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Pay · 17-2121

Marine Engineers and Naval Architects earn $112,230 a year at the midpoint

Starting pay is close to the middle here: the 25th percentile is $99,250 against a median of $112,230, so the first years are not a long climb.

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$112,230median a year · United States
$53.96an hour $124,180average 8,250people
Nine in ten people in this work earn between the two ends. The shaded part is the middle half — where most people are.
$99,25025th $112,230median $137,69075th
$83,01010th percentile $173,33090th percentile
$99,250a year at the 25th percentile, nearer a first job
$172,330best-paying state · District of Columbia
$76,210lowest-paying state · Michigan
+54%top state against the national median
  • Read the spread, not the middle. The median is the midpoint across everyone in the occupation, most of them years into the work. A beginner starts nearer the 10th to 25th percentile, which is why the spread is published alongside it.
  • What the figure counts. The figure counts base pay plus tips, commissions and production bonuses. It leaves out the self-employed, unpaid family workers, private household workers, and the value of benefits or profit sharing.
  • Where you live moves it more than your resume does. National figures. A state or metro area can sit far from the national number, and that gap is usually larger than any difference a resume makes.
  • Not in these numbers. Growth and annual openings are not in this dataset. They come from the separate Employment Projections tables, where an opening is a modelled ten year average and not a posted vacancy.

Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, 2025. Retrieved through the BLS Public Data API on 2026-08-13. bls.gov/oes “BLS.gov cannot vouch for the data or analyses derived from these data after the data have been retrieved from BLS.gov.”

A short climbThe 25th percentile, $99,250, is within 12% of the median.
State matters a lotThe same job pays $172,330 in District of Columbia and $76,210 in Michigan — a gap of $96,120 a year.

Marine engineer earnings, from starting pay to the best-paid 10%

Pick the job, where you work and how long you have done it. The range comes from the published wage percentiles for that job.

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An estimate from survey percentiles, not an offer. Employer, industry, shift and credentials move pay within and beyond this range. Full wage page for this job →

Marine engineer wages, state by state

The 11 states where the most people do this work, of 15 with a published figure: their medians range by 2.19 times. Figures are the 2025 survey.

State Median a year Where most start 10th to 90th Employed
District of Columbia $172,330 $107,030 $107,030 — $195,190 490
Texas $152,780 $93,180 $93,180 — $230,020 330
Florida $130,640 $73,070 $73,070 — $215,470 370
Maryland $130,150 $88,770 $88,770 — $195,190 300
New York $112,230 $112,230 $112,230 — $134,370 250
California $110,700 $66,090 $66,090 — $172,760 250
Washington $109,550 $82,430 $82,430 — $148,510 370
Hawaii $108,200 $80,830 $80,830 — $143,020 120
Maine $100,430 $79,370 $79,370 — $130,480 260
Mississippi $97,060 $63,850 $63,850 — $133,020 70
Wisconsin $78,850 $66,830 $66,830 — $105,390 80

No estimate is published for 1 states: the survey withholds a figure when too few employers report it. Nothing has been filled in for them.

Resumes for marine engineers and naval architects

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Autodesk AutoCADPTC Creo ParametricDassault Systemes SolidWorksMicrosoft Office softwareMicrosoft ExcelMicrosoft PowerPointSAP softwareThe MathWorks MATLAB
  • Performed monitoring activities to ensure that ships comply with international regulations and standards for life-saving equipment and pollution preventatives.
  • Designed complete hull and superstructure according to specifications and test data, in conformity with standards of safety, efficiency, and economy.
  • Conducted analyses of ships, such as stability, structural, weight, and vibration analyses.

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This page includes information from the O*NET 31.0 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license. O*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. The owner of tiersi.com has modified all or some of this information. USDOL/ETA has not approved, endorsed, or tested these modifications.

Ranked 73 of 788 by median pay

Better paid than 91% of the occupations in the survey.

  1. 71 Administrative Services Managers $114,130
  2. 72 Materials Engineers $112,860
  3. 73 Marine Engineers and Naval Architects $112,230
  4. 74 Psychologists, All Other $110,840
  5. 75 Nuclear Technicians $110,240

Examples

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Marine engineer pay rate, hourly and yearly

Starts at this job’s median. Change the rate or the hours; a full-time year is 40 hours for 52 weeks.

$112,237a year

Related work, and what it pays

Occupations in the same group of the federal classification — the usual next steps, or the ones beside this one.

Marine Engineers and Naval Architects$112,230
Computer Hardware Engineers$161,740+$49,510 Aerospace Engineers$134,960+$22,730 Electronics Engineers, Except Computer$130,220+$17,990 Engineers, All Other$122,930+$10,700 Bioengineers and Biomedical Engineers$109,370−$2,860 Environmental Engineers$107,110−$5,120

Questions people ask

What is a marine engineer’s yearly income?

A marine engineer makes a median of $112,230 a year (2025 survey). The middle half earn between $99,250 and $137,690.

What is a marine engineer’s hourly pay rate?

The median pay rate is $53.96 an hour; the average is $124,180 a year.

What is the starting pay for a marine engineer?

Starting pay is usually near the 25th percentile, $99,250 a year, and sometimes as low as the 10th, $83,010.

Which state pays marine engineers and naval architects the most?

District of Columbia, with a median of $172,330 a year.

How many people work as marine engineers and naval architects?

About 8,250 in the United States — number 73 of 788 occupations by median pay.

Work that pays about the same

Median pay within $2,620 of what marine engineers and naval architects earn — $112,230 a year — but not always the same spread.

See all 788 occupations