NP Salary in 2026: Sourced Ranges by Specialty and State

Reviewed May 16, 2026 by the ScrubScope editorial team.

The median nurse practitioner salary was $129,210 in the Bureau of Labor Statistics May 2024 release, the most recent full survey ^[1]. Half of NPs earned more than that, half less. The number you actually land on is decided less by your specialty than by your state, your setting, and how many years you have in the role. That is the part the salary roundups skip.

The short answer

A working RN deciding whether the NP route pays for itself wants one figure, and BLS gives a defensible one: a median around $129,000 nationally for May 2024, with the bottom of the range near $98,000 and a long tail well above $160,000 in the highest-paying states ^[1]. That spread is real, not noise. An NP in a low-cost rural state in an outpatient clinic and an NP in a California hospital are both "nurse practitioners" and can be $50,000 apart on the same BLS table.

Two things matter before you read another salary chart. First, BLS reports NP wages by industry and by state, not by clinical specialty. There is no official BLS "FNP salary" or "PMHNP salary" line, so any site quoting a precise dollar figure by specialty is using survey or aggregator data, not the government number. Second, the figure that decides whether the degree is worth it is not the salary, it is the salary minus what the program costs you and the years it takes to break even. Run that before you enroll, not after.

One note on which BLS number you will see. The $129,210 above is the NP-only OEWS median for occupation 29-1171, the most specific federal figure for nurse practitioners. BLS also publishes a broader Occupational Outlook Handbook group, $132,050 in May 2024, that bundles nurse practitioners with nurse anesthetists and nurse midwives ^[2]. Our comparison guides cite that group figure because they weigh NP against PA and physician; this page uses the narrower NP-only median. Both are real BLS data for the same year; they differ because they count different groups, not because one is wrong.

Sourced salary ranges by specialty

BLS does not publish nurse-practitioner pay by clinical specialty. What it does publish, and what is defensible to quote, is the national distribution and the variation by state and work setting. Here is the May 2024 OEWS picture for occupation 29-1171.

The state gap is the biggest single mover in that table. California's $161,540 state mean runs more than $30,000 above the national median, and Nevada, Washington, and New Jersey sit in the $145,000 to $149,000 band ^[3]. The most populous states, California, Texas, Florida, and New York, employ the most NPs, so the largest job markets are not the same as the highest-paying ones.

A practical read of the table: if you are choosing the NP path for the money, the lever is not the certification you pick, it is where you practice and in what setting. Specialty changes your scope and your daily work; it does not move the BLS number nearly as much as a state line does. Treat any "AGNP earns X, PMHNP earns Y" chart as a survey estimate, not a government figure, and never let an aggregator's specialty number drive a six-figure tuition decision.

What moves the number

Geography first. The same credential paid the California state mean of $161,540 in May 2024 and roughly two-thirds of that in the lowest-paying states ^[3]. Cost of living eats some of that gap, but not all of it, and a high-paying state with full practice authority is a different career than a restricted-practice state at a lower mean.

Setting is the second lever. BLS reports NP wages by industry, and hospital and outpatient-center NPs do not sit at the same point on the distribution as those in physicians' offices. Years in the role is the third: a new NP a year out of certification is rarely at the median, and the people pulling the top of the range are typically experienced, often in a high-acuity or procedural setting.

What does not move the number much is the thing the sales pages push hardest: the program's name. A more expensive NP program does not produce a higher BLS wage. It produces a higher loan balance against the same median. That is why the salary figure alone is the wrong input for the enroll-or-not decision. The right input is the gap between the median for your state and setting and the all-in cost of the program, divided over the years it takes to clear it. Work that out against a specific tuition number and your current RN salary before you enroll, not after.

One caution on the demand side, because the salary roundups oversell it. BLS projects employment for nurse practitioners to grow much faster than the average occupation through the decade, and the NP job outlook page carries the sourced growth and openings figures ^[2]. Strong demand supports the wage; it does not guarantee you the California number from a different state, and a hot outlook is not a reason to pay more for the degree than the break-even math justifies.

If you have shortlisted two or three NP programs and want their cost and placement realities lined up against your state's BLS median before you commit, compare them in the best online FNP programs ranking and the nurse practitioner program overview.

Bottom line

The defensible NP number for 2026 is the BLS May 2024 median of $129,210, with a real range from roughly $98,000 to above $160,000 driven mostly by state and setting, not specialty ^[1]. Use the median for your state and setting, not the headline national figure, and judge the degree on the gap between that number and what the program actually costs you.

For the pathway and program comparisons behind that decision, start with the nurse practitioner pathway overview, and weigh your own tuition figure against your current salary before you shortlist a school. ScrubScope routes inquiries to the schools you choose and does not make admissions or financial-aid decisions; see our full disclosure.

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