Cable Splicer Salary 2026,
What Cable Splicers Actually Earn

How much do cable splicers make in 2026?

Cable splicers are counted in the BLS telecommunications line installers and repairers series: OEWS May 2025 puts the SOC 49-9052 national median at $74,330 a year ($35.73 an hour), with the bottom 10% near $45,310 and the top 10% at $103,680. Two clarifications matter before using that figure. First, the series pools splicers with the wider outside-plant trade — installers, aerial and underground crews and fiber technicians — so it is the trade's band rather than a splicing-specific measurement. Second, this is the telecommunications line series, not the electrical power-line series; power linemen are counted separately under SOC 49-9051 at a higher median, and the two trades are frequently confused because both work on lines from a bucket truck. Inside the telecom band, position is set by what you can splice and where. Copper splicing in existing plant sits lower; fiber splicing, particularly ribbon splicing and high-count backbone work with an OTDR in hand, sits well above the median. Employer type matters too: incumbent carriers pay steadier rates with strong benefits and, in much of the country, union representation, while contractors pay more per hour with more travel and less certainty. Employment is projected to decline 3.1% through 2034, with roughly 8,900 openings a year. → Full cable splicer career guide, career path, credentials & placement →

Note: $74,330 blends every experience level and every setting in this occupation. For pay by level alone, see Pay by Level below.

Published (BLS): BLS OEWS May 2025, SOC 49-9052, United States national estimate. Public, methodologically rigorous, but sampled on a rolling 3-year basis and published ~10 months after collection — so it reflects wages that are already 1–2 years old by the time you read them.

Level and certification medians: distributed across the published BLS percentile range for this SOC code (P10 through P90) according to the credential tiers this occupation actually hires at. They are modeled reference points, not separately surveyed wages.

State and metro figures: modeled — the BLS national median multiplied by the GlobalCybers state wage index, and for metros by the published metro index for that state. They are estimates of local pay, not BLS state or metropolitan-area observations, and are labelled as modeled in the tables below.

No verified placement sample:GlobalCybers does not yet publish a placement median for this role, so no "verified" figure appears anywhere on this page.

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