You don’t have to go to another job interview without knowing how much you can actually make.

People applying to jobs at big companies can get an idea of what their salary might be by looking for a similar opening in Colorado. From Amazon.com Inc. to Walmart Inc., firms have hundreds of job postings that disclose hourly and yearly pay ranges thanks to a new state law.

In...

You don’t have to go to another job interview without knowing how much you can actually make.

People applying to jobs at big companies can get an idea of what their salary might be by looking for a similar opening in Colorado. From Amazon.com Inc. to Walmart Inc., firms have hundreds of job postings that disclose hourly and yearly pay ranges thanks to a new state law.

In an effort to narrow gender wage gaps and provide greater pay transparency, Colorado requires companies with even a few employees in the state to report the expected salary or pay range for new hires. The rule includes remote positions.

Companies have responded in different ways to the new rule, which went into effect in January. Some firms circumvented the disclosure requirements by specifying in their listings that the work can’t be done in the state.

Amazon’s top-paying roles were for software-development engineers in Boulder, Colo.

Photo: Chet Strange/Bloomberg News

Other companies have disclosed pay information in ways that make it difficult to draw comparisons. For instance, some firms are setting pay ranges that are specific to Colorado, hinting that the pay might not be the same elsewhere. Others are posting salaries with ranges of as much as $100,000 or more between the low and high ends. A pharmacist job posting at Walmart said applicants can make anywhere from $52,416 to $153,920 annually for the same job.

To understand more about how companies are paying workers and how they are dealing with Colorado’s new law, The Wall Street Journal looked at more than 5,000 job offers at some of the biggest employers in the state. The jobs were all posted between August and October.

Most positions are still open, and the companies include Amazon, DaVita Inc., Dish Network Corp. , Palantir Technologies Inc. and JBS USA Holdings Inc., among others. Many of the companies also noted on job listings that pay could vary beyond the stated ranges.

Dish, which is based in Englewood, Colo., is actively looking to hire hundreds of people in the state and around the country, said David Scott, the company’s chief human-resources officer. “We believe in wage transparency, and it’s important to note that wages posted do not reflect the entire compensation picture,” he said.

Low-wage work is in high demand, and employers are now competing for applicants, offering incentives ranging from sign-on bonuses to free food. But with many still unemployed, are these offers working? Photo: Bloomberg The Wall Street Journal Interactive Edition

The other companies included in the Journal’s analysis declined to comment or didn’t respond to requests for comment.

Some of the openings with the highest annual base pay were at Lumen Technologies Inc., formerly known as CenturyLink Inc. The telecommunications company offered up to $333,240 for a vice president of strategic alliances, while a senior manager in marketing could make up to $223,680.

Denver-based DaVita’s highest-paying opening was for a chief nursing officer, who can make between $225,000 and $300,000 at the kidney-dialysis company. That is the same range for Dish’s best-paying job, vice president of tax. Most jobs with salaries of up to $200,000 were for directors, senior executives, legal counsel and some for software engineers.

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Amazon’s top-paying roles were for software-development engineers in Boulder, Colo., with a base salary starting at $200,600. One of the few higher-paying jobs at Amazon that didn’t involve programming was for a senior program manager of Amazon Logistics entitlements. The position’s base pay started at $105,000 and went up to $160,000. The role involves working directly with local authorities to find real estate to open new delivery stations.

Walmart, which has more than 100 stores in Colorado, had some of the highest-paying hourly jobs in the state. Pharmacy roles at Walmart went as high as $74 an hour.

Some companies also gave clues into how much stock-based compensation is offered to hires. A role for a software engineer at the data-analytics company Palantir, which is based in Denver, comes with a starting salary of $135,000 and offers $55,000 annually in the form of restricted stock units.

Want to get an idea of what big companies are paying? Here are some examples of what companies are disclosing about pay for jobs in Colorado:

Write to Inti Pacheco at inti.pacheco@wsj.com and Chip Cutter at chip.cutter@wsj.com