In Almaty, more than 52,000 workers receive salaries above 1 million tenge. This is almost 1.6 times more than in Astana. At the same time, the southern capital surpasses the current capital not only in the number of highly paid workers but also in their share. This was reported by Qazaqyia.kz citing Kursiv Media.

According to the Bureau of National Statistics (BNS) study on wage distribution for 2026, in Almaty 52,118 workers have incomes above 1 million tenge, or 11.4% of the total number of workers covered by the survey in the city. In Astana, there are 32,128 such workers, or 10.6%.

Thus, Almaty is ahead of the capital by 19,990 people. However, the difference in shares is significantly smaller and amounts to 0.8 percentage points. This is explained, among other things, by the scale of the labor markets. In Almaty, the survey covered 458,200 workers, while in Astana — 302,500.

At the same time, both cities stand out noticeably against the national background. Across Kazakhstan, 187,994 workers receive salaries above 1 million tenge, or 5.6% of the surveyed number.

Almaty and Astana together account for 84,200 workers with million-tenge salaries. This is almost 45% of their total number in Kazakhstan, although the share of the two cities in the number of workers covered by the study is about 22.5%.

The difference between the cities is even more noticeable in the segment of the highest salaries. In Almaty, 6,317 workers receive accrued salaries above 3 million tenge. In Astana, there are 2,784 such workers. Thus, in the southern capital there are almost 2.3 times more of them.

The share of such workers also differs. In Almaty it is 1.38%, in Astana — 0.92%. This means that high salaries in Almaty are somewhat more widespread even taking into account the larger number of workers.

In total, 14,552 workers in Kazakhstan receive salaries above 3 million tenge. Almaty accounts for 43.4% of this category, Astana — 19.1%. Together, the two cities concentrate more than 62% of workers with such incomes.

Despite the concentration of high salaries in the largest cities, the distribution of incomes across the country as a whole looks different. Of the 3.38 million workers covered by the survey, about 2.02 million people receive no more than 400,000 tenge. This is 59.9% of the total number. A salary above 1 million tenge is found in only every eighteenth worker.

The BNS study is based on data on accrued wages of workers who fully worked in April 2026. The survey includes large organizations, as well as a sample of organizations with up to 250 workers. Therefore, the results do not cover all employed Kazakhstanis, including the self-employed and part of small business workers.

The indicators reflect accrued wages before the deduction of mandatory payments, not the amount workers receive in hand.

Earlier, Kursiv wrote that real wages of Kazakhstanis continue to fall, most sharply in IT and education.