Physician Assistant Salary in Idaho 2026,
$133,790 Median | BLS Data by City

The published Idaho figure is $133,790 a year, or $64.32 an hour, per BLS OEWS May 2025, with a band from $100,590 at the 10th percentile to $160,120 at the 90th. That is 1.5% below the national median of $135,880. Idaho employs 1,320 PAs at a location quotient of 1.48 — well above the national employment rate for the occupation.

Barely distinguishable at the top: Coeur d'Alene $135,240, Twin Falls $135,010 and Boise City $134,800 are within half a percent of one another, then Idaho Falls $129,800 and Pocatello $129,480 form a lower cluster. The practical reading is that Idaho has two PA pay levels, not five, and the difference between them is about 4%.

The Idaho State Board of Medicine, on graduation from an ARC-PA accredited programme and NCCPA certification as a PA-C, with the Board granting prescriptive authority. Idaho requires a documented collaborative relationship with a physician rather than continuous on-site supervision — a model designed for a state where a PA may be the only clinician in a rural community for considerable stretches.

Differently, and it is worth understanding before choosing a route. Idaho grants nurse practitioners full practice authority — no supervision or collaboration agreement at all — while physician assistants practise within a documented collaborative relationship with a physician. The two roles often work side by side in the same Idaho clinic on similar money, with the Idaho PA median at $133,790 and the state's NP median close by, but the regulatory positions are not equivalent.

The structural signals are good. A location quotient of 1.48 means Idaho already relies on the role heavily, the national occupation is projected to grow 20.4%, the state median of $133,790 is within 1.5% of the national figure, and living costs are below average against a flat 5.8% income tax. The constraints are size — roughly 100 openings a year pro-rated — and the collaborative-relationship requirement, which shapes where in the state a post can be located.

Because the geography demands a clinician who can be deployed flexibly and the state's physician supply cannot cover it. Idaho has a large rural population spread thinly, and its health systems have built primary and urgent care around advanced practitioners as a matter of design rather than of stopgap. A location quotient of 1.48 is the measurable result. It also explains why the wage is close to the national median despite a below-average cost base — the role is competed for, not simply filled.

It blends primary care with procedural specialties that pay very differently, and the $100,590 tenth percentile includes part-time and new-graduate practice rather than describing a floor for full-time work. The band's width — from $100,590 to $160,120 — reflects that mixture. A PA weighing an Idaho offer should compare it against the relevant tier: primary care against the $126,820-to-$133,790 range, surgical or emergency work against the $146,230 seventy-fifth percentile.

Specialty and call, with geography a distant third. Moving from outpatient primary care into surgical, emergency or hospitalist practice is essentially the whole distance from the $133,790 median to the $146,230 seventy-fifth percentile. Call and coverage obligations in rural hospitals — where a PA may hold overnight responsibility — add materially on top, and that is what carries the band to $160,120. By comparison, the entire Idaho metro spread from Coeur d'Alene $135,240 to Pocatello $129,480 is about 4%.