California, Maryland, Washington, New Jersey and Massachusetts posted the five highest state median veterinarian salaries in the Bureau of Labor Statistics' May 2025 Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics release (SOC 29-1131) that pass this page's reliability screen, each above the $130,100 national median.
Arizona's published median is left out because BLS's relative standard error on its mean wage estimate is 15.7%.
Two states — Alaska and Delaware — have no published wage estimate, median or mean.
Every wage figure in the tables and rankings below comes from that same release.
The five highest-paying states for veterinarians
The BLS OEWS May 2025 release covers veterinarians (SOC 29-1131) in 49 of 51 reporting jurisdictions — every state except Alaska and Delaware, plus Washington, D.C. Ranked by median annual wage, and leaving out any state whose BLS mean wage estimate carries a relative standard error of 10% or more, the top five are:
| Rank | State | Median | 25th–75th percentile | vs. national |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | California | $163,920 | $125,460–$211,840 | +26% |
| 2 | Maryland | $163,170 | $133,040–$189,450 | +25% |
| 3 | Washington | $160,510 | $124,990–$197,370 | +23% |
| 4 | New Jersey | $160,140 | $126,480–$202,930 | +23% |
| 5 | Massachusetts | $140,260 | $121,670–$175,250 | +8% |
All five sit between 8% and 26% above the $130,100 national median.
BLS also publishes a $152,020 median for Arizona, which would place it fifth, but BLS's relative standard error on Arizona's mean wage estimate is 15.7%, so this page does not rank it; treat the Arizona figure as a rough signal.
For the full national percentile breakdown and what drives the spread within any single state — compensation model, ownership, and practice setting — see the national veterinarian salary page.
Alaska and Delaware: why two states are missing
Alaska and Delaware are the only two of the 51 reporting jurisdictions with no published BLS wage estimate for veterinarians in the May 2025 release — no median and no mean.
What the release shows is a gap in the wage tables, not a zero: BLS publishes no reason alongside the missing estimates, and our sources don't supply one either.
It does not mean there are no working veterinarians in either state, and it should not be read as a below-average or above-average signal.
All that is certain is that no veterinarian wage figure exists for either state in this release — full stop.
The lowest published state medians, for contrast
At the other end of the same release, five states post the lowest published veterinarian medians:
| Rank | State | Median | 25th–75th percentile | vs. national |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | South Dakota | $88,650 | $74,860–$114,400 | −32% |
| 2 | Wyoming | $97,240 | $80,230–$132,890 | −25% |
| 3 | Oklahoma | $98,090 | $71,560–$129,300 | −25% |
| 4 | Montana | $99,390 | $66,830–$130,870 | −24% |
| 5 | North Dakota | $102,180 | $88,610–$115,210 | −21% |
The spread between the top and bottom published states is substantial — California's $163,920 median sits far above South Dakota's $88,650.
Our sources don't give a reason for the gap, so this page reports the numbers rather than assigning a cause.
Veterinarian salary by state: every published median, ranked
The same May 2025 release backs a complete state-by-state answer, not just the edges.
Every veterinarian salary by state that BLS publishes is listed below in median order, with each state's own salary page linked; the 25th–75th column is the middle half of that state's wage distribution, and the vs.-national column compares each median with the $130,100 national figure.
| Rank | State | Median | 25th–75th percentile | vs. national |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | California | $163,920 | $125,460–$211,840 | +26% |
| 2 | Maryland | $163,170 | $133,040–$189,450 | +25% |
| 3 | Washington | $160,510 | $124,990–$197,370 | +23% |
| 4 | New Jersey | $160,140 | $126,480–$202,930 | +23% |
| — | Arizona† | $152,020 | $125,210–$205,030 | low-reliability estimate |
| 5 | Massachusetts | $140,260 | $121,670–$175,250 | +8% |
| 6 | Washington, DC | $134,530 | $132,520–$193,860 | +3% |
| 7 | Illinois | $133,580 | $102,630–$168,050 | +3% |
| 8 | Pennsylvania | $133,520 | $107,810–$166,230 | +3% |
| 9 | Minnesota | $133,110 | $109,260–$164,690 | +2% |
| 10 | New York | $131,830 | $105,750–$173,720 | +1% |
| 11 | Vermont | $131,820 | $110,410–$170,570 | +1% |
| 12 | Florida | $131,660 | $83,790–$166,370 | +1% |
| 13 | Texas | $131,330 | $107,880–$164,000 | +1% |
| 14 | Colorado | $130,840 | $102,090–$162,110 | +1% |
| 15 | Maine | $130,600 | $104,620–$155,000 | 0% |
| 16 | Hawaii | $130,120 | $103,760–$134,000 | 0% |
| 17 | New Mexico | $129,390 | $96,980–$171,140 | −1% |
| 18 | North Carolina | $129,240 | $98,240–$165,430 | −1% |
| 19 | West Virginia | $128,990 | $82,770–$161,940 | −1% |
| 20 | Oregon | $128,880 | $98,570–$154,410 | −1% |
| 21 | New Hampshire | $128,190 | $97,620–$161,180 | −1% |
| 22 | Virginia | $126,730 | $98,630–$177,650 | −3% |
| 23 | Georgia | $126,590 | $103,080–$155,270 | −3% |
| 24 | Rhode Island | $126,570 | $108,820–$139,730 | −3% |
| 25 | Connecticut | $126,190 | $104,780–$167,390 | −3% |
| 26 | Nevada | $125,550 | $119,500–$159,900 | −3% |
| 27 | Michigan | $125,390 | $100,950–$162,030 | −4% |
| 28 | Ohio | $125,060 | $88,750–$156,330 | −4% |
| 29 | Iowa | $124,610 | $94,640–$152,140 | −4% |
| 30 | Indiana | $124,530 | $99,800–$155,980 | −4% |
| 31 | Louisiana | $124,370 | $78,660–$141,140 | −4% |
| 32 | Tennessee | $124,350 | $104,890–$151,770 | −4% |
| 33 | Utah | $123,990 | $99,560–$168,690 | −5% |
| 34 | South Carolina | $122,130 | $96,920–$157,220 | −6% |
| 35 | Idaho | $116,170 | $101,510–$137,010 | −11% |
| 36 | Missouri | $114,660 | $97,280–$149,250 | −12% |
| 37 | Wisconsin | $108,780 | $98,950–$132,880 | −16% |
| 38 | Arkansas | $107,710 | $97,930–$122,140 | −17% |
| 39 | Kansas | $107,080 | $86,250–$129,870 | −18% |
| 40 | Alabama | $105,630 | $95,310–$136,690 | −19% |
| 41 | Mississippi | $105,370 | $85,780–$129,370 | −19% |
| 42 | Kentucky | $104,100 | $73,920–$136,550 | −20% |
| 43 | Nebraska | $103,500 | $85,660–$138,170 | −20% |
| 44 | North Dakota | $102,180 | $88,610–$115,210 | −21% |
| 45 | Montana | $99,390 | $66,830–$130,870 | −24% |
| 46 | Oklahoma | $98,090 | $71,560–$129,300 | −25% |
| 47 | Wyoming | $97,240 | $80,230–$132,890 | −25% |
| 48 | South Dakota | $88,650 | $74,860–$114,400 | −32% |
| — | Alaska | Not published | — | — |
| — | Delaware | Not published | — | — |
Two reading notes.
The vs.-national column is a nominal comparison only — none of these medians is adjusted for cost of living, which gets its own section below.
And Arizona, marked with a dagger, is the one published state this page's ranking rules leave unranked, with no vs.-national figure, because BLS's relative standard error on its mean wage estimate is 15.7%; treat its $152,020 median as a rough signal.
Alaska and Delaware sit at the bottom of the table because no wage estimate exists for either state, as covered above.
What a state median doesn't tell you
A state median is a useful starting point and a poor stand-in for what any specific job pays.
A few limits are worth keeping in view:
- It's a statewide aggregate. A high-cost metro and a rural county in the same state can sit far apart, and BLS's state-level figure doesn't separate them.
- It doesn't isolate compensation structure. In AVMA's class-of-2024 survey, 67.4% of graduates entering full-time employment were paid a base salary plus a production bonus and 1.0% on straight production — see ProSal and production pay, explained — and two states with the same median can have very different mixes of production-based and flat-salary jobs underneath it.
- It isn't adjusted for cost of living. A higher headline number in a higher-cost state doesn't automatically mean more purchasing power.
- It's a single point-in-time snapshot from one BLS release, not a forecast or a guarantee for any individual offer.
Source and scope
Does the state table split out equine veterinarians?
No — BLS doesn't.
BLS publishes one occupation code for all veterinarians (SOC 29-1131) and does not break veterinarian pay out by specialty, species or practice setting, so BLS has no equine veterinarian wage series by state — or by anything else — to add to the table above.
The same is true of every species or setting split: emergency, relief, exotics, large animal.
The closest sourced numbers are national.
The 2025 AVMA report puts equine-practice associates at a median income of $101,000 (2023 income, from a sample of just 33), and its class-of-2024 survey put equine new graduates' average expected starting compensation at $95,920, the lowest of the five practice types.
What sits underneath those figures — the equine owner median and the emergency-pay gap AAEP documents — is on the equine veterinarian salary page.
What does a cost-of-living-adjusted veterinarian salary look like?
We found no federal source that publishes one.
The OEWS medians in the table above are nominal wages — no cost-of-living adjustment appears in the BLS state tables this page is built from, and we found no AVMA cost-adjusted income ranking either.
A cost-of-living-adjusted veterinarian salary ranking you come across will pair a wage series with a separate cost index — two inputs that may not share a year or a method — so treat those rankings as directional rather than as data.
The comparison that holds up is one you run for the places you would actually move between.
Price the housing market in the metro you would practice in, not the statewide average, then compare whole offers — the base or production formula, benefits, continuing-education support and any loan-repayment help.
Two contexts frame the state table.
Inflation is a different question from place-to-place cost: the CPI-U all items index rose 3.4% in the 12 months ending August 2026, before seasonal adjustment, which says nothing about which state costs more to live in.
And regional pay differences are real, but the band runs far narrower than the state table's $88,650–$163,920 spread — AVMA's 2025 report put average compensation by Census region between $135,539 in East South Central states and $158,325 in Middle Atlantic states (2023 income, and averages rather than the medians in the table above).
How geography fits into the bigger pay picture
State is one input among several.
The ratio worth tracking alongside any state ranking is the one between pay and educational debt — see veterinary school debt and the debt-to-income ratio for how that comparison works and where a state's median fits into it.
Within any given state, how an associate is paid — base salary, ProSal, or straight production — is a separate lever on income that the state medians in the table above don't capture.