What a lab technician earns, by metro

Median pay for lab technicians runs from $34,160 in Aguadilla to $103,180 in Kingston — a 3.02× range across 490 metropolitan areas. The national median of $62,930 sits inside that range but describes no particular market.

What the percentile band tells you

Ten per cent of lab technicians earn below $38,910 and ten per cent above $100,990 — a 2.6× band. The upside from median to 90th percentile is 60%, which is a normal amount of room for experience and specialisation to matter. An offer below the 25th percentile is worth questioning; one above the 75th is worth taking seriously.

Where the money is

Kingston (NY) leads and Aguadilla (PR) trails, but the gap is modest. For a role like this the more useful comparison is not between cities but between the 10th and 90th percentile within one — see the band above.

Highest paying metros

Lowest paying metros

Burlington is the cluster

Burlington has 12.54× the national concentration of lab technicians — the densest market in the country for this role, with 1,820 employed locally. Pay there is $51,000, which does not put it near the top of the pay table. Concentration and compensation are different things — a dense market is easier to get hired in and easier to move around within, but the competition that makes it dense also caps what employers need to offer.

Where the role is most concentrated

Largest employers by metro

Current openings

About this data

Figures come from the BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics programme, May 2025 release, SOC code 29-2010. OEWS surveys employers, so it reports what is actually paid rather than what job advertisements claim, and it excludes the self-employed. Estimates cover 490 of 528 metropolitan areas — near-complete coverage, which means the ranges above are reliable rather than drawn from a handful of markets. Read the methodology.