Radiologic Technologist Pay by State

Pay is the first question in almost every imaging career decision, and it is also where advice gets vaguest. This page takes the opposite approach: every number below comes from one public source, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics program (OES, May 2025 release), for occupation 29-2034, Radiologic Technologists and Technicians. The full table covers all fifty states plus the District of Columbia. Nothing here is estimated, projected, or adjusted.

How much do radiologic technologists make?

Nationally, the median annual wage for radiologic technologists is $80,110, and the mean is $83,840, which works out to $40.31 per hour. The median is the midpoint of all reported wages and resists being pulled around by very high or very low outliers, so it is usually the better single number for judging a typical wage; the mean is the arithmetic average and runs higher wherever a top tier of earners stretches the distribution. BLS counts roughly 230,490 employed radiologic technologists nationwide. How that wage actually arrives in a paycheck differs by arrangement, and what changes between PRN and staff pay is its own subject.

Which states pay radiologic technologists the most?

By annual mean wage, the top of the table is California ($117,950), followed by Massachusetts ($101,910), Washington ($100,900), Oregon ($99,630), and New York ($99,000). The District of Columbia ($98,860) and Alaska ($96,670) sit just behind them. At the other end, Mississippi ($59,090), Alabama ($60,800), and Louisiana ($66,240) report the lowest annual means. Small-state figures deserve a caveat: Alaska reports only 370 employed technologists, Wyoming 430, and Vermont 470, so a handful of facilities can move those averages in a way that cannot happen in California’s pool of 20,900.

Radiologic technologist pay in every state

Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OES), May 2025, occupation 29-2034 (Radiologic Technologists and Technicians). Public domain; retrieved July 18, 2026. BLS updates OES annually — for the latest release, check bls.gov/oes.

Why does rad tech pay vary so much by state?

A two-to-one spread between state averages has several drivers stacked on top of each other. Cost of living does the heaviest lifting: the states at the top of the table are also expensive places to live, so a higher nominal wage does not always mean more take-home spending power. Credentialing is a second driver — states differ in whether and how they credential radiologic technologists, and markets where entry carries more requirements tend to price that scarcity in. Local market structure matters too: union density, large hospital-system concentration, and how much imaging volume runs through outpatient and mobile settings all shape what facilities offer. None of these factors is separable from the others in a wage table, which is one more reason to treat state averages as context rather than as an offer you should expect.

How do per diem and PRN rates relate to these numbers?

BLS OES reports employer-reported wages for employees, averaged across full-time and part-time arrangements. Per diem and PRN work relates to those figures loosely, not directly: PRN rates are typically quoted as a higher bare hourly number in exchange for forgoing benefits, and premiums for nights, weekends, holidays, and short-notice coverage — the mechanics covered in how shift differentials work — are often folded into the quoted rate rather than listed separately. On a marketplace like WhiteBadge, each posted shift shows its own rate up front, set for that facility, modality, and time slot, so the practical comparison is always a specific offer against your state’s baseline, not an average against an average.

How should technologists use state wage data?

Three habits keep a wage table useful. First, compare medians when judging a typical wage and means when comparing states to each other consistently. Second, weigh the employment column: averages built on a few hundred technologists move easily, so treat small-state figures as indicative rather than precise. Third, use the state baseline as the floor of a comparison, then evaluate each specific arrangement against it — a decision framework that matters most when weighing relocation or choosing between travel and per diem work, where the same nominal rate can land very differently after housing and licensing costs. State wage data answers “what does this market pay” — the question it cannot answer is what your next shift is worth, because that is always a property of the specific opening.