When it comes to plentiful jobs in artificial intelligence (A.I.) and machine learning, the largest states continue to dominate, according to CompTIA’s latest tech jobs report. 

California and Texas enjoyed thousands of open A.I. jobs in February, with notable month-over-month increases. Massachusetts, Virginia, Washington, New York, and other states offered up hundreds of jobs. Check out the full chart:

The reason for this ranking should be clear: These states host the world’s largest tech companies, all of which are spending immense amounts of resources on securing the best tech talent in A.I. and machine learning. In addition, these states also have robust networks of universities, startups, research firms, and all of the other elements necessary for encouraging the development and implementation of A.I. projects and initiatives. 

As you can see from the above data, the market for A.I. jobs is still pretty small (remember, it’s a highly specialized sub-field) but growing at a healthy clip. That size, combined with the amount of training needed to master A.I. and machine-learning tools, ultimately benefits technologists, as organizations are happy to pay a healthy premium in order to secure the A.I. talent they need. 

In late 2021, O’Reilly pegged the average salary of data and A.I. professionals at $146,000 per year (that’s from 2,778 respondents in the U.S. and 284 in the U.K.), with salaries increasing an average of 2.25 percent per year. Average compensation was highest in California ($176,000), which, again, hosts many of those large tech companies with infinite budgets for talent. Pretty much every industry is interested in A.I. talent, as well, which means new opportunities—no matter where (and how) you work.