Anesthesiologist Salary in Washington 2026:
$499,990 Median

Washington anesthesiologists earn a median $499,990 a year per BLS OEWS May 2025, with the middle half between $437,430 and $646,930 and a full range of $239,000 to $646,940. That median is 27.7% above the $391,490 national figure, and because Washington levies no personal income tax, the after-tax gap against most other states is wider still.

Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, at $646,930, well above the statewide median of $499,990. BLS does not publish an anesthesiology median for Spokane-Spokane Valley. The Seattle figure sitting exactly at the state 75th percentile tells you that the upper quarter of Washington anesthesiology is effectively the Seattle market.

No. Washington licenses anesthesiologists as physicians — the Washington Medical Commission issues the physician and surgeon licence, and the Washington State Board of Osteopathic Medicine and Surgery licenses osteopathic physicians. There is no anesthesiology-specific state credential. Board certification comes from the American Board of Anesthesiology, a national body, and subspecialty certification in critical care, pain medicine, cardiac or paediatric anaesthesia follows the same route.

At these levels it matters a great deal. An anesthesiologist at the Washington 75th percentile of $646,930 pays no state income tax, where a top-bracket state would take a substantial share of that. The offsets are modest — a Paid Family & Medical Leave premium of about 0.81% of wages in 2026 and a WA Cares premium of 0.58% — and Washington's 7% capital gains tax touches investment income rather than clinical earnings.

Because it concentrates tertiary surgical volume. Washington's location quotient of 1.74 across about 1,540 anesthesiologists reflects a large academic medical centre presence, level-one trauma capability serving a wide regional catchment including neighbouring states, and a substantial ambulatory surgical sector in the Puget Sound corridor. That volume is what supports both the employment and the pay.

That the Washington 75th and 90th percentiles are essentially the same figure — $646,930 and $646,940 — indicates a large group of anesthesiologists compensated at a very similar high level, most of them in the Seattle market. It is the signature of partnership and group compensation models that pay to a shared formula rather than negotiating individually, and it means the practical ceiling in Washington anesthesiology is reached by joining the right group rather than by out-negotiating peers within one.

It is not a full-time clinical figure. Academic appointments trading cash for protected time, part-year and part-time practice, and first-year-out arrangements all annualise low in OEWS, and in a specialty with a $499,990 median the tenth percentile is describing a different working arrangement rather than a poorly paid version of the same job. The sample here is also modest at about 1,540 physicians statewide, so the tails move between vintages.

Call burden and case mix do most of the work. Washington groups typically compensate on a units-and-call model, so overnight and weekend coverage, trauma availability and high-acuity cardiac or paediatric case mix are what separate the state median of $499,990 from the $646,930 seventy-fifth percentile. The anaesthesia care team model, widely used in Washington, also means many anesthesiologists supervise CRNAs across multiple rooms, which raises billable volume per physician and underpins the state's high concentration.