Plumber Salary in Florida 2026,
$52,910 Median | BLS Data by City

Florida plumbers, pipefitters and steamfitters earn a median $52,910 a year, $25.44 an hour, per BLS OEWS May 2025, with the middle half between $47,220 and $62,820 and a full range of $38,940 to $73,610. That is 17.1% below the $63,800 national median — a wide gap that Florida's lack of income tax reduces but does not remove.

Palm Bay-Melbourne-Titusville at $59,780, then Jacksonville at $58,920, North Port-Bradenton-Sarasota at $58,150, Naples-Marco Island at $57,830 and Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach at $57,760. All five are above the statewide median of $52,910, which places the bottom of the Florida band in the rural counties and smaller markets that the metro table does not cover.

It depends on the level. Plumbing contractors are licensed by the state through the Construction Industry Licensing Board within the Department of Business and Professional Regulation, which issues certified licences valid statewide and registered licences valid only in the jurisdiction that qualified the holder. Journeyman plumbers, however, are licensed at county and municipal level rather than by the state, so requirements vary between jurisdictions and a plumber moving across Florida may need a new local card.

No. Florida has no personal income tax and no local income tax, so a plumber at the median of $52,910 keeps the whole amount apart from federal tax, including emergency call-out and overtime pay. At this income level the saving is real but does not offset the 17.1% gap to the national median, and Florida's property insurance costs are a meaningful counterweight for homeowners.

Because the national figure for SOC 47-2152 is lifted substantially by unionised industrial pipefitting and steamfitting in the Northeast, the Midwest and the West Coast — refineries, power plants, large mechanical contracts — and Florida has comparatively little of that work. Florida's trade is dominated by residential and light commercial plumbing bid competitively among non-union contractors, which sets rates near the bottom of the national distribution even though the state's location quotient is 0.98 and demand is steady.

That the money and the mobility sit at the contractor level. The Construction Industry Licensing Board's certified plumbing contractor licence works anywhere in Florida; a registered licence works only where you qualified. Journeyman licensing, by contrast, is a county and municipal matter, so a journeyman card issued in one Florida county does not automatically travel. For anyone planning a career here, that argues strongly for pursuing the state certified contractor licence rather than accumulating local journeyman credentials — and it is a large part of why the $73,610 ninetieth percentile is contractor territory.

SOC 47-2152 pools plumbers with pipefitters and steamfitters, and Florida's mix is heavily weighted to the first. That is precisely why the Florida figure sits so far below the national one: the comparison is against a national pool containing far more industrial pipefitting. The published band also excludes the emergency call-out premiums and storm-recovery overtime that are a real part of Florida plumbing income and that the state does not tax.

Specialty certification and contractor status. Medical gas piping certification, backflow prevention certification and commercial and industrial pipefitting all pay above residential service work and are what the $62,820 seventy-fifth percentile reflects. Above that, the Construction Industry Licensing Board certified contractor licence changes the economics entirely by allowing you to pull permits and take work in your own name. Florida's repipe market — an ageing coastal housing stock with failing original plumbing — is the steadiest high-margin service work in the state.