Respiratory Therapist Salary in Florida 2026,
$81,160 Median | BLS Data by City

Florida respiratory therapists earn a median $81,160 a year, $39.02 an hour, per BLS OEWS May 2025, with the middle half between $75,210 and $87,990 and a full range of $64,240 to $100,310. That is 1.4% below the $82,280 national median before tax and ahead of it after, because Florida takes no income tax.

Lakeland-Winter Haven at $86,300, then Sebastian-Vero Beach-West Vero Corridor at $83,310, North Port-Bradenton-Sarasota at $83,110, Port St. Lucie at $82,860 and Orlando-Kissimmee-Sanford at $82,070. All five sit above the statewide median of $81,160 — interior and smaller coastal Florida pays a recruitment premium that Miami, Tampa and Jacksonville do not need to.

The Florida Board of Respiratory Care, within the Department of Health. Licensure requires graduation from an accredited respiratory care programme and National Board for Respiratory Care credentialing, and Florida imposes its own continuing education requirements at renewal. Above the licence, the Registered Respiratory Therapist designation is what Florida hospitals require for ICU, neonatal and critical-care assignments.

No. Florida has no personal income tax and no local income tax, so the whole of an $81,160 median salary is subject only to federal tax — as are night, weekend and critical-care differentials, which in this profession are a substantial part of annual earnings.

They are the main pay mechanic. Florida hospitals pay night, weekend and on-call differentials on top of base hourly rates, and critical-care, neonatal and transport assignments carry their own premiums. A therapist on permanent nights with weekend rotation can sit near the $87,990 seventy-fifth percentile on the same base rate as a day-shift colleague near the $81,160 median — and Florida taxes none of the difference.

Because chronic respiratory disease burden tracks age and Florida has the oldest population in the country. COPD management, long-term ventilator care, pulmonary rehabilitation and the winter surge in respiratory admissions during the seasonal population influx all generate sustained demand. What is notable is that this has not produced a wage premium: Florida's location quotient of 0.99 and its $81,160 median are both almost exactly at national levels, because the state's large allied health training pipeline supplies the demand it creates.

The published figure is an annualised salaried-equivalent number, and in a profession where much of the real variation comes from differentials and overtime it understates what many Florida RTs actually earn. A therapist working consistent nights with weekend rotation banks meaningfully more than $81,160 implies. Conversely, part-time and PRN therapists — a large group in Florida's skilled nursing and long-term acute care sector — will not see the annualised figure at all.

A distinctive employment segment that most states have at smaller scale. Florida has a large long-term acute care hospital and ventilator-weaning sector serving a population that survives critical illness into extended recovery, and those facilities employ respiratory therapists heavily. The work is less acute than ICU practice but carries its own competency requirements and, importantly, offers stable schedules. NBRC specialty credentials plus transport and ECMO team assignment in the large hospital systems are what reach the $87,990 seventy-fifth percentile and the $100,310 ninetieth.