Crematory Operators Salary and Pay
How much do Crematory Operators make?
Crematory Operators pay a median of $42,880 a year in the BLS May 2024 survey, with a mean of $44,790 across 2,950 counted jobs. Half of all workers in the occupation earn between $35,890 and $49,800.
The complete pay picture for Crematory Operators: 2,950 jobs nationally, a median of $42,880, and the state and metro tables that show where that median is beaten and where it is not.
Updated November 5, 2026
Salary converter for this occupation
Every level in the picker is a published BLS figure for Crematory Operators, not a national average. Annual-to-hourly conversions divide by 2,080 hours, the survey's full-time year; top-coded levels use $239,200, the floor BLS prints, so the true figure is higher.
The national wage ladder (BLS OEWS, May 2024)
| Pay level | Annual wage | Hourly wage |
|---|---|---|
| 10th percentile | $31,970 | $15.37 |
| 25th percentile | $35,890 | $17.25 |
| Median (50th) | $42,880 | $20.62 |
| 75th percentile | $49,800 | $23.94 |
| 90th percentile | $60,260 | $28.97 |
Percentiles answer the question a single average cannot: where would a given Crematory Operators offer sit among all 2,950 workers doing this job? The survey top-codes at $239,200+ and withholds unreliable cells, shown as n/p in the table.
Employment and concentration
The occupation employed 2,950 people in May 2024, 0.00% of every job BLS counted. Florida is the largest employer at 440 jobs, and the leading three states between them hold 36.3% of the workforce. Concentration peaks in Pennsylvania, whose location quotient of 3.54 says this work is 3.54 times as dense there as it is nationwide.
Read the ladder as a career path in numbers: $35,890 at the 25th percentile, $42,880 at the middle, $49,800 at the 75th. The full 10-to-90 range runs $28,290, a ratio of 1.9 to 1. Where a specific job offer lands on that range says more about the role's level than the occupation's headline median does.
Pay by state
Every state with a publishable estimate is in this table, 24 of them, sorted by jobs. The pay leader by median is Maryland at $69,010; the jobs leader is Florida:
| State | Employment | Jobs per 1,000 | Location quotient | Mean annual | Median annual |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Florida | 440 | 0.0 | 2.33 | $39,170 | $37,300 |
| Pennsylvania | 410 | 0.1 | 3.54 | $48,120 | $48,480 |
| California | 220 | 0.0 | 0.65 | $52,370 | $49,860 |
| Texas | 220 | 0.0 | 0.82 | $39,290 | $33,040 |
| Ohio | 190 | 0.0 | 1.78 | $43,960 | $42,600 |
| Indiana | 130 | 0.0 | 2.13 | $40,840 | $37,930 |
| Oregon | 110 | 0.1 | 2.87 | $43,350 | $41,770 |
| Illinois | 100 | 0.0 | 0.90 | $43,660 | $41,600 |
| Michigan | 100 | 0.0 | 1.15 | $43,970 | $44,710 |
| North Carolina | 100 | 0.0 | 1.04 | $41,980 | $39,550 |
| Colorado | 80 | 0.0 | 1.52 | $54,000 | $51,450 |
| Washington | 80 | 0.0 | 1.25 | $47,960 | $47,480 |
| Arizona | 70 | 0.0 | 1.08 | $47,070 | $39,270 |
| Nevada | 70 | 0.0 | 2.33 | $45,230 | $45,260 |
| Alabama | 50 | 0.0 | 1.19 | $36,840 | $32,040 |
| Massachusetts | 50 | 0.0 | 0.77 | $50,650 | $52,240 |
| West Virginia | 40 | 0.1 | 3.16 | $49,520 | $39,900 |
| Maryland | 30 | 0.0 | 0.65 | $60,980 | $69,010 |
| New York | 30 | 0.0 | 0.19 | $57,080 | $50,490 |
| Kansas | n/p | n/p | n/p | $36,170 | $35,750 |
| Kentucky | n/p | n/p | n/p | $39,390 | $38,840 |
| New Jersey | n/p | n/p | n/p | $56,720 | $59,240 |
| South Carolina | n/p | n/p | n/p | $30,400 | $31,510 |
| Virginia | n/p | n/p | n/p | $43,630 | $43,190 |
The occupation in context
Ranked against all 826 published occupations, Crematory Operators stands number 790 by employment and number 662 by median pay. Inside its own major group, Personal Care and Service Occupations, the group median wage is $37,320 across 32 detailed occupations, so this occupation pays 15% more than its group median, and it supplies 0.1% of the group's 3,159,920 jobs. In 11 of the 24 states with a published median, the state median beats the national median of $42,880, which is the single best quick test of whether this occupation's pay is set nationally or locally: a high count means local markets regularly outbid the national figure.
Metropolitan areas: where the jobs and the pay sit
Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach, FL is the largest metro employer with 110 jobs, 3.7% of the national total. Below, the biggest employers come first; the pay table after it only counts metros with 500 or more jobs in the occupation, so its leader is a real market and not a statistical artifact.
Largest metro employers
| Metropolitan area | Employment | Mean annual | Median annual |
|---|---|---|---|
| Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach, FL | 110 | $40,520 | $38,500 |
| Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington, PA-NJ-DE-MD | 110 | $51,810 | $57,340 |
| Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN | 80 | $44,340 | $43,390 |
| Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, FL | 80 | $38,970 | $37,290 |
| Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX | 70 | $44,280 | $34,910 |
| Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA | 60 | $49,860 | $47,530 |
| New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ | 60 | $59,270 | $54,810 |
| Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA | 60 | $48,770 | $49,300 |
| Orlando-Kissimmee-Sanford, FL | 50 | $39,040 | $36,810 |
| Boston-Cambridge-Newton, MA-NH | 40 | $53,730 | $56,640 |
What the median pay looks like as a budget
Budget arithmetic on the median: $3,573 a month before tax, $1,649 biweekly, $825 weekly. Moving from the 25th percentile ($35,890) to the 75th ($49,800) is worth $13,910 a year, which is the realistic size of the experience and specialization premium inside this occupation. To turn any of these gross figures into spendable money, run them through the paycheck calculator; to weigh an offer against your current role, use the salary calculator; to test a raise against prices, the raise vs inflation calculator.
To place a real offer: a salary of $47,168 would sit between the median ($42,880) and the 75th percentile ($49,800), inside the top half but outside the top quarter of this occupation's ladder. An offer at the 25th percentile, $35,890, is $6,990 under the median, the typical size of the discount attached to entry-level or low-cost-market postings in this field.
Related occupations in Personal Care and Service Occupations
Sibling occupations in Personal Care and Service Occupations: Morticians, Undertakers, and Funeral Arrangers, First-Line Supervisors of Gambling Services Workers, Animal Trainers, Barbers, Locker Room, Coatroom, and Dressing Room Attendants, Gambling Service Workers, All Other. Medians there are computed identically, so the comparison is apples to apples; the full set lives on the Careers hub.
Frequently asked questions
How much do Crematory Operators make an hour?
The median hourly wage is $20.62, and the mean hourly wage is $21.53, from the May 2024 OEWS estimates. Annual figures for Crematory Operators use the survey's 2,080-hour year where a conversion is needed, which is how the $42,880 annual median and the hourly figures reconcile.
Which state pays Crematory Operators the most?
Maryland, with a median annual wage of $69,010 across 30 jobs. The full state table on this page ranks every publishing state by employment and shows median and mean side by side.
How big is the Crematory Operators workforce?
2,950 wage and salary workers in May 2024, 0.00% of U.S. employment in the survey. Employment concentrates most in Pennsylvania by location quotient (3.54).
How current is this Crematory Operators salary data?
These are the May 2024 OEWS estimates behind the $42,880 median and the 2,950 job count on this page, released by BLS on April 2, 2025 and downloaded on November 5, 2026. OEWS is an employer survey, so those figures describe wages actually paid in this occupation, not advertised ranges.