What are the Best Paid Design Professions in India? (Updated 2024)

The design industry is booming with opportunities like never before. With an eye for aesthetics, there are innumerable lucrative career paths that you can explore in the field of design. However, it can be rather confusing and daunting to navigate these career options in design. Whether you’re just starting out in the field, looking to make a career switch or wish to enhance your existing skills, this hand-picked list of the best paying design jobs in India should help you focus your efforts.

Curated with the help of PayScale, this list details the average salary in the country across the various specialisations. Do keep in mind, however, that salaries vary with the type of company, location, workforce demand, and experience.

Interaction design is the highest paid design job in India, with a typical interaction designer earning an average base salary of INR 7.64L per year. A specialised component of UX design, this field involves professionals examining how a user and a product interact with each other. In addition to identifying key interactions of products, interaction designer develops design strategies, create prototypes to test concepts, and stay updated with trends that impact users. To perform their duties, they use software like Sketchup, Figma, Adobe XD, and InVision, among others.

Cool fact: Interaction Design professionals in Chennai seem to earn an average of 28.5% more than the national average!

Automotive designers rake in an average annual base salary of INR 6.5L. This industry requires creative minds who aspire to constant innovation. The role of an automotive designer involves drafting layouts of automobile components, systems, and assemblies using sketches, prototypes, and models. In addition, they also collaborate with automobile engineers to identify design limitations and suggest precise solutions. Common software for 3D modelling used by automobile designers are Rhino, blender, and Alias.

Art directors are among the highest-paid design professionals in India with an average base salary of INR 6.46L, which may increase dramatically with the company. With growing digitisation, there is a huge demand for art directors in almost every field as they act as mediators among writers, designers, and others. Their role extends to all the design and visual elements to be used in magazines, newspapers, product packaging, and television production. They ensure the overall design strategy is aligned with the product or brand while directing others to follow in the same footsteps. 

 

With the responsibility of leading a team of many creative heads such as graphic or web designers, this role requires one to be a leader with vision, as well as an able team player.

With an average annual salary of INR 6-7L, which is 66% higher than the national average, product design is the fourth highest-paid design job in India. Bangalore and Hyderabad are preferred locations that provide higher salaries as compared to the rest of the country.

From defining a problem to designing a solution, product designers do it all.  In more specific terms, they define product specifications, create digital drawings, and design fully functional products ready to be marketed. Product designers explicitly use tools and software like Rhino, Illustrator, and Fusion 360, to name a few,

A lot of product designers have begun to explore parametricism in India, so being good at computational design tools wouldn’t go amiss!

UX design bags the fifth position among the highest paying design jobs in India. The average base salary of a UX designer lies between INR 6-7 L yearly, and you might be surprised to know that even a newbie in this field can earn up to an average of INR 4L per year. Cities such as Bangalore, Gurgaon, Pune, Mumbai, and Delhi are preferred destinations for a UX designer in India as they provide higher paychecks.

As a UX/UI designer plays a crucial role in designing and developing intuitive interfaces for digital products. They deeply understand the user behaviour and help create prototypes, while ensuring proper implementation of design elements. Sketch, figma, and balsamiq are some of the tools that come in handy for UX/UI designers.

Fact time: UX Designers are paid 19.8% more in the Silicon Plateau – Bangalore!

UI/UX is also an excellent career alternative for those with an architecture background, owing to the focus on human-centred design in both fields.

With a strong skillset in analytics, mechanics, and problem solving – industrial designers are responsible for the mass production of goods. Their expertise lies in masterfully blending artistic views with computer skills to come up with engineering models. Before developing any new product or model, they consider multiple factors including cost, usability, and functionality. To perform their duties effectively and efficiently, they usually use tools like AutoCAD, Blender, Rhino, Solidworks, etc.

A typical industrial design professional earns an average base salary of INR 6L per year in this field. It has been found that industrial designers in Chennai earn an average of 29.9% more than the national average!

As the name suggests, game designers are entrusted with the overall design of the games. They are responsible for visualising, conceptualising, and designing storylines, characters, plots, elements, and other important aspects of the game. It is again one of the highest paying design jobs, with an average base salary of about INR 6L annually in India. The salary may further be subject to your individual experience, skills, and abilities. Game design is still a niche field in India with limited job availability, but individuals with this skill may find some excellent opportunities abroad.

The fields that didn’t make the cut but are worth mentioning are Graphic Design, UI, Animation, Jewellery, Exhibition, and Architectural Design.

By now, you are quite familiar with the highest paying design jobs in which you can foresee your career. Those belonging to the AEC sector can learn computational design and parametric modelling to make their way through the design field. Novatr offers Master Computational Design Course with real-world applications, helping you master computational tools, software, and plugins. With a unique blend of mentor-led interactions, elective specialisations, and a live capstone project, this course prepares you to build designs beyond one’s imagination. Visit the course page now!

Head to our Resources page to learn more about computational design and its applications.