Should You Use TypeScript? Here's What It Actually Costs

I've hired both and the salary difference will make you cry. TypeScript devs cost about 30% more than JavaScript developers, and every year they get pickier about compensation. Recent salary surveys show TypeScript developers averaging $122k annually, while JavaScript developer rates range significantly lower.

Why Your Budget Will Cry

Here's the reality from hiring in 2025:

Senior TypeScript devs want $150k-175k while JavaScript seniors are usually happy with $110k-130k. CloudDevs data confirms TypeScript developer salaries averaging $122k annually, with top tech firms paying $120k-$180k annually. That's like $40-45k more per dev, per year. Had one candidate straight-up laugh when I offered $140k - said he had three other offers starting at $165k. My 5-person team's salary costs jumped from $650k to maybe $820k, something like that, just making the switch.

Contractors are even worse. TypeScript contractors charge $120-180/hour while JavaScript contractors are $80-120/hour. Arc's developer rate data shows JavaScript hourly rates typically $61-80 globally, while TypeScript specialists command premiums averaging $91k+ base with significant regional variations. TeamCubate reports JavaScript developers at $25-150/hour varying by experience vs significantly higher TypeScript rates. I learned this shit the hard way when our contractor bill hit $28k for work that should've cost maybe $18k.

The Supply Problem is Real

There just aren't enough TypeScript developers. Everyone wants them, but half the JavaScript devs claiming TypeScript skills can't handle generics without having a complete meltdown.

I posted a TypeScript job last month and got maybe 40 applicants. Same exact role for JavaScript? Something like 120+ applicants. The TypeScript candidates were pickier as hell - demanding higher salaries, better benefits, full remote, and one guy wanted a $5k signing bonus just to consider our offer.

The worst part? Many "TypeScript" developers are just JavaScript devs who read the docs once. I've interviewed dozens who fall apart when you ask about conditional types or mapped types. Had one "senior TypeScript developer" who couldn't explain the difference between interface and type. Another one claimed 5 years of TypeScript experience but had never heard of discriminated unions. Finding someone who actually knows TypeScript well enough to architect with it? Good fucking luck.

Hidden Costs That Will Fuck You

Recruiting takes forever. Finding a decent TypeScript dev takes roughly 3+ months versus maybe 6 weeks for JavaScript. My last TypeScript hire took 4 months and we ended up paying $15k to a recruiter just to find someone who wouldn't quit after two weeks.

Training costs money. Converting JavaScript teams costs real money - budget around $10k per developer between training, lost productivity, and senior dev time babysitting. We spent 3 months with half our team basically useless while they fought with the compiler. Had to buy every developer a Frontend Masters subscription ($390/year each) plus send two seniors to a TypeScript workshop in Austin ($3k each including travel). Still took them weeks to understand why T extends keyof U isn't the same as T extends U[keyof U].

Junior devs quit. I've had three junior developers bail during TypeScript transitions. The learning curve breaks some people, especially when the compiler starts bitching about every line they write.

Geographic Reality Check

Offshore isn't much cheaper. Ukrainian TypeScript developers still cost around 70-80% more than their JavaScript counterparts. Regional rate analysis shows JavaScript developers at $46-65/hour globally, while TypeScript developers command higher rates across all regions. The TypeScript premium exists everywhere.

Remote work fucked everything up. Now that everyone can hire remotely, TypeScript developers have global opportunities. Lost two developers in 2024 to remote Bay Area companies offering $180k+ for the same work they were doing here for $135k. Your local TypeScript dev can just as easily work for a Silicon Valley company paying 40% more and never leave their bedroom.

When It's Worth the Pain

Look, TypeScript developers are expensive for a reason. If your project is:

• Over 50k lines of code
• Has more than 5 developers
• Will be maintained for 2+ years
• Already having production bugs from type errors

Then pay the premium. The TypeScript tax pays for itself when you're not fixing "Cannot read property 'user' of undefined" at 3 AM on a Saturday because some frontend dev assumed the API response would always have a user object (it didn't during server maintenance).

But if you're building an MVP or have a small team? Just use JavaScript and save the money for when you actually need TypeScript's benefits. Don't pay enterprise prices for startup problems.

And here's the thing - those salary premiums I just told you about? That's just the tip of the iceberg. The real wallet-crushing costs come from build times that'll make you question your career choices, migration nightmares that drag on for months, and infrastructure upgrades that'll triple your AWS bills...

TypeScript's dirty secret isn't just the salary premium

• it's the soul-crushing build times and migration disasters that nobody mentions in those cheerful blog posts.

The [TypeScript Performance Wiki](https://github.com/microsoft/Type

Script/wiki/Performance) admits these issues exist, but good luck finding that buried in the docs. Performance optimization studies show significant compilation bottlenecks, while Microsoft's native port plans promise 10x faster builds

• eventually.

Compilation is Slow as Hell

TypeScript compilation is slow as shit.

I'm talking 4-8 minute builds that used to take 30 seconds with JavaScript. The TypeScript GitHub issues are full of developers having nervous breakdowns over performance. [Performance benchmarking research](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/389689114_Performance_Benchmarking_Type

Script_vs_JavaScript_in_Modern_Web_Development) confirms significant compilation overhead, while optimization guides try to mitigate the pain. Large-scale project analysis shows why TypeScript chokes on big codebases.

Real numbers from our team:

• JavaScript build: 45 seconds (webpack 5.74.0)
• TypeScript build: 4-8 minutes, sometimes longer if TypeScript 4.9 decides to hate you
• Daily builds per dev: maybe 20-25
• Time spent waiting: 2+ hours per dev per day
• Cost: probably $15k/month paying people to stare at terminals

Our build server costs tripled because TypeScript needs around 8GB+ RAM just to not crash during compilation.

Had one guy's laptop completely freeze when he tried to run tsc --build on our monorepo

• killed his whole machine for like 10 minutes. The worst part? Sometimes it just fails randomly with "FATAL ERROR: CALL_AND_RETRY_LAST Allocation failed
• JavaScript heap out of memory" and you have to restart the whole damn thing.

Migration is a Nightmare Factory

Every "simple" TypeScript migration turns into a 6+ month nightmare.

Here's what actually happens:

**Month 1-2:

Optimism Phase**

• Install Type

Script 5.1, configure tsconfig.json (took 3 days to get this right)

• Everything breaks immediately with like 800 type errors
• Spend about 2 weeks just getting the project to compile with any everywhere
• Discover half your npm packages don't have @types definitions

Month 3-4: Reality Sets In

• Hot reload stops working (webpack-dev-server conflicts with ts-loader)
• Every save requires a full restart (10+ seconds each time)
• Junior devs start submitting resumes after fighting with React.

FC types for a week

• @ts-ignore comments everywhere because the compiler is being a pedantic asshole
• Spent $800 on @types packages for legacy dependencies that barely work

Month 5-6: Acceptance

• Half the team threatens to quit
• You're 3 months behind on actual features
• Management starts asking why builds take forever
• Finally get basic types working

Slack's TypeScript migration took about 6 months to annotate most of their desktop app, and that was with a team of experts. Stripe migrated millions of lines over several years. Airbnb's migration tools were created to handle large-scale conversions, while enterprise modernization case studies show the complexity involved. Migration guide research confirms the pain is real.

If these engineering powerhouses struggle with migration, you will too.

The Learning Curve from Hell

TypeScript isn't just "JavaScript with types." It's a completely different language with its own special ways to make you suffer. The TypeScript Handbook tries to make it seem simple, but r/typescript is full of developers crying about the complexity. Productivity comparison studies show initial learning drops, while performance analysis confirms the cognitive overhead. Development experience research shows the complexity impact on teams.

Week 1: "This isn't so bad, just add some types"
Week 2: Fighting with generic constraints and conditional types
Week 3: Googling "typescript error TS2322" for like the 40th time (still no fucking clue what it means)
Week 4: Seriously considering switching careers after spending 3 hours debugging `TS2589:

Type instantiation is excessively deep and possibly infinite`

The error messages are about as useful as a screen door on a submarine:

Type '{ x: number; }' is not assignable to type 'IntrinsicAttributes & { y: string; }'.

Property 'y' is missing in type '{ x: number; }' but required in type '{ y: string; }'.

Translation:

You fucked up a prop name, but we're going to make you decode this academic bullshit to figure it out. I see this garbage error at least 5 times a day and it never gets less annoying. Oh, and TS2345: Argument of type 'string' is not assignable to parameter of type 'never' is my personal favorite

• means you probably have a type guard somewhere that's too strict, but good luck finding it in a 200-file codebase.

Infrastructure Costs That'll Surprise You

Build servers eat CPU like candy. Our AWS bills went up around 60% just from Type

Script compilation.

We had to upgrade from t3.large to c5.2xlarge instances just to handle the damn compilation load.

Docker images become fat as hell. Our production Docker images went from roughly 150MB to 400MB+ because TypeScript needs Node.js, the compiler, and all the @types packages during build.

Development machines suffer. Junior devs with 8GB laptops can't run TypeScript + VSCode + Chrome without everything crawling to a halt. Had one intern's MacBook Air literally overheat and shut down during a TypeScript build

• the fan was screaming for 10 minutes straight. Budget around $1000+ per dev for hardware upgrades or you'll be buying new laptops every year.

When It's Actually Worth It

TypeScript makes sense if:

• You have production bugs costing $50k+ annually
• Your team can survive 6 months of reduced productivity
• You can afford build server upgrades
• Your junior developers won't quit during migration
• Your codebase is over 100k lines

But if you're shipping MVP features, have tight deadlines, or a junior-heavy team? Stick with Java

Script and ESLint. Don't pay enterprise complexity taxes for startup problems.

The builds are slow, the migration sucks, and your team will hate you. But once you get through the hell, those compile-time error catches are worth not getting paged at 3 AM.

So you've seen the nightmare scenarios and horror stories. But developers still have burning questions about making this decision...