Dermatologist Salary in Illinois 2026,
$435,750 Median | BLS Data by City

Illinois dermatologists earn a median $435,750 a year per BLS OEWS May 2025, with a 25th percentile of $224,220, a 75th percentile also reported at $435,750 and a 90th at $538,170. The 10th percentile is $148,550. That median stands 32.6% above the $328,730 national figure, among the largest state premiums for any physician specialty.

Chicago-Naperville-Elgin is the only Illinois metro with a published dermatology median, and it reports $435,750 — identical to the statewide figure. BLS does not publish a dermatology median for Peoria. In practice that means the Illinois premium is not a Chicago premium: it applies across the state's published dermatology employment.

No. Illinois licenses dermatologists as physicians through the Medical Licensing Board at the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation, with no dermatology-specific state credential. Board certification comes from the American Board of Dermatology, and Mohs micrographic surgery is a fellowship-trained subspecialty — both national credentials that Illinois does not administer but that employers and patients screen on.

Because dermatology is one of the most supply-constrained specialties in American medicine and Illinois has not kept pace with demand. Residency positions in the specialty are limited nationally and have grown slowly, while demand from skin-cancer screening in an ageing population and from medical-aesthetic services has risen sharply. Where a state's dermatology capacity falls short of that demand, price rises — and a 32.6% premium is what that looks like.

Considerably, because this specialty has an unusually high share of private-practice and procedure-driven income. Illinois taxes every dollar at 4.95%, so a dermatologist at the Illinois 90th percentile of $538,170 faces the same rate as one at $224,220, and no Illinois city adds a local income tax. Practice owners should also look at the Illinois pass-through entity tax election, which lets the practice settle state tax at entity level.

It means Illinois dermatology compensation is packed very tightly through the upper-middle of its distribution — a quarter of the state's dermatologists sit between the median and the 75th percentile without the figure moving at all. Combined with a $224,220 twenty-fifth percentile and a $538,170 ninetieth, the shape is a large, uniformly well-paid core with a distinct academic and part-time tail below it and a procedural elite above it.

BLS does not publish state employment for this cell, so there is no workforce figure to weigh the estimate against and only one metro is published. Estimates in that situation deserve caution: the direction is clear and well corroborated by the specialty's national supply picture, but the precise percentile values should be treated as indicative. This page makes no claim about how many dermatologists Illinois employs, because BLS does not say.

It is the main pay mechanic in this specialty. Medical dermatology — skin cancer screening, chronic inflammatory disease, biopsies — is insurance-reimbursed and sets the floor around the Illinois 25th percentile of $224,220. Procedural work, particularly Mohs micrographic surgery, and cash-pay aesthetic services carry far better economics and are what reach the $538,170 ninetieth percentile. Most established Illinois practices run a blend, and the ratio of that blend explains more of an individual dermatologist's income than seniority does.