Only 7% of European product jobs say what they pay

The EU Pay Transparency Directive was supposed to change how European job ads look: member states had until 7 June 2026 to transpose it, and it gives applicants the right to know a role’s pay range before the first interview. One month past that deadline, we counted the listings on our own index that actually publish a salary. Of 1,655 live product roles at European companies, 123 disclose pay — 7.4%.

Who discloses, who doesn’t

Germany leads the big markets: roughly 12% of German product listings carry a range. The UK — which isn’t bound by the directive but has an older ad-transparency culture — sits near 7%. The Netherlands is at 8–9%. France is at under 3%, and among the 50 live Spanish listings on the index, not a single one names a number.

The pattern behind those averages: disclosure comes from either regulated finance (banks publishing VP-band ranges) or from companies that hire across many countries and standardised on transparency once, globally — Zendesk, GitLab, SAP and a handful of others account for a disproportionate share of the disclosed ranges we see.

What the disclosed ranges say

Where European product roles do publish numbers, senior IC ranges cluster between €65k and €120k depending on market, with the widest published range on the index right now spanning €66k–€250k at a single Italian company. Regulated-finance roles and pan-European staff-level positions publish the highest ceilings.

What this means if you’re searching

• Treat a published range as a signal about the employer, not just the role — companies that disclose once tend to disclose everywhere, and tend to negotiate less adversarially.
• The directive’s applicant-rights kick in during the process even when the ad is silent: in EU member states you can now ask for the range before interviewing. Do it in the first call.
• On workinproduct you can filter to roles with disclosed pay — it’s a small pool, but it’s the honest pool.

We’ll re-run this count as enforcement ramps up. If the directive works, this article should age badly.