---
title: "Grader and Sorter, Agricultural Products"
description: "Grade, sort, or classify unprocessed food and other agricultural products by size, weight, color, or condition."
canonical: "https://nuecareer.com/careers/grader-and-sorter-agricultural-products"
last-updated: "2026-10-09T10:57:55.138Z"
---

# Grader and Sorter, Agricultural Products

**Category:** Farming, Fishing, and Forestry · **SOC code:** 45-2041 · **O\*NET-SOC code:** 45-2041.00

Grade, sort, or classify unprocessed food and other agricultural products by size, weight, color, or condition.

Also advertised as: Agriculture Laborer; Apple Sorter; Corn Lab Technician; Distribution Technician; Egg Grader; Egg Worker; Grader; Potato Grader.

## At a glance

- **Median annual wage:** $35,730 (BLS OEWS, May 2025)
- **Median hourly wage:** $17.18/hr
- **Wage range (10th–90th percentile):** $29,580 to $44,490, with the middle half between $34,320 and $38,260
- **Total US employment:** 25,180
- **Typical entry education:** No formal credential
- **Preparation required:** Little or no preparation — O\*NET rates this "Job Zone 1-2: Very Little to Some Preparation Needed"
- **Projected growth:** -3.4% over 2025–2035 (BLS EP, 2025–2035)
- **Annual job openings:** 5,800 openings a year
- **AI-resilience score:** 47/100 — a NueCareer heuristic over O\*NET work activities and context, not a BLS or O\*NET figure

## Pay

National wage distribution, BLS OEWS, May 2025, across 25,180 US jobs.

| Percentile | Annual wage |
| --- | --- |
| 10th | $29,580 |
| 25th | $34,320 |
| 50th (median) | $35,730 |
| 75th | $38,260 |
| 90th | $44,490 |
| Mean (average) | $36,430 |

### Pay by state

The 15 highest-paying states, by median annual wage. The cost-of-living-adjusted column divides the state median by that state's BEA Regional Price Parity, so the columns answer different questions: the first is what the job pays there, the second is what that pay buys there.

| State | Median annual wage | Cost-of-living adjusted | Employment |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| CO | $48,740 | $47,297 | 230 |
| MN | $47,540 | $48,205 | 30 |
| ME | $45,810 | $47,202 | 40 |
| ND | $45,590 | $51,248 | 260 |
| NE | $45,560 | $50,564 | 330 |
| UT | $42,710 | $43,201 | 100 |
| IA | $42,450 | $48,369 | 170 |
| MA | $41,770 | $39,496 | 40 |
| MD | $41,740 | $39,768 | 430 |
| IL | $41,670 | $41,688 | 220 |
| SD | $39,900 | $45,041 | 380 |
| MI | $39,180 | $40,720 | 100 |
| OH | $38,500 | $41,499 | 100 |
| PA | $38,430 | $39,386 | 970 |
| KS | $38,170 | $42,379 | 160 |

22 more states with published wage data are omitted here. The full table for all 37 states is at https://nuecareer.com/careers/grader-and-sorter-agricultural-products/salary-by-state, or as JSON at https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/grader-and-sorter-agricultural-products.

## Outlook

BLS projects employment to move from 45,400 in the 2025–2035 base year to 43,800 by the end of the cycle — a loss of 1,500 jobs, or -3.4%. Declining: -3.4% against 3.5% projected for all occupations over the same cycle. About 5,800 openings a year are expected on average, counting openings from growth as well as from workers leaving the occupation permanently. Source: BLS EP, 2025–2035.

## How to get in

- **Typical entry education:** No formal educational credential (BLS Employment Projections).
- **Preparation level:** Little or no preparation — O\*NET's preparation band for this occupation is "Job Zone 1-2: Very Little to Some Preparation Needed".
- **Related work experience typically required:** None.
- **Typical on-the-job training:** Short-term on-the-job training.

### Education people in this job actually hold

O\*NET surveys incumbents, so this distribution describes who is in the job today and can differ from the BLS entry requirement above.

| Education level | Share of workers |
| --- | --- |
| Less than a High School Diploma | 63.8% |
| High School Diploma or the equivalent (such as a GED) | 26.7% |
| Associate's Degree or other 2-year degree | 4.9% |
| Post-Secondary Certificate | 4.7% |

## What the work involves

- Discard inferior or defective products or foreign matter, and place acceptable products in containers for further processing.
- Weigh products or estimate their weight, visually or by feel.
- Grade and sort products according to factors such as color, species, length, width, appearance, feel, smell, and quality to ensure correct processing and usage.
- Place products in containers according to grade and mark grades on containers.

## Skills and knowledge

### Essential skills

- Monitoring — importance 2.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Listening — importance 2.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speaking — importance 2.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Critical Thinking — importance 2.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Reading Comprehension — importance 2.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Writing — importance 2.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Learning — importance 2.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Mathematics — importance 1.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Transferable skills

These are the skills that carry into other occupations, and they drive the related-occupation and career-change rankings on this site.

- Coordination — importance 2.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Judgment and Decision Making — importance 2.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Time Management — importance 2.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Social Perceptiveness — importance 2.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Complex Problem Solving — importance 2.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Persuasion — importance 1.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Service Orientation — importance 1.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Quality Control Analysis — importance 1.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Knowledge areas

- Production and Processing — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- English Language — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Mechanical — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Food Production — importance 2.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Education and Training — importance 2.7 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Foreign Language — importance 2.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Abilities

- Manual Dexterity — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Near Vision — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Category Flexibility — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Oral Comprehension — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Finger Dexterity — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Oral Expression — importance 2.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

## Who it suits

O\*NET rates every occupation on the six Holland (RIASEC) interest areas, on a 1–7 scale. This occupation's strongest areas are Realistic (R), Conventional (C).

| Interest area | Score (1–7) |
| --- | --- |
| R — Realistic | 5.64 |
| C — Conventional | 5.00 |
| I — Investigative | 2.48 |
| E — Enterprising | 2.16 |
| A — Artistic | 1.67 |
| S — Social | 1.50 |

### Personality fit

These scores are **derived by NueCareer**, not published by any government agency: they are cosine similarities between a personality type's trait profile and this occupation's O\*NET interest and work-style ratings, expressed 0–100. Treat them as a starting point for exploration, not as evidence that a type belongs in a job.

| Type | Fit score (0–100) |
| --- | --- |
| ISTJ | 92.7 |
| ESTJ | 78.2 |
| ISFJ | 77.4 |
| ISTP | 74.4 |
| INTJ | 66.2 |

Best-fitting types: ISTJ. The bank also flags this occupation as introvert-friendly, meaning O\*NET work-context ratings put it low on public contact and performing for the public.

## Related occupations

O\*NET's primary related occupations, in its own ranked order.

- [Packer and Packager, Hand](https://nuecareer.com/careers/packer-and-packager-hand) — median $36,280
- [Food and Tobacco Roasting, Baking, and Drying Machine Operator and Tender](https://nuecareer.com/careers/food-and-tobacco-roasting-baking-and-drying-machine-operator-and-tender) — median $44,810
- [Meat, Poultry, and Fish Cutter and Trimmer](https://nuecareer.com/careers/meat-poultry-and-fish-cutter-and-trimmer) — median $38,300
- [Food Batchmaker](https://nuecareer.com/careers/food-batchmaker) — median $42,290
- [Packaging and Filling Machine Operator and Tender](https://nuecareer.com/careers/packaging-and-filling-machine-operator-and-tender) — median $43,220
- [Food Cooking Machine Operator and Tender](https://nuecareer.com/careers/food-cooking-machine-operator-and-tender) — median $41,590
- [Farmworker and Laborer, Crop, Nursery, and Greenhouse](https://nuecareer.com/careers/farmworker-and-laborer-crop-nursery-and-greenhouse) — median $35,660
- [Separating, Filtering, Clarifying, Precipitating, and Still Machine Setter, Operator, and Tender](https://nuecareer.com/careers/separating-filtering-clarifying-precipitating-and-still-machine-setter-operator-and-tender) — median $51,610
- [Machine Feeder and Offbearer](https://nuecareer.com/careers/machine-feeder-and-offbearer) — median $41,220
- [Weigher, Measurer, Checker, and Sampler, Recordkeeping](https://nuecareer.com/careers/weigher-measurer-checker-and-sampler-recordkeeping) — median $46,380

## Sources

- **O\*NET** — O\*NET 31.0 Database, August 2026. https://www.onetcenter.org/database.html
- **BLS OEWS** — BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025. https://www.bls.gov/oes/
- **BLS EP** — BLS Employment Projections, Table 1.2, 2025–2035. https://www.bls.gov/emp/
- **BEA RPP** — BEA Regional Price Parities by State, 2024. https://www.bea.gov/data/prices-inflation/regional-price-parities-state-and-metro-area

---

This bank 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 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). O\*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. NueCareer has transformed the data by joining it to BLS wage and projection data and deriving facet, personality-fit and AI-resilience scores. BLS and BEA data are public domain (17 U.S.C. §105).

O\*NET content is used under [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). How these figures are sourced and derived: https://nuecareer.com/careers/methodology

JSON representation of this page: https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/grader-and-sorter-agricultural-products