Electrical Engineer Salary (2026), outlook and how to become one

Electrical Engineers earn a median of $120,630 a year (BLS OEWS, May 2025). That is 137% above the $50,980 median for all US occupations. That works out at $58.00/hr. The middle half earn between $92,830 and $152,950. The top 10% earn $184,300 or more.

The median hourly wage for electrical engineers is $58.00 (BLS OEWS, May 2025). On a full-year basis the $120,630 annual median works out to about $10,050 a month before tax.

BLS does not publish a starting salary. The nearest measure is the low end of the pay range: the lowest-paid 10% of electrical engineers earn less than $76,550 a year and the bottom quarter less than $92,830 (BLS OEWS, May 2025). New workers often start near that end, but where a particular job starts depends on the employer, the state and the credentials you bring, so read these as the bottom of the range rather than a guaranteed entry wage.

Yes, more often than not. The median is $120,630, so more than half of electrical engineers earn over $100,000 a year (BLS OEWS, May 2025). In 43 states the median itself is above $100,000: New Mexico ($158,520), California ($144,040), District of Columbia ($143,000), New Hampshire ($135,710), and 39 more.

The highest state medians for Electrical Engineers are New Mexico ($158,520), California ($144,040), District of Columbia ($143,000) (BLS OEWS, May 2025).

BLS does not split electrical engineers' pay by specialty or employer, but its range shows how far the top end runs: the highest-paid 10% earn more than $184,300, against a median of $120,630 (BLS OEWS, May 2025). Location moves pay the most in the published data: the best-paying states are New Mexico ($158,520), California ($144,040), District of Columbia ($143,000). BLS also counts 5 specialty careers inside this occupation (battery energy storage engineer, grid interconnection engineer, protection and control engineer, RF engineer), which share its federal pay figures.

Yes. BLS reports a bachelor's degree as the typical entry-level education for Electrical Engineers, and O*NET rates the preparation needed as considerable preparation. In O*NET's survey of people already doing the job, 81.6% hold bachelor's degree.

Yes, strongly. Employment is projected to grow 9.9% over 2025–2035, more than double the 3.5% projected for all occupations (BLS EP, 2025–2035). BLS still projects about 11,400 openings a year, mostly from workers retiring or moving to other work.

Electrical and electronics engineers design, develop, and test electrical and electronic equipment, components, and systems. A core O*NET task: investigate customer or public complaints to determine the nature and extent of problems. Employers most often ask for Analytical or scientific software, Computer aided design CAD software, Data base user interface and query software.

Most work more than 40. In O*NET's survey of people in the job, 58% of electrical engineers usually work more than 40 hours a week, 42% work exactly 40 and 0% work fewer. 84% say their schedule is regular and 7% irregular, and 9% work seasonally. Source: O*NET 31.0 Database, Work Context.

O*NET scores Electrical Engineers highest on the Realistic, Investigative and Conventional interest areas, so the work mixes hands-on, practical work with tools, machines or the outdoors with investigating, analysing and solving problems with ideas and data. On NueCareer's MBTI-to-interest mapping the closest types are ISTJ, ISTP. Personality is a fit signal, not a gate. The free NueCareer quiz scores your own profile against all 1,731 careers in the bank.

4 years to enter the field; roughly 8 years to a PE for those who pursue one. No licence is needed for entry-level work. The PE adds the FE after graduation, several years of relevant experience, and the PE exam, with the caveat that two of the three electrical PE exams are offered only one day per year.

Yes, and it is issued by the state you work in, not nationally. Each state issues its own licences and most recognise licensure from other states as long as the licensing state's requirements meet or exceed their own. Several states require continuing education for engineers to keep their licences. The bigger practical variable is the exemption for employees of manufacturers, which is what keeps most electrical engineers out of the licensing system entirely: Texas, for example, construes its Engineering Practice Act as not applying to a private corporation or its full-time employees in connection with the research, development, design, fabrication, production, assembly, integration or service of products manufactured by that entity, and expressly defines those products to include computer software, firmware, hardware and semiconductor devices. It separately exempts most full-time employees of privately owned or cooperative utilities who lack final authority over designs incorporated into fixed works on the property of others or made available to the public.

The FE (Fundamentals of Engineering exam) and the PE Electrical and Computer (Principles and Practice of Engineering exam, Electrical and Computer). Generally the first step towards licensure, designed for students close to finishing or recent graduates of an EAC/ABET-accredited program. Computer-based and offered year round, 110 questions in a six-hour appointment, $225 paid directly to NCEES. Take FE Electrical and Computer.

Women make up 10.1% of electrical engineers, against 47.1% of all employed people: a heavily male-dominated occupation. 23.9% are 55 or older, close to the 23.2% across all jobs. The median worker is 41.4 years old (all workers: 42.1). Source: BLS Current Population Survey, 2025 annual averages, for the Census group "Electrical and electronics engineers".