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Architect salary guide: pay by role and state
Official US wage data for architects, drafters, engineers and designers, by percentile and by state, from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (May 2025). Written for the person budgeting a hire, and it goes one step further than salary: to what the hire costs in total.
By Malena BruggerSales Coordinator
What architecture and engineering roles earn in the US
National annual wages for nine occupations, May 2025. The median is the middle of the market: half of the people in the occupation earn more and half earn less. The 10th and 90th percentiles mark the edges.
Architects, median
$99,280
Mean $106,260
Architectural and civil drafters, median
$66,150
Mean $70,740
Civil engineers, median
$100,840
Includes structural engineers
Benefits on top of salary
42.9%
BLS: 30.0% of total compensation
Median annual wage by occupation
Every percentile, occupation by occupation
Slide the table sideways to see every percentile.
| Occupation (SOC code) | Employment | 10th pct. | 25th pct. | Median | 75th pct. | 90th pct. | Mean |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Architectural and Engineering Managers (11-9041) | 220,260 | $120,810 | $139,360 | $171,270 | $212,500 | $262,760 | $181,540 |
| Electrical Engineers (17-2071) | 198,750 | $76,550 | $92,830 | $120,630 | $152,950 | $184,300 | $125,100 |
| Mechanical Engineers (17-2141) | 296,810 | $73,990 | $84,130 | $104,110 | $132,590 | $164,340 | $113,610 |
| Civil Engineers (17-2051) | 367,840 | $68,240 | $79,930 | $100,840 | $129,680 | $163,220 | $108,670 |
| Architects, Except Landscape and Naval (17-1011) | 106,770 | $62,300 | $77,960 | $99,280 | $126,550 | $161,420 | $106,260 |
| Landscape Architects (17-1012) | 19,600 | $54,770 | $64,170 | $79,870 | $104,090 | $130,190 | $88,780 |
| Cost Estimators (13-1051) | 224,220 | $48,530 | $61,150 | $78,740 | $101,850 | $130,820 | $85,390 |
| Interior Designers (27-1025) | 71,500 | $41,420 | $51,840 | $67,190 | $85,740 | $114,140 | $74,540 |
| Architectural and Civil Drafters (17-3011) | 103,700 | $46,260 | $55,650 | $66,150 | $80,870 | $99,710 | $70,740 |
How our nine roles map to BLS categories
BLS classifies jobs by the work performed, not by title, so there is no official line for a BIM Modeler or a Revit Technician. Each role below points to the closest category, and the note says how to read it. Each hiring kit has a job description ready to post and interview questions for the role.
Slide the table sideways to see the note and the hiring kit for each role.
| Role | BLS category used | Median | How to read it | Hiring kit |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| BIM Modeler | Architectural and Civil Drafters (17-3011) | $66,150 | BLS has no separate category for BIM modelers; the closest official one is Architectural and Civil Drafters. | BIM Modeler kit |
| Architect | Architects, Except Landscape and Naval (17-1011) | $99,280 | Official BLS category: Architects, Except Landscape and Naval. | Architect kit |
| Architectural Designer | Architectural and Civil Drafters (17-3011) | $66,150 | BLS classifies jobs by their duties, not their title, and has no architectural designer category; we show Architectural and Civil Drafters, so treat it as a lower bound. | Architectural Designer kit |
| CAD Drafter | Architectural and Civil Drafters (17-3011) | $66,150 | Official BLS category: Architectural and Civil Drafters. | CAD Drafter kit |
| Revit Technician | Architectural and Civil Drafters (17-3011) | $66,150 | BLS has no separate category for Revit technicians; the closest official one is Architectural and Civil Drafters. | Revit Technician kit |
| Project Architect | Architects, Except Landscape and Naval (17-1011) | $99,280 | BLS does not split architects by seniority; this is the Architects category as a whole, so compare a project architect against its upper percentiles. | Project Architect kit |
| MEP Engineer | Mechanical Engineers (17-2141) | $104,110 | BLS splits MEP work across Mechanical Engineers and Electrical Engineers; we show Mechanical Engineers, the larger of the two. | MEP Engineer kit |
| Structural Engineer | Civil Engineers (17-2051) | $100,840 | BLS counts structural engineers inside Civil Engineers. | Structural Engineer kit |
| BIM Manager | Architectural and Engineering Managers (11-9041) | $171,270 | BLS has no BIM manager category; the closest is Architectural and Engineering Managers, which also covers more senior roles, so read it as an upper reference. | BIM Manager kit |
Architect salary by state
Median and mean annual wage for architects (except landscape and naval) in 15 states, May 2025. The national median is $99,280. New York’s median matches it by coincidence; BLS publishes the state as its own series.
Slide the table sideways to compare each state with the national median.
| vs national | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Massachusetts | $117,330 | $119,100 | +18.2% |
| California | $108,540 | $121,910 | +9.3% |
| Colorado | $102,400 | $110,290 | +3.1% |
| Arizona | $102,000 | $105,840 | +2.7% |
| Georgia | $100,420 | $114,600 | +1.1% |
| Washington | $100,190 | $100,740 | +0.9% |
| New Jersey | $99,800 | $118,250 | +0.5% |
| New York | $99,280 | $111,890 | same |
| Oregon | $98,800 | $100,940 | −0.5% |
| Virginia | $97,680 | $105,970 | −1.6% |
| Pennsylvania | $97,030 | $98,700 | −2.3% |
| Florida | $96,240 | $100,170 | −3.1% |
| North Carolina | $95,700 | $104,270 | −3.6% |
| Texas | $94,490 | $98,910 | −4.8% |
| Illinois | $81,780 | $92,840 | −17.6% |
Architectural and civil drafter salary by state
Median and mean annual wage for architectural and civil drafters in the same 15 states, May 2025. The national median is $66,150. This is the category this guide uses for CAD drafters, BIM modelers and Revit technicians.
Slide the table sideways to compare each state with the national median.
| vs national | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Massachusetts | $76,990 | $77,110 | +16.4% |
| California | $76,520 | $80,360 | +15.7% |
| Colorado | $76,370 | $78,240 | +15.4% |
| New York | $76,260 | $78,160 | +15.3% |
| Georgia | $74,940 | $75,040 | +13.3% |
| Oregon | $74,000 | $74,430 | +11.9% |
| Washington | $73,000 | $74,420 | +10.4% |
| Pennsylvania | $64,800 | $69,080 | −2.0% |
| Arizona | $64,750 | $69,550 | −2.1% |
| Virginia | $63,450 | $67,510 | −4.1% |
| Texas | $63,320 | $68,600 | −4.3% |
| New Jersey | $62,960 | $67,820 | −4.8% |
| North Carolina | $62,750 | $66,430 | −5.1% |
| Florida | $62,640 | $65,550 | −5.3% |
| Illinois | $58,240 | $63,050 | −12.0% |
From salary to the total cost of a hire
Salary is the biggest line, not the whole bill. The BLS Employer Costs for Employee Compensation survey puts benefits at 30.0% of what private employers spend on compensation (June 2026): paid leave, supplemental pay such as bonuses, insurance, retirement and legally required costs such as Social Security and Medicare. If benefits are 30.0% of the total, wages are the other 70.0%, so benefits add 42.9% on top of salary.
For an architect at the national median, that takes $99,280 in salary to about $141,829 a year before recruiting, software and a desk. OEWS salaries leave year end bonuses out and ECEC counts them as a benefit, so adding the two does not count anything twice.
To add recruiting, software licenses and office costs, and to set a US hire next to a remote professional, use the architect hiring cost calculator. It loads these same BLS medians for each role.
How to use this to budget a hire
Pick the category. Find your role in the mapping table. For roles BLS does not name, such as BIM Modeler, read the note before you use the number.
Pick a point in the range. The median is the middle of the market. For someone with more experience than most people in the category, look toward the 75th percentile; for someone early in their career, toward the 25th.
Adjust for your state. Compare your state with the national median in the state tables. If your state is not listed, BLS publishes every state in its OEWS tables.
Add what sits on top of salary. Benefits add about 42.9%, then recruiting, software and the desk. The hiring cost calculator adds them line by line.
Compare before you commit. Put the total next to a remote professional for the same role, with the same software costs on both sides.
Methodology: where these numbers come from
What OEWS is
Every wage on this page comes from the Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) program of the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, May 2025 estimates, released on May 15, 2026. OEWS combines six semiannual survey panels collected over three years, covering about 1.1 million establishments. The figures here are cross industry and national or statewide; BLS also publishes them by metro area and by industry.
What a salary means here
OEWS wages are straight time gross pay. They include base pay, commissions and production bonuses, and they exclude overtime, year end and other nonproduction bonuses, profit sharing and the employer’s cost of benefits. Annual figures assume a full year of 2,080 hours. A percentile is a boundary: the median is the point where half earn more and half earn less.
What it does not include
OEWS covers wage and salary employees only: self-employed architects, owners and partners in unincorporated firms are not in it. BLS also notes that OEWS does not record pay by the level of work performed, so the data cannot separate a junior from a senior architect; the percentiles are the closest proxy, and BLS itself names experience as one reason pay differs within an occupation. There is no category for BIM or Revit titles, which is why the role table points each one to the closest occupation.
How we read the data
We pulled the national and state series from the BLS public data API on September 23, 2026 and checked them against the Occupational Outlook Handbook. Every value in the tables was published by BLS; none was suppressed or estimated by us. The drafter figures are for architectural and civil drafters (SOC 17-3011), not for all drafters.
Budgeting a hire? See the whole picture first
Salary is one line of the budget. WorldTeams places vetted remote architects, drafters and BIM professionals who work in your time zone. Tell us the role and compare the numbers.
Questions, answered
How much do architects make in the US?
Architects (except landscape and naval) earned a median of $99,280 a year in May 2025, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, with a mean of $106,260. The lowest paid 10% earned less than $62,300 and the top 10% more than $161,420. BLS counted 106,770 architects on payrolls; self-employed architects and partners in unincorporated firms are not part of these figures.
How much do architects make in New York?
The median architect salary in New York State was $99,280 in May 2025, the same as the national median by coincidence, and the mean was $111,890. Of the 15 states in this guide, Massachusetts had the highest median at $117,330 and Illinois the lowest at $81,780. These are statewide figures; BLS publishes separate tables for metropolitan areas, including New York's.
Do architectural drafters and architects earn the same?
No. In May 2025 the median for architectural and civil drafters was $66,150, against $99,280 for architects, so drafters earned about 33% less at the median. You may also see $68,090 quoted as the drafter salary: that is the median for all drafters, mechanical and electrical included, not the architectural and civil group this guide uses.
Why doesn't BLS list BIM modelers?
BLS classifies jobs by the work performed, not by job title or software, and its occupation list does not try to name every title. BIM modelers and Revit technicians have no line of their own, so this guide uses Architectural and Civil Drafters, with a median of $66,150 in May 2025, as the closest official category. Read it as a reference point for the role rather than a BIM modeler salary.
What do structural and MEP engineers earn?
BLS counts structural engineers inside Civil Engineers, whose median was $100,840 in May 2025. MEP work splits between Mechanical Engineers, with a median of $104,110, and Electrical Engineers, at $120,630. Pick the category that matches the discipline you are hiring for and use the 25th and 75th percentiles in the national table to place a junior or a senior engineer.
How much does a BIM manager make?
There is no BIM manager category in BLS data. The nearest one, Architectural and Engineering Managers, had a median of $171,270 in May 2025, but it also covers more senior roles, so treat it as an upper reference rather than a going rate. For what the job involves day to day, see what to look for in a BIM manager.
Sources: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025; BLS, Occupational Employment and Wages news release, May 15, 2026; BLS, OEWS frequently asked questions (wage definition, survey design); BLS, Standard Occupational Classification User Guide; U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Employer Costs for Employee Compensation, June 2026; BLS OEWS profile: Architects, Except Landscape and Naval (17-1011); BLS OEWS profile: Landscape Architects (17-1012); BLS OEWS profile: Architectural and Civil Drafters (17-3011); BLS OEWS profile: Civil Engineers (17-2051); BLS OEWS profile: Mechanical Engineers (17-2141); BLS OEWS profile: Electrical Engineers (17-2071); BLS OEWS profile: Interior Designers (27-1025); BLS OEWS profile: Cost Estimators (13-1051); BLS OEWS profile: Architectural and Engineering Managers (11-9041).
Last updated September 23, 2026.