Respiratory Therapist Salary in Colorado 2026,
$86,220 Median | BLS Data by City

The published Colorado figure is $86,220 a year, or $41.45 an hour, per BLS OEWS May 2025, with a band from $66,560 at the 10th percentile to $109,070 at the 90th and quartiles at $78,980 and $100,130. That is 4.8% above the national median of $82,280. The row is SOC 29-1126, an exact match to the occupation.

Yes. The Department of Regulatory Agencies licenses respiratory therapists on the basis of an accredited programme and the national credentialing examination, with continuing competency requirements for renewal. There is no additional Colorado examination, but a licence from another state does not transfer automatically — a therapist relocating here applies to DORA and the licence must issue before practice begins.

Boulder at $91,880, then Colorado Springs $87,890, Denver-Aurora-Centennial $85,870, Fort Collins-Loveland $83,880 and Grand Junction $81,290. Colorado Springs sitting above Denver is notable — it has a substantial hospital sector serving a large military and veteran population, with a demand profile Denver's does not replicate.

Genuinely, yes. Denver sits at about a mile of elevation and much of the state is considerably higher, and that changes baseline oxygen saturation, the presentation of altitude-related pulmonary conditions, and the parameters used in ventilator management. A therapist arriving from a sea-level practice has to recalibrate, and it is a real clinical competence rather than a piece of local colour.

Reasonably. A 4.8% premium over the national median, a 0.82 location quotient indicating the state is not oversupplied, a flat 4.4% income tax with only a small flat municipal head tax, and a peer group Colorado leads except for Rhode Island. The workforce is small at 2,110, which means fewer positions but also less competition for them, and the narrow education pipeline nationally supports the profession's bargaining position everywhere.

Because it prevents the supply response that would otherwise erode the premium. Accredited respiratory therapy programmes are far less numerous than nursing programmes nationally, and each has limited clinical placement capacity. So when a state's demand for respiratory therapists grows — as Colorado's has with population growth and critical care expansion — the workforce cannot expand quickly in response. A 0.82 location quotient alongside a 4.8% wage premium is what that looks like: the state employs fewer therapists than its size implies and pays above the national median to get them, and the situation has persisted rather than resolved.

Its healthcare demand profile. Colorado Springs hosts a large military and veteran population with an associated hospital and health system presence, and the clinical mix that generates — including chronic respiratory disease management and critical care — is not simply a smaller version of Denver's. Combined with a smaller local pool of licensed therapists, that supports $87,890 against Denver-Aurora-Centennial's $85,870. For a therapist, it is a genuinely attractive combination: a higher published median in a market that costs substantially less to live in than either Denver or Boulder.

Sample size and setting. A 2,110-person state workforce means the percentile estimates rest on a modest sample and should be treated as indicative rather than precise, particularly at the tails. And while SOC 29-1126 is an exact occupational match, it does not separate settings — acute hospital respiratory care, sleep diagnostics, home care and skilled nursing all sit on this row and pay differently. The $100,130 seventy-fifth percentile is predominantly acute and critical care hospital practice, and a therapist considering a home care or diagnostics role should not assume the median applies to it.