jewelry retailer with 870 stores across Asia, staffing its e-commerce push.
Mixcare Health

70%

efficiency gain

5 Team members 2 Countries

A digital health platform that moved delivery to Vietnam and Malaysia without slowing down.
SatLayer

50%

productivity uplift

20% Team growth 40% Capability

A Bitcoin restaking platform that added frontend and design capacity as it scaled.
Lane Crawford Joyce

3

role types staffed

10 Engineers 2x Dev speed

A luxury retail group in Asia that stood up a Vietnam tech team in two months.
imBee

3 days

to first SDR hire

3 SDRs hired ID Hiring market

An omnichannel chat platform that built its lead generation team out of Indonesia.
WELL3

2 mo

hiring time saved

1 Lead engineer HK Hiring market

A blockchain wellness platform that hired the lead engineer anchoring its offshore team.

Hiring Developers is Easy with Second Talent

Hire in 3 steps, not 3 months.

1

Tell Us What You Are Building

Share what to ship, automate, or scale. Plus stack, budget, and timezone overlap.

2

Meet Top Picks in 24 Hours

6–8 pre-vetted Developers fluent in Claude Code and modern AI stacks. Interview the ones you like.

3

Ship From Day One

We handle contracts, payroll, and equipment. Your Developer ships real output within the first week.

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Agent-ready talent at $103K a year less.

Vetted on agentic workflows and matched to your stack before you see a résumé.

Lin Xiaoyu, Mandarin AI Trainer Chengdu, China
Vetted
MandarinSimplified ChineseEnglishResponse Rating +2

Lin writes and reviews Mandarin training data in Simplified Chinese. She rates model answers for fluency and accuracy, and rewrites translated data so it reads natively.

Advanced English Full-time Ready

Lin Xiaoyu

Mandarin AI Trainer · 6+ Years

Working remotely at a US Healthtech

Hire Lin
Tao Sun, Dedicated Game Developer Shenzhen, China
Vetted
UnityUnreal Engine 5C#C++ +2

Tao is a dual-engine game developer with both Unity and Unreal mastery. He has shipped mobile and PC titles for global publishers from China, owning gameplay frameworks, content pipelines, and platform certification.

Advanced English Full-time Ready

Tao Sun

Dedicated Game Developer · 11+ Years

Working remotely at an EU AI

Hire Tao
Xinyi Zhou, Dedicated Unreal Engine Developer Beijing, China
Vetted
Unreal Engine 5C++BlueprintsNiagara +2

Xinyi is an Unreal Engine 5 developer with deep AAA experience. She has shipped console and PC titles at Tencent and NetEase-tier studios, owning gameplay systems, animation programming, and tools work.

Advanced English Full-time Ready

Xinyi Zhou

Dedicated Unreal Engine Developer · 9+ Years

Working remotely at a US Healthtech

Hire Xinyi
Xiao Li, Dedicated DevOps Engineer Hangzhou, China
Vetted
KubernetesTerraformAWSCI/CD +2

Xiao is a DevOps engineer specializing in cloud-native infrastructure and platform engineering. She has built and maintained production environments for large-scale tech companies, with deep expertise in container orchestration and observability.

Advanced English Full-time Ready

Xiao Li

Dedicated DevOps Engineer · 7+ Years

Working remotely at an AU Fintech

Hire Xiao
Yun Zhao, Dedicated Data Engineer Beijing, China
Vetted
PythonApache SparkFlinkBigQuery +2

Yun is a data engineer with expertise in building real-time data pipelines and analytics platforms. She has designed data infrastructure for large-scale e-commerce and ad-tech companies processing billions of events daily.

Advanced English Full-time Ready

Yun Zhao

Dedicated Data Engineer · 9+ Years

Working remotely at a US Healthtech

Hire Yun

Why Second Talent?

Vetted talent, lower costs, a clear process.

  • 50-70% cost savings

    No office overhead, no traditional employee expenses.

  • AI-native talent

    Solves complex problems with 5x productivity.

  • Working U.S. hours

    4-6 hours of overlap to stay aligned.

  • Rigorous vetting

    Verified tests & interviews, and background checks.

How Second Talent Works

Customer Speaks

Feedback from teams who hired through us.

Thanks to Second Talent, Open Campus quickly built a skilled tech team of 10 within two months, boosting productivity by 70% and accelerating our Web3 platform's development.

This success has strengthened our role in decentralized education and fueled our market expansion, highlighting our leadership in Web3 innovation.

Jonah L.

Jonah L.

Head of Portfolio (raised US$100m)

Animoca Brands

Second Talent helped Beyond Cars (acquired by Carro) swiftly build a top-tier tech team in just a month, accelerating our platform's development and boosting productivity.

This success allowed us to expand into new markets, ultimately leading to our acquisition by a major automotive e-commerce company.

Garry Y.

Garry Y.

Co-Founder (acquired by Carro)

Carro

Partnering with Second Talent has been a game-changer for our tech expansion.

Their ability to source top-tier talent from Vietnam helped us scale rapidly while maintaining quality. Their pre-vetted candidates integrated seamlessly, and their account management ensured smooth onboarding.

Tom F.

Tom F.

Co-founder (#1 US Real Estate Coach)

Tom Ferry

Second Talent played a key role in our tech expansion, quickly providing high-quality frontend talent that integrated seamlessly into our projects.

Their pre-vetted candidates, smooth onboarding process, and excellent support helped us build a strong, cost-effective team that drives our success.

Marco A.

Marco A.

Co-founder & CTO

Finno

Second Talent built our team of pre-vetted engineers who made our hiring decisions straightforward.

Once onboarded, our tech team saw a significant boost in productivity and development speed. Their excellent account management and responsive customer service also ensured smooth handling of all post-onboarding HR matters.

Jack N.

Jack N.

Director of IT (10,000+ employees)

Lane Crawford

Second Talent helped us rapidly scale by sourcing top-quality SDR talent from Indonesia.

Their pre-screened candidates fit perfectly, and their smooth onboarding and support built a strong, cost-effective team that helped to test and experiment sales with another market.

Leo W.

Leo W.

Co-founder (raised US$5m)

imbee

Hire Remote Developers in China from anywhere

Wherever your team sits, hire remote Developers in China through Second Talent, with dedicated pre-vetted talent and compliant employment handled for you.

Hiring from United States

  • 4–6 hours of daily overlap with US hours
  • Delaware MSA, NDA and IP assignment on file
  • USD billing, monthly invoices, Stripe or bank transfer

Most US clients hiring Developers in China start with one engineer and scale to a 3–5 person team within the first quarter.

Hiring from Europe & the UK

  • 6–8 hours of daily overlap with CET and UK working hours
  • GDPR aligned, EU standard contractual clauses available
  • EUR or GBP billing supported, SEPA / Wise / bank transfer

European teams hiring Developers in China typically replace 3–4 senior open roles with one Second Talent engagement.

Hiring from Australia

  • 6–8 hours of daily overlap with Sydney and Melbourne working hours
  • AU-aligned contracts, ABN-friendly invoicing
  • AUD or USD billing, monthly cycle

Australian teams hiring Developers in China get the closest time-zone alignment of any offshore destination.

Hire Now

Hire Developers by Specialization in China

Guide to Hiring Developers in China

Everything you need to know about employment laws, payroll, and compliance when hiring developers in China.

China has the deepest engineering pool on earth and the most friction attached to using it. Both parts are worth understanding before you decide.

$919B

Software and IT services revenue, first five months of 2026

8M

People employed in software development

464

EF English score, 86th of 123 countries

$4,500

Monthly starting point for a senior engineer through us

Scale, and an AI hiring surge

Software and IT services revenue reached about $919 billion in the first five months of 2026, up 10.3 percent year on year, across roughly eight million people in software development. The AI competition for engineers is intense: Tencent raised technical recruitment 36 percent in 2026, AI roles account for more than 60 percent of Alibaba's hiring and more than 90 percent of Baidu's campus intake. Beijing holds 19 of the country's top 50 AI companies, Shanghai 14, with Shenzhen and Guangzhou holding 10 between them.

English is the trade-off

China scored 464 in the 2025 EF English Proficiency Index, 86th of 123. Engineering talent is exceptional and English is genuinely a constraint for most of it. Teams that succeed here run written-first, keep specifications precise, and put a bilingual lead between the team and the business.

Employment costs vary by city, not nationally

Employer contributions run 30 to 35 percent including the housing fund and are set city by city, with the contribution base banded between 60 and 300 percent of the local average wage and reset every July. Since September 2025 any agreement to waive social insurance is void, and an employee can resign on that basis and claim severance. Budget from the city, never from a national average.

See what each role actually pays in the China developer rate card.

Sources: China Ministry of Industry and Information Technology software revenue data, 2026; EF English Proficiency Index 2025; Supreme People\'s Court Interpretation II, in force September 2025.

Working Hours

40 hours/week (8 hrs/day, 5 days). "996" culture exists but is non-compliant.

Overtime Pay

150% weekdays, 200% rest days, 300% statutory holidays. Max 36 hrs OT/month.

Probation Period

1 month (<1 yr contract), 2 months (1-3 yrs), 6 months (3+ yrs).

Leave Entitlements in China

Leave Type
Entitlement
Annual Leave
5 days (1-10 yrs), 10 days (10-20 yrs), 15 days (20+ yrs).
Sick Leave
3-24 months depending on tenure. Paid at 60-100% by region.
Maternity Leave
98 days nationally + provincial extensions (30-60 extra days common).
Paternity Leave
15-30 days depending on province.
Public Holidays
11 days (New Year, Spring Festival 3 days, Qingming, Labor Day, National Day 3 days).

Notice Period

30 days (written notice) or 1 month salary in lieu.

Severance Pay

1 month per year of service. Capped at 12 months (for high earners).

Payroll & Tax in China

Component
Details
Employer Contributions
~31% (pension 16%, medical 10%, unemployment 0.5%, housing 5-12%).
Employee Contributions
~23% (pension 8%, medical 2%, unemployment 0.5%, housing 5-12%).
Income Tax
Progressive 3%-45%. Monthly standard deduction: CNY 5,000.
Minimum Wage
Beijing: CNY 2,420/mo (~$335). Shanghai: CNY 2,690/mo (~$372). Varies by city.
13th Month / Bonus
Not mandatory. Year-end bonus standard (1-6 months in tech).
Senior Developer Salary
$4,500-$5,500/mo

Second Talent handles all of this for you

Payroll, taxes, social contributions, leave tracking, contracts, and compliance in China. You focus on building your product.

Hire Talent

Pricing

Hire vetted engineers from $2,999/month*

Per full-time engineer, with vetting, employment, equipment, a dedicated partner and a replacement guarantee included. No upfront fees: you pay only when you hire.

Start Hiring

*Starting price for a full-time engineer. Final rate depends on role, seniority and location.

Frequently Asked Questions

Answers to common questions.

How much does a senior engineer in China cost?
Senior software engineers in China range from $4,500–$5,500/month through Second Talent. Mid-level: $3,200–$4,200/mo. Staff/lead level: $6,000–$7,500/mo. 50-70% lower than equivalent US salaries.
Do I need to set up a Chinese entity to hire?
No. You can hire Chinese engineers as independent contractors, or use Second Talent's Employer of Record (EOR) service to handle payroll, contracts, taxes, and local labor compliance on your behalf.
What time zone do Chinese engineers work in?
China Standard Time is UTC+8 all year, so China runs 12 hours ahead of US Eastern while US daylight time lasts and 13 hours ahead in winter. Engineers typically use an overlap model: one or two daily meetings in the early-morning US window, with the rest of the day handled async in Slack, Notion and Linear.
What kinds of roles do Chinese engineers excel at?
Backend (Java, Go, Python, C++), AI/ML (TensorFlow, PyTorch), cloud and DevOps (AWS, GCP, Kubernetes), embedded/IoT (C++, Rust, RTOS), and high-scale distributed systems. China produces strong talent across all of these.
Should I outsource software development to China or hire dedicated engineers?
Outsourcing hands a project to a vendor's team. Hiring through Second Talent adds full-time engineers from China to your own team, employed through our employer of record in China, so you set their priorities and review their code directly. On our market rates, a mid-level full-stack developer in China costs $35 to $82 an hour, against $85 to $135 in the United States. Full-time engineers start from $2,999 a month.
What do Chinese web and app developers earn?
On our rate cards, React developers in China earn ¥15K-¥95K/mo, iOS developers ¥15K-¥95K/mo, Android developers ¥15K-¥100K/mo and web developers ¥10K-¥100K+/mo. On our market rates, a mid-level mobile app developer in China charges $44 to $102 an hour and a React developer $36 to $85. See the China web developer rate card and our China cost guide.
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$0 upfront costs, pay only when you make a hire

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