Surgical Technologist Salary in Florida 2026,
$62,440 Median | BLS Data by City

Florida surgical technologists earn a median $62,440 a year, $30.02 an hour, per BLS OEWS May 2025, with the middle half between $52,410 and $75,170 and a full range of $41,270 to $85,620. That is 3.4% below the $64,650 national median before tax and above it after, because Florida takes no income tax.

Port St. Lucie at $65,780, then Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach at $65,520, Naples-Marco Island at $64,910, Jacksonville at $64,070 and Sebastian-Vero Beach-West Vero Corridor at $63,530. All five sit above the statewide median of $62,440, and the leaders are high-surgical-volume coastal markets with small local labour pools.

No. Florida issues no licence, registration or state examination for surgical technologists and the title is not protected, so hospitals may train into the role. What employers require in practice is the Certified Surgical Technologist credential from the National Board of Surgical Technology and Surgical Assisting, earned after an accredited programme. The surgical first assistant credential above it is also national rather than state-issued.

No. Florida has no personal income tax and no local income tax, so the full $62,440 median is subject only to federal tax, including call pay and shift differentials. Florida also has no state estate or inheritance tax and caps homestead assessment growth through Save Our Homes.

Cardiovascular and transplant service lines, robotic surgery, and first assistant practice. Cardiovascular scrub roles carry heavy call and a scarcity premium; robotic competence is increasingly required in Florida's orthopaedic and urologic programmes; and the NBSTSA surgical first assistant credential moves you into a materially different role at the top of the band. Together these are what the $75,170 seventy-fifth percentile and the $85,620 ninetieth reflect.

It means two employment markets with different economics. Hospital operating rooms run complex cases around the clock with call obligations, trauma coverage and specialty service lines — and pay accordingly, which is where the upper half of the $41,270 to $85,620 band lives. Florida's very large ambulatory surgical centre sector runs high-volume, narrow-case-mix schedules — cataracts, endoscopy, straightforward orthopaedics — during daylight hours with little or no call. The trade is predictability against the call pay and case complexity that reach the $75,170 seventy-fifth percentile.

The band is wide because the occupation is not uniform, and the $41,270 tenth percentile reflects uncertified and newly trained technologists rather than a market rate for a Certified Surgical Technologist. Read the $52,410 twenty-fifth percentile as the realistic floor with the credential. On the other side, call pay is a substantial component of hospital surgical technology earnings and the annualised figure does not isolate it, so the upper half of the band understates hospital work with heavy call.

Certification, service line and call, in that order. NBSTSA certification is the entry gate at most Florida systems and typically attaches to a defined pay grade. Service line is next: cardiovascular, neurosurgery and transplant scrub roles pay above general surgery because the skills are scarcer and the call heavier. And call itself — being available for emergency cases overnight and at weekends — is the mechanism by which a Florida technologist reaches the $75,170 seventy-fifth percentile and the $85,620 ninetieth, with the state taxing none of it.