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Pay · 27-4015

Lighting Technicians earn $68,060 a year at the midpoint

Where you land matters more here than in most jobs — the top tenth earn more than 3.1 times the bottom tenth. The midpoint is $68,060.

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$68,060median a year · United States
$32.72an hour $78,380average 8,900people
Nine in ten people in this work earn between the two ends. The shaded part is the middle half — where most people are.
$52,77025th $68,060median $95,64075th
$42,31010th percentile $130,76090th percentile
$52,770a year at the 25th percentile, nearer a first job
$126,100best-paying state · Washington
$41,900lowest-paying state · Missouri
+85%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.”

State matters a lotThe same job pays $126,100 in Washington and $41,900 in Missouri — a gap of $84,200 a year.

Lighting technician 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 →

No. 308 of 788 by median pay

Better paid than 61% of the occupations in the survey.

  1. 306 Librarians and Media Collections Specialists $68,270
  2. 307 Crane and Tower Operators $68,080
  3. 308 Lighting Technicians $68,060
  4. 309 Health Information Technologists and Medical Registrars $68,020
  5. 310 Rotary Drill Operators, Oil and Gas $67,890

Examples

Resumes written for this kind of work.

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

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Adjacent work, and what it pays

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

Lighting Technicians$68,060
Film and Video Editors$75,420+$7,360 Camera Operators, Television, Video, and Film$74,990+$6,930 Broadcast Technicians$59,570−$8,490

Resumes for lighting technicians

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

Microsoft Office softwareAutodesk AutoCADProgrammable logic controller PLC softwareMicrosoft ExcelMicrosoft OutlookRockwell RSLogixMicrosoft PowerPointSAP Maintenance
  • Assessed safety of wiring or equipment set-up to determine the risk of fire or electrical shock.
  • Consulted with lighting director or production staff to determine lighting requirements.
  • Disassembled and stored equipment after performances.

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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.

Lighting technician wages across the states

The 20 states where the most people do this work, of 27 with a published figure: their medians range by 3.01 times. Figures are the 2025 survey.

State Median a year Where most start 10th to 90th Employed
Washington $126,100 $72,980 $72,980 — $175,010 80
California $94,070 $50,910 $50,910 — $159,610 2,950
New Jersey $87,550 $63,220 $63,220 — $109,380 340
New York $78,000 $52,000 $52,000 — $133,000 780
Connecticut $72,450 $61,230 $61,230 — $99,990 80
Georgia $70,150 $48,240 $48,240 — $123,020 260
Oklahoma $67,110 $40,960 $40,960 — $134,480 60
Florida $62,190 $38,550 $38,550 — $83,890 600
Nevada $61,250 $24,960 $24,960 — $90,830 390
Tennessee $60,870 $43,140 $43,140 — $137,190 280
Virginia $60,340 $29,360 $29,360 — $75,000 190
Michigan $60,210 $50,070 $50,070 — $60,210 230
Oregon $57,900 $46,800 $46,800 — $101,820 180
Pennsylvania $57,660 $37,780 $37,780 — $95,180 100
Ohio $54,940 $34,820 $34,820 — $78,640 260
Texas $53,150 $36,050 $36,050 — $68,850 210
Indiana $50,080 $35,800 $35,800 — $147,400 190
Maryland $49,080 $39,030 $39,030 — $100,990 130
Utah $49,080 $32,160 $32,160 — $69,770 120
Missouri $41,900 $31,200 $31,200 — $120,690 90

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.

Lighting technician pay rate, hourly to yearly

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

$68,058a year

Questions people ask

What is a lighting technician’s yearly income?

A lighting technician makes a median of $68,060 a year (2025 survey). The middle half earn between $52,770 and $95,640.

What is a lighting technician’s hourly pay rate?

The median pay rate is $32.72 an hour; the average is $78,380 a year.

What is the starting pay for a lighting technician?

Starting pay is usually near the 25th percentile, $52,770 a year, and sometimes as low as the 10th, $42,310.

Which state pays lighting technicians the most?

Washington, with a median of $126,100 a year.

How many people work as lighting technicians?

About 8,900 in the United States — number 308 of 788 occupations by median pay.

Jobs that pay about the same

Median pay within $530 of what lighting technicians earn — $68,060 a year — but not always the same spread.

See all 788 occupations