---
title: "Pharmacy Technician"
description: "Prepare medications under the direction of a pharmacist. May measure, mix, count out, label, and record amounts and dosages of medications according to…"
canonical: "https://nuecareer.com/careers/pharmacy-technician"
last-updated: "2026-08-23T15:56:39.581Z"
---

# Pharmacy Technician

**Category:** Healthcare Practitioners and Technical · **SOC code:** 29-2052 · **O\*NET-SOC code:** 29-2052.00

Prepare medications under the direction of a pharmacist. May measure, mix, count out, label, and record amounts and dosages of medications according to prescription orders.

Also advertised as: Accredited Pharmacy Technician; Certified Pharmacy Technician (CPhT); Chemotherapy Pharmacy Technician (Chemo Pharmacy Technician); Compounding Technician; OR Pharmacy Tech (Operating Room Pharmacy Tech); RPhT (Registered Pharmacy Technician).

## At a glance

- **Median annual wage:** $45,750 (BLS OEWS, May 2025)
- **Median hourly wage:** $22.00/hr
- **Wage range (10th–90th percentile):** $36,020 to $61,040, with the middle half between $37,850 and $49,990
- **Total US employment:** 471,680
- **Typical entry education:** High school
- **Preparation required:** Some preparation — O\*NET rates this "Job Zone Three: Medium Preparation Needed"
- **Projected growth:** +6.4% over 2024–2034 (BLS EP, 2024–2034)
- **Annual job openings:** 49,000 openings a year
- **AI-resilience score:** 38/100 — 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 471,680 US jobs.

| Percentile | Annual wage |
| --- | --- |
| 10th | $36,020 |
| 25th | $37,850 |
| 50th (median) | $45,750 |
| 75th | $49,990 |
| 90th | $61,040 |
| Mean (average) | $46,620 |

### 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 |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| WA | $58,900 | $55,040 | 8,150 |
| CA | $55,110 | $49,774 | 39,860 |
| OR | $54,900 | $53,115 | 4,320 |
| AK | $52,640 | $51,427 | 800 |
| CO | $49,970 | $48,490 | 6,010 |
| MT | $49,400 | $52,195 | 1,340 |
| MN | $48,300 | $48,975 | 7,340 |
| WY | $48,260 | $52,065 | 600 |
| UT | $48,140 | $48,693 | 5,030 |
| NV | $47,980 | $47,990 | 4,070 |
| VT | $47,940 | $48,939 | 760 |
| AZ | $47,640 | $47,320 | 12,970 |
| ND | $47,560 | $53,463 | 890 |
| DC | $47,410 | $43,139 | 1,130 |
| NH | $47,360 | $45,466 | 1,970 |

39 more states with published wage data are omitted here. The full table for all 54 states is at https://nuecareer.com/careers/pharmacy-technician/salary-by-state, or as JSON at https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/pharmacy-technician.

## Outlook

BLS projects employment to move from 490,400 in the 2024–2034 base year to 521,800 by the end of the cycle — a gain of 31,500 jobs, or +6.4%. Much faster than average: 6.4% against 3.1% projected for all occupations over the same cycle. About 49,000 openings a year are expected on average, counting openings from growth as well as from workers leaving the occupation permanently. Source: BLS EP, 2024–2034.

## How to get in

- **Typical entry education:** High school diploma or equivalent (BLS Employment Projections).
- **Preparation level:** Some preparation — O\*NET's preparation band for this occupation is "Job Zone Three: Medium Preparation Needed".
- **Related work experience typically required:** None.
- **Typical on-the-job training:** Moderate-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 |
| --- | --- |
| Post-Secondary Certificate | 42.0% |
| High School Diploma | 35.7% |
| Some College Courses | 14.6% |
| Associate's Degree (or other 2-year degree) | 3.8% |
| Bachelor's Degree | 3.8% |

## What the work involves

- Answer telephones, responding to questions or requests.
- Maintain proper storage and security conditions for drugs.
- Receive and store incoming supplies, verify quantities against invoices, check for outdated medications in current inventory, and inform supervisors of stock needs and shortages.
- Establish or maintain patient profiles, including lists of medications taken by individual patients.
- Clean and help maintain equipment or work areas and sterilize glassware, according to prescribed methods.
- Assist customers by answering simple questions, locating items, or referring them to the pharmacist for medication information.
- Receive written prescription or refill requests and verify that information is complete and accurate.
- Order, label, and count stock of medications, chemicals, or supplies and enter inventory data into computer.

## Skills and knowledge

### Essential skills

- Active Listening — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Reading Comprehension — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speaking — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Critical Thinking — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Learning — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Monitoring — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Writing — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Mathematics — importance 3.0 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.

- Social Perceptiveness — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Service Orientation — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Complex Problem Solving — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Judgment and Decision Making — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Coordination — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Time Management — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Persuasion — importance 2.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Management of Personnel Resources — importance 2.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Knowledge areas

- Customer and Personal Service — importance 4.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Medicine and Dentistry — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Mathematics — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- English Language — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Computers and Electronics — importance 3.7 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Law and Government — importance 3.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Abilities

- Oral Comprehension — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Comprehension — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Oral Expression — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Near Vision — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speech Recognition — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Problem Sensitivity — importance 3.8 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 Conventional (C), Realistic (R), Social (S).

| Interest area | Score (1–7) |
| --- | --- |
| C — Conventional | 7.00 |
| R — Realistic | 4.21 |
| S — Social | 3.32 |
| I — Investigative | 2.99 |
| E — Enterprising | 2.52 |
| A — Artistic | 1.00 |

### 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 | 87.8 |
| ISFJ | 86.2 |
| ESTJ | 82.8 |
| ESFJ | 72.2 |
| ISTP | 55.9 |

Best-fitting types: ISTJ, ISFJ, ESTJ.

## Related occupations

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

- [Pharmacist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/pharmacist) — median $140,910
- [Pharmacy Aide](https://nuecareer.com/careers/pharmacy-aide) — median $37,680
- [Medical Assistant](https://nuecareer.com/careers/medical-assistant) — median $45,690
- [Veterinary Technician](https://nuecareer.com/careers/veterinary-technician) — median $47,380
- [Phlebotomist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/phlebotomist) — median $45,230
- [Licensed Practical Nurse](https://nuecareer.com/careers/licensed-practical-nurse) — median $64,400
- [Medical and Clinical Laboratory Technician](https://nuecareer.com/careers/medical-and-clinical-laboratory-technician) — median $62,930
- [Nursing Assistant](https://nuecareer.com/careers/nursing-assistant) — median $42,260
- [Surgical Technologist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/surgical-technologist) — median $64,650
- [Optician, Dispensing](https://nuecareer.com/careers/optician-dispensing) — median $47,260

## Sources

- **O\*NET** — O\*NET 30.3 Database, May 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, 2024–2034. https://www.bls.gov/emp/
- **BLS OOH** — BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2024–2034 edition. https://www.bls.gov/ooh/
- **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 30.3 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/pharmacy-technician