How much do media planners make in 2026?
Media planners are reported inside SOC 13-1161, market research analysts and marketing specialists, which BLS OEWS May 2025 puts at a national median of $78,760 a year, or $37.87 an hour, with a P10 to P90 range of $43,390 to $155,480 across 899,580 workers. That is a broad match and one of the broadest in this dataset: the code contains nearly 900,000 people doing marketing work of every description, and media planning is a small specialism inside it. Read the band accordingly. Agency media planning specifically starts low, with assistant and planner roles at holding-company agencies sitting well below the pooled median, and rises steeply for people who move into strategy, investment or client leadership. The other structural fact is automation. Programmatic buying has taken a large share of the mechanical execution out of media, which removed a tier of jobs while raising the value of planners who can build a measurable strategy, interrogate attribution and argue a budget against a business outcome. BLS projects 6.7% growth through 2034 for this large code, with roughly 87,200 openings a year across all of its marketing occupations. → Full media planner career guide, career path, credentials & placement →
Note: $78,760 blends every experience level and every setting in this occupation. For pay by level alone, see Pay by Level below.
- Media Planners earn a national median $78,760/yr ($37.87/hr) (BLS OEWS May 2025, SOC 13-1161); the P10 to P90 range is $43,390 to $155,480.
- This is a very broad SOC match: nearly 900,000 marketing workers share the row, so the median describes marketing generally rather than media planning specifically.
- Agency media planning starts below the pooled median and rises steeply for those who move into investment, strategy or client leadership, which is where the money is.
- Programmatic automation removed much of the execution work and raised the value of measurement, attribution and budget argumentation skills.
US Media Planner Pay Distribution · BLS OEWS May 2025
Pay by Level · BLS OEWS May 2025
How much do media planners 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 13-1161; 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 13-1161, 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 media planner earn at each career stage?
Media planning pay follows budget responsibility and measurement capability. Each median below is anchored to the BLS OEWS distribution for SOC 13-1161.
By State
Which states pay media planners the most in 2026?
These are modeled state estimates, not BLS state observations: the national median for SOC 13-1161 scaled by the GlobalCybers state wage index. Agency media employment concentrates in a handful of advertising centres where real pay differs from what a general wage index predicts, and much planning work is now performed remotely for agencies headquartered elsewhere.
6 of 51 state guides shown, ranked by median. Bar is relative to California ($90,570), the highest-paying state shown. See all role salary guides →
By Metro
Which cities pay media planners the most?
Metro figures are modeled, national median times state wage index times published metro index, not BLS metropolitan observations. Holding-company agencies cluster in a few metros, and centralised investment teams concentrate the best-paid roles more tightly still.
BLS OEWS MSA estimates, May 2025. Nominal pay — weigh each metro against its cost of living before relocating.
Certification Impact
Which certifications raise a media planner’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 media planner pay compare to related roles?
BLS OEWS national median across the closest trades. Media Planners 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 media planner wages on BLS.gov →
Take-Home Pay
What does a media planner 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
Media Planner Salary, Frequently Asked Questions
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