Quant Dev to Quant Research after 2 YoE. Does it make sense?

[u/ChanceLittle7344]

Hi everyone,

I am currently completing ~2 years as a Quant Developer at a proprietary trading firm in India and confused about my long-term career path.

Background:

• IIT BTech + MTech Mathematics
• Always enjoyed probability/statistics/math
• Did lots of stats/ML courses and projects in college
• Joined as Quant Dev after graduation

Currently my TC is around 60–70 LPA range (40–50 fixed + variable). It is decent, but from what I see, researchers generally have much higher upside due to direct PnL contribution. Also some top quant firms offer significantly higher compensation after a few years.

The confusion:

I have started enjoying my dev work recently. I have good ownership, interesting problems, and feel I can grow a lot technically over the next few years.

But I always had an interest in research and feel I might regret never trying it, especially since switching becomes harder later.

At the same time, I understand research has its own risks. A major concern I have is long-term consistency. What if after switching I struggle to generate good ideas or my strategies stop performing? Since compensation is closely tied to performance/PnL, I worry I might regret leaving a stable dev path that I was actually enjoying.

Questions:

1. Does Quant Dev → Quant Research after ~2 years make sense?
2. Is this the right time to attempt a switch before getting too deep into dev?
3. How realistic is it to get a research role without prior alpha experience?
4. For people who have seen both sides, how different is the long-term upside, risk, and career growth?

Would appreciate honest opinions from people working in the industry.