Attorney Salary in Texas 2026,
$154,200 Median | BLS Data by City

Texas attorneys earn a median $154,200 a year, $74.13 an hour, per BLS OEWS May 2025, with the middle half between $102,810 and $223,390 and a full range of $79,340 to $349,490. That is 3.4% below the $159,670 national median before tax, and comfortably above it after tax, since Texas takes nothing.

Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington leads at $168,510, then Midland at $163,090, Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands at $157,980, Austin-Round Rock-San Marcos at $153,330 and El Paso at $140,550. Midland placing second is genuine: Permian Basin mineral title, royalty and energy transactional practice pays big-city rates in a small city with a fraction of the living costs.

Yes, in defined circumstances. The Texas Board of Law Examiners, acting under the Supreme Court of Texas, permits admission without examination for attorneys who have actively practised law for a qualifying period in another US jurisdiction and meet the character and fitness requirements. That is a material advantage over states such as Florida and California, which admit no one without their own examination, and it is one reason Texas firms recruit laterals nationally.

No. Texas levies no personal income tax and no municipal income tax, so a Texas lawyer at the median of $154,200 or the 75th percentile of $223,390 owes state tax on none of it. Texas does impose a franchise tax on business entities above a revenue threshold, which is a consideration for solo practitioners and small firms structuring their practice, but it is not a tax on salary.

It is one of the few genuine differentiators in the state. The Texas Board of Legal Specialization certifies attorneys in defined practice areas after a written examination, a substantial-involvement showing and peer review, and Texas advertising rules restrict how attorneys may claim specialisation without it. In competitive Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington and Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands practice areas it is a visible mark on the route from the median of $154,200 toward the $223,390 seventy-fifth percentile.

Because the work is concentrated in high-value practice rather than volume. Texas has four distinct legal economies — Houston energy and maritime, Dallas-Fort Worth corporate and commercial, Austin technology and regulatory, and a large border practice — and the first two generate transactional matters at rates set nationally rather than locally. Fewer lawyers per worker doing higher-value work produces exactly this pattern: a median of $154,200 that tracks the country while employment concentration sits below it.

The $79,340 tenth percentile is a real Texas market, not a statistical artefact. Rural district attorney offices, legal aid across the Rio Grande Valley, and small-town general practice pay in that region, and El Paso's whole-metro median of $140,550 shows how far the state's edges sit from Dallas. The statewide $154,200 median is a blend of two different professions, and which one you are entering matters more than the average.

Practice area and equity, in that order. The Texas 90th percentile of $349,490 is reached almost entirely through firm equity, general counsel appointments and origination-heavy transactional practice in energy, private equity and complex commercial litigation. Hours alone do not get there — Texas billing rates in mid-market practice do not scale far enough. The structural feature that helps is that none of the increment is taxed by the state, so the effective gain from partnership is larger here than in almost any comparable legal market.