How much do controls technicians make in 2026?
Controls technicians are counted in the BLS electrical and electronics repairers, commercial and industrial equipment series: OEWS May 2025 gives the SOC 49-2094 national median as $74,090 a year ($35.62 an hour), with the bottom 10% near $46,840 and the top 10% at $105,590. That is one of the highest medians among technician occupations that require no licence, and the reason is scarcity of a specific combination: understanding the process, the electrical system and the program at once. A controls technician follows a fault from a symptom on a production line through field devices and wiring to a PLC program and an HMI or SCADA screen, and decides whether the problem is a sensor, a drive parameter, a network fault or logic. Pay rises with platform breadth — multiple PLC families, industrial Ethernet and fieldbus networks, servo and motion control, robot integration — and with sector, where pharmaceutical, semiconductor, automotive, water utility SCADA and data centre work pay above general manufacturing. Note the series shows a slight projected decline of 0.8% with roughly 4,700 openings a year, which reflects the shrinking of legacy electronics repair inside the same code rather than weak demand for automation skills. Employment is projected to change by -0.8% through 2034. → Full controls technician career guide, career path, credentials & placement →
Note: $74,090 blends every experience level and every setting in this occupation. For pay by level alone, see Pay by Level below.
- Controls Technicians earn a national median $74,090/yr ($35.62/hr) (BLS OEWS May 2025, SOC 49-2094); the P10 to P90 range is $46,840 to $105,590.
- At a $74,090 median, controls work is among the best-paid technician occupations that require no licence, with a band running from $46,840 to $105,590.
- The paid skill is integration: following a fault across process, field wiring, drives, PLC logic and network layers, which very few maintenance staff can do end to end.
- The pooled series shows a 0.8% projected decline because legacy electronics repair sits in the same code — automation demand itself is strong, and platform breadth is what raises pay.
US Controls Technician Pay Distribution · BLS OEWS May 2025
Pay by Level · BLS OEWS May 2025
How much do controls technicians earn at each level?
BLS OEWS publishes one blended wage for the whole occupation and does not break pay out by credential or practice level. The levels below distribute the published percentile range across the credential tiers this role actually hires at.
Level medians are aligned to the BLS OEWS May 2025 percentile distribution for SOC 49-2094; GlobalCybers does not yet publish a verified placement sample for this role, so no verified median is shown.
Methodology & Sources
How the numbers on this page are built
Published (BLS): BLS OEWS May 2025, SOC 49-2094, 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.
Pay by Career Level
How much does a controls technician earn at each career stage?
Controls pay tracks how many layers of a system you can diagnose without help. Each median is anchored to the BLS OEWS distribution for SOC 49-2094.
By State
Which states pay controls technicians the most in 2026?
State figures are modeled estimates — the BLS national median multiplied by the GlobalCybers salary-calculator state wage index — not BLS state observations. Controls demand concentrates around automated industry: states with semiconductor, pharmaceutical, automotive, food processing and data centre investment pay above the modeled figure and offer the platform variety that raises long-run earnings.
6 of 51 state guides shown, ranked by median. Bar is relative to California ($85,200), the highest-paying state shown. See all role salary guides →
By Metro
Which cities pay controls technicians the most?
Metro figures are modeled — national median times state wage index times published metro index — not BLS MSA observations. Metro premiums here understate one option worth knowing about: system integrators and OEM commissioning roles pay travel-based packages that can exceed any local plant rate for technicians willing to be on the road.
BLS OEWS MSA estimates, May 2025. Nominal pay — weigh each metro against its cost of living before relocating.
Certification Impact
Which certifications raise a controls technician’s pay the most?
Median annual pay before and after each credential, based on GlobalCybers placement data cross-referenced with BLS. License upgrades move the needle most; stackable certs add on top.
Impacts are not additive, the licensing rows share the same career ladder. Browse all 167 certifications →
Trade Comparison
How does controls technician pay compare to related roles?
BLS OEWS national median across the closest trades. Controls Technicians sit mid-pack on median but carry one of the widest P10–P90 spreads, licensing and specialization drive the upside.
BLS OEWS May 2025. Verify controls technician wages on BLS.gov →
Take-Home Pay
What does a controls technician actually take home after taxes?
The medians above are gross base wage.
Estimates use 2026 federal brackets, standard deduction, and 7.65% FICA. Actual take-home varies with filing status, deductions, and local tax.
FAQ
Controls Technician Salary, Frequently Asked Questions
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