Last updated: April 21, 2026

CNC Programmer Salary by State (2025-2026): Pay & Growth

Name: CNC Programmer Salary by State 2025-2026
Creator: Manufacturing Lead Generation
License: https://manufacturingleadgeneration.com/terms/

CNC programmers sit in the middle of one of the hardest parts of modern manufacturing, turning part prints, tolerances, tooling choices, and machine limits into code that actually runs on the floor. That's why the salary spread is wider than many plant teams expect. In the latest state wage tables for Computer Numerically Controlled Tool Programmers, published through O*NET's BLS-backed wage system, the state median runs from $52,000 in Mississippi to $81,970 in Washington.

This resource pulls together every available O*NET local wage page and O*NET state trend page for CNC programmers, then organizes the numbers into one place you can actually use. If you're benchmarking compensation, launching a new machining cell, expanding to another state, or selling into precision manufacturing, this is the cleaner way to compare pay, demand, and projected openings. We compiled 131 core data points and 105 source links, and every core number links to the original source page.

CNC programmer pay, quick snapshot

$65,670

National median annual pay, CareerOneStop / O*NET

$31.57

National average hourly pay, O*NET wage tables

28,300

US employment, O*NET national trends panel

13%

National projected growth, with 3,100 annual openings

National CNC programmer salary overview
Top-paying states
Lower-paying states and why cheap labor can mislead
Fastest-growth states
States with the most openings
Full salary and openings table
How manufacturers should read this data
What actually drives CNC programmer pay
A hiring playbook for CNC programmer compensation
FAQ
Cite this page
Sources

National CNC programmer salary overview

At the national level, CNC programmers show up as a smaller occupation than machinists, set-up operators, or broad production roles, but the pay is notably stronger. The latest national wage panel for this occupation shows a median annual wage of $65,670, a 75th-percentile wage of $80,300, and a 90th-percentile wage of $97,930. The average hourly wage is $31.57, which tells you this role sits well above typical operator-level compensation in many shops. Source: CareerOneStop / O*NET.

Demand is not standing still either. O*NET's national trend panel shows 28,300 CNC programmer jobs nationwide, climbing to 31,900 in the next projection period, with 13% growth and roughly 3,100 annual openings. That matters because openings are not just new jobs. They include replacement demand, which is a real problem in machining as veteran programmers retire and fewer younger workers come in with deep CAM and G-code experience. Source: O*NET national trends panel.

If you're a plant leader, the headline isn't just that CNC programmers cost money. It's that bad programming costs more. A strong programmer cuts prove-out time, reduces scrap, improves cycle time, and helps shops get more work through the same machines. A weak one creates bottlenecks at the CAM seat, forces machinists to fix code on the fly, and drags quoting accuracy because no one trusts estimated run times. That's why this salary data is useful beyond HR. It helps explain why some machining regions support higher margins than others.

Across the state wage pages that currently publish usable salary data, the average state median is $65,442. The gap from Mississippi to Washington is $29,970, or about 58%. That is large enough to break a one-size-fits-all comp band. It also tells marketers, recruiters, and software vendors where programming talent is concentrated, expensive, or under pressure.

What this means on the shop floor

CNC programmers affect setup time, first-pass yield, spindle utilization, and how fast a shop can launch a new job. When they're scarce, engineering managers end up borrowing machinist time, supervisors start approving edits they shouldn't, and delivery dates slip. That's one reason the BLS machining occupation outlook still matters even when total headcount growth looks moderate.

Top-paying states for CNC programmers

The highest-paying CNC programmer markets are not random. Washington, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and California all combine technical manufacturing density with expensive labor markets and a steady need for precision work. Aerospace, medical, electronics, defense, and high-mix machining tend to push programming complexity up, which pushes pay up with it.

There's another pattern here. Several top-paying states do not lead the nation in raw openings. They pay more because the available talent pool is tighter, the work is more specialized, or the local cost structure forces employers to move faster on offers. If you are recruiting nationally, these states are where cheap assumptions fall apart first.

Rank	State	Median annual pay	Average hourly pay	Annual openings
1	Washington	$81,970	$39.41	70
2	Connecticut	$81,780	$39.32	70
3	Massachusetts	$80,060	$38.49	30
4	California	$78,750	$37.86	340
5	Minnesota	$75,940	$36.51	130
6	Kansas	$75,870	$36.48	80
7	Oregon	$75,800	$36.44	100
8	Missouri	$71,140	$34.20	60
9	Vermont	$70,160	$33.73	10
10	Utah	$69,590	$33.46	50

Washington leads the published table at $81,970, while Connecticut is close behind at $81,780. That's not just a West Coast story. New England markets also show up high, which lines up with the concentration of aerospace, medical device, and high-precision suppliers in those states.

Lower-paying states still aren't always easy hiring markets

The lower end of the table includes Mississippi, Arkansas, Louisiana, Iowa, and Oklahoma. On paper those markets look cheaper. In practice, some are still difficult because the number of experienced CNC programmers is small, the path from operator to programmer is inconsistent, and one large aerospace or industrial employer can tighten the market fast.

That's the trap in salary benchmarking for machining roles. A lower median wage does not mean abundant labor. It can mean the market is thin, informal, or heavily dependent on a handful of employers. Shops that benchmark only on pay and ignore openings, projected growth, or local program depth often end up with long vacancies and missed shipments.

Rank	State	Median annual pay	Projected growth	Annual openings
1	Mississippi	$52,000	29%	10
2	Arkansas	$52,830	17%	20
3	Louisiana	$55,720	0%	10
4	Iowa	$56,660	20%	60
5	Oklahoma	$58,080	15%	50
6	Nebraska	$59,370	21%	20
7	Montana	$59,680	N/A%	N/A
8	Kentucky	$59,760	25%	30
9	Ohio	$59,850	14%	230
10	Rhode Island	$60,670	20%	10

Why this matters

Mississippi has the lowest published median at $52,000, but its projected growth rate still runs 29%. A cheaper wage market can still be a hard hiring market.

Fastest-growth states for CNC programmer demand

The fastest-growth states tell you where new machining demand is building fastest. Idaho, Utah, Arizona, Nevada, and Georgia lead the current projections table. Some of those states have growing aerospace, electronics, semiconductor, or contract manufacturing footprints. Others benefit from general population and business migration, which can lift both industrial investment and competition for technical labor.

Growth is especially useful because wages usually lag. A state can show strong projected demand before salary surveys fully catch up. If your comp team waits for last year's average to move, you'll often lose the first few rounds of hiring in these faster-growth markets.

Rank	State	Projected growth	Current employment	Projected employment
1	Idaho	38%	210	290
2	Utah	34%	350	470
3	Arizona	33%	400	530
4	Nevada	33%	30	40
5	Georgia	31%	420	550
6	Mississippi	29%	70	90
7	Oregon	28%	780	1,000
8	South Carolina	27%	220	280
9	Florida	25%	750	940
10	Kentucky	25%	240	300

State growth and openings come from the linked O*NET state trend pages, which pull from the state projections system.

States with the most CNC programmer openings

Raw openings tell a different story than growth rates. California, Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio, and Texas lead on annual openings because they already have large machining and industrial bases. These are the states where replacement demand and expansion demand stack together. If a shop is always hiring, this is the list that tends to explain why.

For sales and marketing teams, this is also a practical prospecting list. High openings usually mean more new equipment, more programming bottlenecks, more CAM software evaluation, and more pressure to standardize or automate programming workflows.

Rank	State	Annual openings	Current employment	Median annual pay
1	California	340	3,000	$78,750
2	Wisconsin	260	2,040	$64,500
3	Michigan	250	2,320	$62,040
4	Ohio	230	2,040	$59,850
5	Texas	220	1,780	$66,750
6	Illinois	180	1,530	$65,920
7	Minnesota	130	1,050	$75,940
8	Pennsylvania	110	980	$61,990
9	Florida	100	750	$65,690
10	Oregon	100	780	$75,800

Full CNC programmer salary by state table

Not every state publishes every field for this occupation. Where O*NET does not publish a wage or trend number, the table shows N/A. We kept those states in the table anyway so you can see where the public dataset is thin instead of hiding the gaps.

State	Median annual pay	Average hourly pay	Employment	Growth	Openings
Alabama	$60,840	$29.25	340	21%	40
Alaska	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
Arizona	$69,220	$33.28	400	33%	60
Arkansas	$52,830	$25.40	180	17%	20
California	$78,750	$37.86	3,000	17%	340
Colorado	N/A	N/A	420	24%	50
Connecticut	$81,780	$39.32	530	23%	70
Delaware	N/A	N/A	40	0%	0
District of Columbia	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
Florida	$65,690	$31.58	750	25%	100
Georgia	$65,000	$31.25	420	31%	60
Hawaii	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
Idaho	$64,670	$31.09	210	38%	30
Illinois	$65,920	$31.69	1,530	19%	180
Indiana	$62,050	$29.83	770	21%	90
Iowa	$56,660	$27.24	540	20%	60
Kansas	$75,870	$36.48	680	24%	80
Kentucky	$59,760	$28.73	240	25%	30
Louisiana	$55,720	$26.79	50	0%	10
Maine	$66,660	$32.05	120	8%	10
Maryland	$63,760	$30.66	310	19%	40
Massachusetts	$80,060	$38.49	230	13%	30
Michigan	$62,040	$29.83	2,320	13%	250
Minnesota	$75,940	$36.51	1,050	21%	130
Mississippi	$52,000	$25.00	70	29%	10
Missouri	$71,140	$34.20	460	20%	60
Montana	$59,680	$28.69	N/A	N/A	N/A
Nebraska	$59,370	$28.54	190	21%	20
Nevada	$61,300	$29.47	30	33%	0
New Hampshire	$63,040	$30.31	350	23%	40
New Jersey	$66,800	$32.11	510	14%	60
New Mexico	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
New York	$65,840	$31.65	1,080	-7%	0
North Carolina	$60,880	$29.27	750	24%	90
North Dakota	N/A	N/A	20	0%	0
Ohio	$59,850	$28.77	2,040	14%	230
Oklahoma	$58,080	$27.93	470	15%	50
Oregon	$75,800	$36.44	780	28%	100
Pennsylvania	$61,990	$29.80	980	17%	110
Rhode Island	$60,670	$29.17	50	20%	10
South Carolina	$64,000	$30.77	220	27%	30
South Dakota	$63,080	$30.33	130	23%	20
Tennessee	$67,090	$32.25	340	21%	40
Texas	$66,750	$32.09	1,780	23%	220
Utah	$69,590	$33.46	350	34%	50
Vermont	$70,160	$33.73	100	10%	10
Virginia	$65,390	$31.44	410	20%	50
Washington	$81,970	$39.41	610	8%	70
West Virginia	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
Wisconsin	$64,500	$31.01	2,040	25%	260
Wyoming	$61,830	$29.73	N/A	N/A	N/A

How manufacturers should read this data

If you're hiring CNC programmers, use three numbers together, not one. First, look at wage. Second, look at openings. Third, look at local employment base. A state with moderate pay but very few qualified programmers can still be a painful market. A state with high pay but deeper local employment may actually be easier to hire in because more talent exists to begin with.

If you're opening a new machining operation, top-employment states like California, Michigan, and Ohio deserve a different read than fast-growth states like Idaho and Utah. The first group often gives you a bigger installed labor base. The second may give you momentum, but also faster wage movement and a smaller bench.

If you sell software or services to machine shops, this dataset is useful for market targeting too. States with high employment and high openings usually have more programming pain, more quoting pressure, and more interest in automation around CAM, setup reduction, post-processor cleanup, and training. That's why the openings leaders are often the same markets where digital manufacturing vendors get traction faster.

One more caution, public wage data always lags reality a bit. Overtime, bonuses, shift premiums, and role-blending can all push real compensation above published medians. In many shops, the best CNC programmer is doing fixture design, process engineering, quoting support, prove-out, or cell troubleshooting too. The public title does not always capture all of that value.

What actually drives CNC programmer pay by state

A lot of people ask, how much does a CNC programmer make, then stop at one national number. That misses how the role works in a real plant. The average pay for CNC programmers moves with part complexity, machine mix, and the amount of responsibility carried by one employee. A programmer writing repeat jobs for simple 2-axis turning is different from a programmer handling 5-axis aerospace parts, fixture planning, post edits, and first-article prove-out.

The average salary for a CNC programmer also shifts when shops expect more digital work upstream. In many higher-paying states, programmers are not just typing G-code. They are working in CAD and CAM environments, reviewing customer models, choosing workholding strategy, and solving tolerance stack issues before chips start flying. That combination pushes the pay range up because mistakes are expensive. A bad setup can burn material, break tools, tie up a spindle, and miss a ship date in one afternoon.

Another big factor is whether the programmer is floor-connected or office-isolated. In leaner job shops, the CNC programmer may also support quoting, estimate cycle times, train setup staff, or jump into troubleshooting when a new part family hits the floor. In bigger plants, the title may be narrower but the systems are more demanding. Both situations can create a higher hourly rate than generic job-board salary estimates suggest.

Cost of living matters, but it is not the only story. High-cost coastal states often post strong wages because housing, insurance, and business overhead are higher. At the same time, some lower-cost manufacturing states still post solid programmer pay because the labor pool is tight and advanced machining capacity is concentrated in a small number of employers. That is why median wage, openings, and local employment should be read together. Cost of living alone will not tell you whether a market is easy.

The timing of salary movement matters too. When a market starts heating up, employers first notice slower hiring, longer vacancies, and more counteroffers. Wage tables catch up later. That lag is why fast-growth states deserve extra attention even if the current median looks manageable. If projections are climbing, the average pay and average salary figures usually follow after employers compete for the same limited pool of programmers.

Three practical salary drivers

Programming scope, from basic edits to full CAD/CAM ownership.
Industry mix, especially aerospace, medical, defense, semiconductor, and high-mix precision work.
Local labor tightness, measured better by openings and employment depth than by wage alone.

A hiring playbook for CNC programmer compensation

If you are building a compensation plan, start with the state median but do not stop there. Ask what kind of CNC programmer you actually need. A programmer who can clean up proven code is one market. A programmer who can own fixtures, posts, toolpaths, and process handoff is another. Many employers underpay because the job title stays the same while the responsibility level expands. Then they wonder why the search drags on for months.

It also helps to translate annual numbers into monthly and hourly views. Managers sometimes ask about pay per month because budgeting is done monthly, while candidates often compare offers using hourly rate language. A national median around $65,670 works out to roughly $5,473 per month before overtime or bonuses. The national average hourly rate of $31.57 provides another anchor, but real offers may move higher if the role includes nights, weekends, urgent prove-outs, or customer-facing process support.

Experience bands matter, but years of experience should never be used alone. Ten years doing light edit work on the same family of parts is different from five years programming complex parts across multiple controls. Employers get better results when they benchmark by demonstrated capability: CAM ownership, post knowledge, setup reduction, macro use, fixture strategy, inspection awareness, and the ability to hand off repeatable jobs to operators and setup staff.

One more mistake is importing salary expectations from generic lists of popular companies for CNC programmers. National brand names can be useful context, but they do not replace local market data. A shop in Wisconsin or Texas competing for high-output programmer talent should care more about nearby aerospace suppliers, medical manufacturers, and contract machining firms than about a random national listicle. Local competition wins or loses offers.

For recruiting teams, the best workflow is simple. Use this page to find the state median, check the local openings number, then ask whether your role sits above or below standard market scope. If your job also includes CAD review, fixture design input, process engineering support, or customer DFM feedback, your offer probably needs to sit above the published median. If the role is narrower and the plant has strong support systems, the published range may be enough.

For industrial marketers, this data is link-worthy because it points to where programming pain is concentrated. High-opening states often create demand for automation software, quoting tools, simulation, recruiting services, training, and technical content. When you know where CNC programmer demand is highest, you know where many machine shops are feeling margin pressure, labor pressure, and throughput pressure at the same time.

Recommended way to use this dataset

Use state wage data for baseline comp, use openings for urgency, use employment depth for talent availability, and use your actual role scope to set the final offer. That combination is much more reliable than broad salary estimates from job boards.

A useful way to frame offers is to build a typical pay range for each plant instead of one national band. If a role is mostly edit work and setup support, the offer may sit near the market middle. If the programmer is expected to handle manual programming, own posts, support simulation, or run a core CAM package like Mastercam, the band should move higher. Many shops discover this only after interviewing candidates who are clearly stronger than the original job spec.

The state data also helps explain why candidate expectations vary so much. In some markets, experienced programmers will treat 29 per hour as low for complex work. In stronger specialty markets, 36 per hour may still be reasonable if the programmer is carrying heavy process responsibility. Those numbers should not be copied blindly, but they are a reminder that hourly conversations need context around machine count, part mix, tolerance risk, and how much programming discipline the shop really needs.

As of April 2026, the public tables also show why regional examples matter. Colorado has trend data but missing published wage fields for this occupation, while Illinois shows both wages and a large employment base. That difference is exactly why this page keeps incomplete state rows instead of hiding them. The gaps themselves tell you where public benchmarks are strong, where they are weak, and where employers may need to validate offers with local recruiter feedback instead of anonymous salary estimates scraped from the web. Shops that hire annually should treat that extra validation step as part of normal planning.

FAQ

What is the average CNC programmer salary in the US?

The latest national wage panel shows a median annual wage of $65,670 and an average hourly wage of $31.57 for CNC programmers. If you want a quick budgeting view, that is roughly $5,473 per month before overtime or bonuses. Source: CareerOneStop / O*NET.

Which state pays CNC programmers the most?

Among states with published wage data, Washington currently leads with a median annual wage of $81,970. That is the highest salary for a CNC programmer in the current published state median table, although individual employers may offer more for specialized work. Source: Washington O*NET wage page.

Which states hire the most CNC programmers?

California leads on annual openings in the current projections table, followed by Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio, and Texas. Those markets combine large installed machining bases with ongoing replacement demand. Source: O*NET state trends.

Why use O*NET for CNC programmer salary by state?

Because O*NET publishes consistent local wage and trend pages for Computer Numerically Controlled Tool Programmers across states. Public manufacturing salary data is messy, and this is one of the cleaner standard occupation series available. It is far better than relying only on generic salary estimates or broad lists of popular companies for CNC programmers.

Cite this page

Suggested citation:

Manufacturing Lead Generation. “CNC Programmer Salary by State (2025-2026): Pay, Growth & Openings Data.” Updated April 21, 2026. https://manufacturingleadgeneration.com/cnc-programmer-salary-by-state/

If you cite a single state figure, link directly to that state's O*NET wage or trend page as well.

Sources

This page uses O*NET local wage pages, O*NET state trend pages, the O*NET occupation summary, CareerOneStop's occupation profile, and the BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook. We list every core source below so editors, journalists, and industrial marketers can verify the data quickly.

A few quick SEO-style notes for readers doing compensation research: CNC programmer salaries vary a lot by region, average salary and median salary are not the same thing, and the salary for a CNC programmer often moves with the complexity of the mill, lathe, or multi-axis work being programmed. On some job boards you'll see salary estimates, pay range language, or phrases like highest salary for a CNC programmer and lowest salary for a CNC programmer. Those can be useful for rough screening, but this page is built from published state data instead. If you're comparing pay per hour, per month, and pay per year, or trying to map wages by years of experience, use the state wage pages as the starting point, then layer on your shop's actual role scope. The same goes for questions like how much does a CNC programmer make, what is the average salary for a CNC programmer, or what is the hourly rate in a local market.