Telephone Operators Salary and Pay
How much do Telephone Operators make?
The median Telephone Operators worker earns $39,130 a year ($18.81), and the mean annual wage is $42,880. BLS counted 3,950 people in this occupation in May 2024. The middle half of earners make between $35,860 and $48,530.
One page for the whole Telephone Operators pay distribution: national ladder first, then all 19 state rows and the metro rankings, every figure from BLS OEWS May 2024.
Updated November 5, 2026
Salary converter for this occupation
Hourly figures use the BLS full-time convention of 2,080 hours a year. The converter loads this occupation's own ladder, median $39,130 first; type any offer into the custom box to price it against the same year.
The national wage ladder (BLS OEWS, May 2024)
| Pay level | Annual wage | Hourly wage |
|---|---|---|
| 10th percentile | $31,440 | $15.11 |
| 25th percentile | $35,860 | $17.24 |
| Median (50th) | $39,130 | $18.81 |
| 75th percentile | $48,530 | $23.33 |
| 90th percentile | $57,510 | $27.65 |
The five rows are five different workers in the same occupation, from the 10th percentile ($31,440) to the 90th ($57,510). BLS suppresses cells that fail its reliability rules (n/p here) and caps the highest wages at $239,200+ a year or $115.00+ an hour; in this ladder that top code appears at the very top rows only.
Employment and concentration
May 2024 employment stood at 3,950, or 0.00% of the U.S. total. Texas leads the state table with 640 jobs; the top three states sum to 35.2% of the occupation. The concentration measure tells the more interesting story: Hawaii posts a location quotient of 2.68, so a worker there is far more likely to meet a colleague in this field than the national pattern suggests.
One in ten workers in this field earns $31,440 or less, and one in ten earns $57,510 or more, so the top-to-bottom ratio is 1.8 to 1 and the annual gap is $26,070. The mean ($42,880) versus median ($39,130) comparison shows a right-skewed ladder where senior and specialist roles lift the average in this occupation.
Pay by state
Every state with a publishable estimate is in this table, 19 of them, sorted by jobs. The pay leader by median is California at $56,770; the jobs leader is Texas:
| State | Employment | Jobs per 1,000 | Location quotient | Mean annual | Median annual |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Texas | 640 | 0.0 | 1.80 | $40,830 | $36,800 |
| Pennsylvania | 400 | 0.1 | 2.59 | $38,260 | $36,040 |
| New York | 350 | 0.0 | 1.43 | $57,670 | $53,510 |
| New Jersey | 230 | 0.1 | 2.09 | $44,480 | $40,770 |
| California | 190 | 0.0 | 0.42 | $57,410 | $56,770 |
| Ohio | 190 | 0.0 | 1.32 | $38,170 | $38,110 |
| Georgia | 140 | 0.0 | 1.15 | $38,450 | $36,510 |
| Maryland | 110 | 0.0 | 1.59 | $43,720 | $41,220 |
| Kentucky | 100 | 0.0 | 1.90 | $36,780 | $38,100 |
| Louisiana | 80 | 0.0 | 1.72 | $32,040 | $34,050 |
| South Carolina | 70 | 0.0 | 1.20 | $40,500 | $36,160 |
| Michigan | 60 | 0.0 | 0.56 | $40,760 | $40,300 |
| Hawaii | 40 | 0.1 | 2.68 | $56,620 | $52,160 |
| Oklahoma | 40 | 0.0 | 0.85 | $36,550 | $37,400 |
| Connecticut | 30 | 0.0 | 0.74 | $44,380 | $40,620 |
| Nevada | 30 | 0.0 | 0.84 | n/p | n/p |
| District of Columbia | n/p | n/p | n/p | $47,160 | $47,890 |
| Massachusetts | n/p | n/p | n/p | $47,920 | $46,370 |
| Wisconsin | n/p | n/p | n/p | $37,530 | $37,830 |
The occupation in context
Ranked against all 826 published occupations, Telephone Operators stands number 773 by employment and number 716 by median pay. Inside its own major group, Office and Administrative Support Occupations, the group median wage is $47,850 across 54 detailed occupations, so this occupation pays 18% less than its group median, and it supplies 0.0% of the group's 18,218,060 jobs. In 9 of the 18 states with a published median, the state median beats the national median of $39,130, 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
New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ is the largest metro employer with 380 jobs, 9.6% of the national total. Two rankings follow across the 19 metros BLS publishes for this occupation: where the jobs are, then where the money is, with the pay ranking restricted to metros employing at least 500 people in this occupation to keep small samples out of the lead.
Largest metro employers
| Metropolitan area | Employment | Mean annual | Median annual |
|---|---|---|---|
| New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ | 380 | $52,950 | $51,390 |
| Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington, PA-NJ-DE-MD | 160 | $41,450 | $39,060 |
| Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV | 90 | $46,300 | $44,400 |
| Baltimore-Columbia-Towson, MD | 70 | $44,310 | $41,220 |
| Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA | 70 | $53,490 | $52,990 |
| Memphis, TN-MS-AR | 70 | n/p | n/p |
| Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Roswell, GA | 50 | $43,500 | $42,440 |
| Cincinnati, OH-KY-IN | 50 | $38,580 | $37,040 |
| Cleveland, OH | 50 | $39,830 | $38,460 |
| Pittsburgh, PA | 50 | $37,320 | $36,040 |
What the median pay looks like as a budget
As a household number, $39,130 a year is $3,261 a month gross, $1,505 every two weeks, $752 a week. Moving from the 25th percentile ($35,860) to the 75th ($48,530) is worth $12,670 a year, which is the realistic size of the experience and specialization premium inside this occupation. The next step from a gross figure is a net one: run the $3,261 monthly figure through the paycheck calculator applies your state's taxes, the salary calculator compares two offers in any unit, and the raise vs inflation calculator tells you whether a nominal raise is a real one.
To place a real offer: a salary of $43,043 would sit between the median ($39,130) and the 75th percentile ($48,530), inside the top half but outside the top quarter of this occupation's ladder. An offer at the 25th percentile, $35,860, is $3,270 under the median, the typical size of the discount attached to entry-level or low-cost-market postings in this field.
Related occupations in Office and Administrative Support Occupations
Sibling occupations in Office and Administrative Support Occupations: Billing and Posting Clerks, Production, Planning, and Expediting Clerks, Tellers, Postal Service Mail Carriers, Hotel, Motel, and Resort Desk Clerks, Insurance Claims and Policy Processing Clerks. Medians there are computed identically, so the comparison is apples to apples; the full set lives on the Careers hub.
Frequently asked questions
What is the median salary for Telephone Operators?
$39,130 a year ($18.81), the middle wage among 3,950 counted workers in the BLS May 2024 estimates. The 75th percentile is $48,530 and the 90th is $57,510.
Where are Telephone Operators jobs concentrated?
By headcount, Texas leads with 640 jobs; by concentration, Hawaii leads with a location quotient of 2.68, meaning the occupation is 2.68 times as dense there as nationally.
What do the top 10% of Telephone Operators earn?
$57,510 a year or more. The gap between the 90th percentile and the median ($39,130) is the size of the senior and specialist premium in this occupation.
How does EveryCalc get Telephone Operators pay data?
From the Bureau of Labor Statistics OEWS bulk files for May 2024 (national, state, and metropolitan), downloaded November 5, 2026. Nothing on this page is self-reported by workers or scraped from job postings.