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Pay · 27-4021

Photographers earn $44,660 a year at the midpoint

Across roughly 51,760 people in this work, the midpoint is $44,660 a year, with most starting near $36,050.

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$44,660median a year · United States
$21.47an hour $55,410average 51,760people
Nine in ten people in this work earn between the two ends. The shaded part is the middle half — where most people are.
$36,05025th $44,660median $62,74075th
$30,82010th percentile $91,81090th percentile
$36,050a year at the 25th percentile, nearer a first job
$110,970best-paying state · District of Columbia
$32,810lowest-paying state · Arkansas
+148%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.
  • The annual figure is arithmetic. For hourly occupations the annual figure is the hourly rate times 2080 hours. It is a calculation, not observed earnings: part time is the norm in retail and food service.
  • 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.”

State matters a lotThe same job pays $110,970 in District of Columbia and $32,810 in Arkansas — a gap of $78,160 a year.

Photographer earnings, from starting pay to the top 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 →

Resumes for photographers

Name the job in the builder and the duties, skills and credentials it is screened on are written in for you.

Adobe PhotoshopAdobe Creative Cloud softwareAdobe InDesignAdobe IllustratorAdobe After EffectsApple Final Cut ProAdobe AcrobatWordPress
  • Adjusted apertures, shutter speeds, and camera focus according to a combination of factors, such as lighting, field depth, subject motion, film type, and film speed.
  • Created artificial light, using flashes and reflectors.
  • Determined desired images and picture composition, selecting and adjusting subjects, equipment, and lighting to achieve desired effects.

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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.

Photographer wages by state

The 35 states where the most people do this work, of 49 with a published figure: their medians range by 3.38 times. Figures are the 2025 survey.

State Median a year Where most start 10th to 90th Employed
District of Columbia $110,970 $46,080 $46,080 — $148,360 260
New York $60,050 $37,890 $37,890 — $109,470 3,650
Massachusetts $57,990 $38,480 $38,480 — $112,760 830
Oregon $53,630 $37,010 $37,010 — $110,380 510
Utah $52,140 $31,440 $31,440 — $81,070 660
Connecticut $49,790 $34,010 $34,010 — $79,880 630
Washington $48,050 $37,440 $37,440 — $83,200 960
California $47,840 $36,470 $36,470 — $125,490 7,980
Kentucky $47,170 $23,990 $23,990 — $76,490 380
Colorado $47,070 $36,440 $36,440 — $92,200 1,140
Virginia $46,550 $31,200 $31,200 — $91,060 1,580
Minnesota $46,470 $36,890 $36,890 — $84,530 730
Maryland $46,450 $31,200 $31,200 — $93,660 790
Hawaii $45,960 $30,800 $30,800 — $105,820 440
Georgia $43,770 $22,690 $22,690 — $103,550 1,420
Florida $42,640 $29,990 $29,990 — $80,400 4,390
Wisconsin $42,060 $31,540 $31,540 — $80,550 850
Texas $41,280 $24,910 $24,910 — $62,720 4,330
New Jersey $40,520 $34,990 $34,990 — $91,780 1,460
Pennsylvania $40,520 $29,020 $29,020 — $75,100 1,870
Missouri $39,170 $29,600 $29,600 — $74,530 950
Ohio $38,470 $23,670 $23,670 — $80,990 1,540
Iowa $38,290 $15,080 $15,080 — $77,830 430
Tennessee $37,950 $28,820 $28,820 — $67,060 780
South Carolina $37,890 $26,480 $26,480 — $71,810 630
Kansas $37,790 $29,340 $29,340 — $72,380 300
Nevada $37,460 $26,610 $26,610 — $57,640 890
North Carolina $37,120 $28,330 $28,330 — $76,060 2,130
Arizona $36,970 $32,080 $32,080 — $84,130 1,360
Louisiana $36,830 $19,180 $19,180 — $70,310 510
Oklahoma $36,750 $17,210 $17,210 — $63,370 330
Illinois $36,570 $31,200 $31,200 — $96,770 2,150
Alabama $36,130 $24,590 $24,590 — $72,550 530
Indiana $35,960 $24,960 $24,960 — $59,350 810
Arkansas $32,810 $24,890 $24,890 — $43,950 240

No estimate is published for 2 states: the survey withholds a figure when too few employers report it. Nothing has been filled in for them.

Photographer 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.

$44,658a year

Examples

Resumes made for this kind of work.

Real sheets, filled in end to end — for this job and the ones beside it.

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Ranked 636 of 788 by median pay

Better paid than 19% of the occupations in the survey.

  1. 634 Food and Tobacco Roasting, Baking, and Drying Machine Operators and Tenders $44,810
  2. 635 Customer service representatives $44,770
  3. 636 Photographers $44,660
  4. 637 Library Technicians $44,580
  5. 638 Furniture Finishers $44,540

Nearby work, and what it pays

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

Photographers$44,660
Film and Video Editors$75,420+$30,760 Camera Operators, Television, Video, and Film$74,990+$30,330 Media and Communication Equipment Workers, All Other$70,720+$26,060 Lighting Technicians$68,060+$23,400 Broadcast Technicians$59,570+$14,910

Questions people ask most

What is a photographer’s yearly income?

A photographer makes a median of $44,660 a year (2025 survey). The middle half earn between $36,050 and $62,740.

What is a photographer’s hourly pay rate?

The median pay rate is $21.47 an hour; the average is $55,410 a year.

What is the starting pay for a photographer?

Starting pay is usually near the 25th percentile, $36,050 a year, and sometimes as low as the 10th, $30,820.

Which state pays photographers the most?

District of Columbia, with a median of $110,970 a year.

How many people work as photographers?

About 51,760 in the United States — number 636 of 788 occupations by median pay.

Work that pays about the same

Median pay within $190 of what photographers earn — $44,660 a year — but not always the same spread.

See all 788 occupations