Radiologic Technologist Salary in Ohio 2026,
$78,320 Median | BLS Data by City

Ohio radiologic technologists earn a median $78,320 a year, $37.65 an hour, per BLS OEWS May 2025, with the middle half between $64,950 and $82,430 and a full range of $60,360 to $98,450. That is 2.2% below the $80,110 national median.

Columbus at $80,200, then Cincinnati at $79,270, Toledo at $79,080, Dayton-Kettering-Beavercreek at $78,750 and Cleveland at $78,720. The entire table spans under fifteen hundred dollars, which is about as flat as metro distributions get — in Ohio, modality credentials rather than geography determine pay.

The Ohio Department of Health, through its radiologic licensure programme, rather than a professional licensing board. The general radiographer licence requires ARRT registration or an equivalent examination; Ohio also issues limited-scope licences authorising imaging of defined anatomical areas only, and a general X-ray machine operator category. Which credential you hold governs what you may image and materially affects pay.

Ohio's state income tax is a flat 2.75% in 2026 with roughly the first twenty-six thousand dollars of taxable income exempt. Municipal income tax adds 1% to 2.5% depending on the city — Columbus, Cleveland and Akron are all at 2.5% — and is generally levied where you work. It applies to call pay and shift differentials as well as base salary.

Scope, and it drives pay. The full radiographer licence permits general radiography and is the basis for hospital employment and modality progression into CT, MRI and interventional work. A limited-scope licence authorises imaging of defined anatomical areas only and is aimed at clinic, urgent care and orthopaedic practice settings. Limited-scope holders sit toward the $60,360 tenth percentile and cannot progress into the advanced modalities without the full licence and ARRT registration.

Because Ohio's limited-scope licensure creates a distinct lower tier. Clinics, urgent care centres and orthopaedic practices across the state employ limited-scope technologists to image specific anatomical regions, and that work is genuinely paid around the $60,360 tenth percentile. The $64,950 twenty-fifth percentile is closer to what a full-licence, ARRT-registered radiographer earns in a hospital, and it is the number to read if that is your credential.

The occupation code pools limited-scope clinic technologists with general radiographers and with technologists who have cross-trained into CT and interventional work but remain coded here. That produces a $60,360-to-$98,450 band covering three different jobs. Use the $64,950 twenty-fifth percentile as the general-radiography floor and the $82,430 seventy-fifth as the advanced-modality marker rather than treating the median as a single career point.

Modality stacking and shift. Adding ARRT post-primary certification in computed tomography is the standard first step and typically attaches to a defined pay increment in Ohio hospital systems; interventional, cardiac catheterisation and mammography follow. Imaging departments run around the clock, so night, weekend and call-back differentials are how a technologist reaches the $82,430 seventy-fifth percentile without leaving bedside work — and MRI cross-training is what carries the last stretch toward $98,450.