Roles in Web3

Technical roles

Smart Contract Developer

What you do: Write the code that handles money. Build protocols, token contracts, and DeFi logic in Solidity (Ethereum) or Rust (Solana). Test extensively because bugs can lose millions.

Day-to-day: Write Solidity, write tests in Foundry or Hardhat, get your code audited, deploy to testnet and mainnet, fix vulnerabilities.

Salary range: $120K-250K+

Frontend Engineer

What you do: Build the user interface that connects to smart contracts. Users interact with your React/Next.js app, which calls blockchain functions through their wallet.

Day-to-day: Build UI components, integrate wallet connections (wagmi, ethers.js), display on-chain data, handle transaction states (pending, confirmed, failed).

Salary range: $100K-200K+

Protocol Engineer

What you do: Work on the core blockchain infrastructure — consensus mechanisms, networking layers, or node software. This is deep systems programming.

Day-to-day: Write Go, Rust, or C++ code for blockchain clients. Optimize performance. Work on upgrades and hard forks.

Salary range: $150K-300K+

Security Auditor

What you do: Review smart contract code to find vulnerabilities before hackers do. High-stakes work — your audit is the last defense before real money goes into a contract.

Day-to-day: Read Solidity line by line, write proof-of-concept exploits, document findings, recommend fixes.

Salary range: $120K-250K+

Non-technical roles

Product Manager

What you do: Define what gets built and why. In Web3, this includes tokenomics design, governance mechanisms, and balancing on-chain vs off-chain features.

Day-to-day: Write specs, prioritize the roadmap, analyze on-chain data (Dune Analytics), gather user feedback from Discord and governance forums.

Salary range: $100K-200K+

Community Manager

What you do: Build and nurture the community on Discord, Telegram, and Twitter. In Web3, the community is the product's user base, its governance body, and its marketing engine.

Day-to-day: Moderate Discord, answer questions, organize AMAs, create educational content, escalate bugs from users to engineers.

Salary range: $60K-120K

Developer Relations (DevRel)

What you do: Help external developers build on your protocol. Create documentation, tutorials, SDKs, and demo apps. Speak at conferences.

Day-to-day: Write technical docs, build example code, run developer workshops, collect feedback on developer experience.

Salary range: $100K-200K+

Business Development

What you do: Form partnerships between protocols. In Web3, this means integrations (get your token listed on a DEX, your protocol integrated into a wallet) and co-marketing.

Day-to-day: Outreach, partnership proposals, integration coordination, deal negotiation.

Salary range: $90K-180K+

Key takeaways

• Web3 has the same roles as Web2 tech — plus a few specialized ones (smart contract dev, auditor, DevRel).
• Technical roles require Solidity/Rust/TypeScript. Non-technical roles require communication and crypto curiosity.
• Community management is uniquely important because users are also governance participants.
• Salaries are competitive with Web2 tech companies.