The numbers, no preamble
It is the first question on almost every call we take, and almost nobody answers it on their website. So here it is.
The Spanish market in 2026 works with three formats, each with its own range:
- Fractional, 3,000 to 6,000 euros a month. Two or three days of dedication per week. The most common format for companies that already have some technical staff and are missing judgement and direction.
- Full-time interim, 8,000 to 12,000 euros a month. Someone genuinely sitting in the CTO seat, daily, usually for a specific phase: a large migration, a funding round, the departure of whoever ran technology.
- Fixed scope, 4,000 to 15,000 euros. A technical audit, investor due diligence, or architecture design before building starts. Defined scope, defined price, defined end date.
Why comparing against an internal CTO's salary misleads
The argument repeated everywhere is this: an internal CTO costs 80,000 to 140,000 euros gross a year, so external is cheaper. It is true, and it is also a bad argument.
It is true because on top of salary you have social security, search time (three to six months for a genuinely senior profile), the risk of hiring wrong, and severance if it does not work.
And it is a bad argument because almost no company calling about an external CTO was about to hire an internal one. They were about to carry on with none. The real comparison is not 4,000 a month against 10,000 a month. It is 4,000 a month against continuing to make technical decisions on instinct.
And that has a price that shows up on no payroll: the platform rebuilt from scratch eight months in, the senior developer hired for the wrong stack, the four months spent building a feature nobody uses.
What you are actually paying for
When someone buys hours of an external CTO, they are not buying hours. They are buying a fairly specific list:
- Architecture decisions that hold. Choosing the stack, deciding what to build and what to buy, and writing down why.
- Judgement on technical hires. Defining the roles, running the technical interviews, and avoiding the expensive hire that takes six months to reveal itself as a mistake.
- A roadmap an investor will believe. If there is a round involved, the technical story has to stand up to someone who knows.
- Translation between business and engineering. A good part of the job is explaining to the team why the business asks for what it asks, and to the business why the team says it takes three months.
- Someone who owns the outcome. Not a report with recommendations, but a person answerable for whether the decision was right.
When you should not hire an external CTO
I would rather say this before you write to us and we both lose a call.
If what you need is someone to write code, do not look for an external CTO. Look for a developer or a development agency. Paying technical leadership rates for execution work is throwing money away, and you end up with someone expensive doing something that is not their job.
If your company has fewer than three people and you are still working out what to sell, also no. At that stage technical decisions are reversible and cheap. The money is better spent talking to customers.
And if you already have an internal CTO who works, what can make sense is a one-off audit or a second opinion on a big decision, not a second CTO. We have seen that setup and it ends badly for everyone.
How to ask for a quote without wasting time
Technical leadership quotes vary a lot because scope varies a lot. To make the first conversation useful instead of an hour of generic questions, come with four things clear.
What problem made you look for this now and not six months ago. How many technical people you have today and what each of them does. What has to be true in six months for you to call it a success. And what budget you have, even as a wide range.
With that, a serious proposal takes a few days. Without it, what comes out is an hourly rate that helps nobody.
Frequently asked questions
Between 3,000 and 6,000 euros a month on a fractional basis (two or three days a week) and between 8,000 and 12,000 euros a month full-time interim. Fixed-scope audit or technical due diligence projects run from 4,000 to 15,000 euros depending on scope.
On direct cost, yes: an internal CTO in Spain means 80,000 to 140,000 euros gross a year plus social security, search time and severance if they do not fit. But that is usually the wrong comparison, because most companies looking for an external CTO were not going to hire an internal one: they were going to carry on with no technical direction.
Documented architecture decisions, judgement and involvement in technical hiring, a technology roadmap aligned with business milestones, translation between business and engineering, and ownership of the decisions taken. It does not include development: if what you need is code written, the right profile is a different one.
Typically six to twelve months, reviewed quarterly. Under three months there is not enough time for decisions to turn into measurable results. Fixed-scope projects (audit, due diligence) are the exception and run two to six weeks.
Yes, and it is usually the sensible move. A two or three week technical audit makes the real state of the system clear and tells you whether the working relationship fits before committing to months of dedication.