Occupation salary profile

Architects, Except Landscape and Naval

SOC 17-1011 BLS OEWS May 2025 H-1B LCAs, last 12 months

Plan and design structures, such as private residences, office buildings, theaters, factories, and other structural property. Excludes “Landscape Architects” (17-1012) and “Marine Engineers and Naval Architects” (17-2121).

National median · BLS
$99,280
▲ +2.68% YoY
H-1B sponsor median
$78,000
▲ +1.3% YoY · 1,717 LCAs
Average salary · BLS
$106,260
Mean annual wage
U.S. employment
106,770
Jobs (BLS)
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Enter your pay and a location to see where you stand against BLS and H-1B pay, your estimated take-home pay, and your purchasing power.

Pay range for Architects, Except Landscape and Naval

Annual base pay at each percentile. BLS covers all U.S. workers in this occupation; H-1B covers 1,717 certified Labor Condition Applications filed by sponsoring employers in the last 12 months.

Percentile All U.S. workers (BLS) H-1B sponsored
10th — entry pay$62,300$64,459
25th$77,960$69,060
Median (50th)$99,280$78,000
75th$126,550$90,000
90th — top pay$161,420$108,000
H-1B sponsors pay a median of $78,000 for Architects, Except Landscape and Naval — 21.4% below the BLS national median of $99,280.

Hourly ⇄ annual pay

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Based on hrs/week × weeks/year = 2,080 hrs
Projections 2025–2035

Job outlook for Architects, Except Landscape and Naval

BLS projects employment of architects, except landscape and naval to grow 4.3% from 2025 to 2035, faster than the 3.5% average for all occupations. About 6,900 openings are projected each year, on average, from new jobs and from replacing workers who retire or move to other occupations.

Jobs 2025 → 2035
124,600 → 129,900
+5,300 jobs
Projected change
+4.3%
All occupations: +3.5%
Openings per year
6,900
Average, 2025–2035
Typical entry education
Bachelor's degree
No related experience required
On-the-job training
Internship/residency
Self-employed
14% of workers (2025)
Preparation needed (O*NET Job Zone 5)
Extensive Preparation Needed. Most of these occupations require graduate school. For example, they may require a master's degree, and some require a Ph.D., M.D., or J.D. (law degree).
Fastest-growing jobs → Best-paying jobs that need a bachelor's degree →

Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Employment Projections 2025–2035 · BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook →

H-1B sponsored pay

Pay by H-1B wage level

Employers assign every H-1B filing a Department of Labor prevailing-wage level, from Level I (entry) to Level IV (fully competent). Pay rises steeply with level.

H-1B median $78,000
Change vs prior year +1.3%
After inflation (CPI-U) -1.77%
Wage level LCAs Share P25 Median P75
Level I 1,016 59.2% $66,000 $72,000 $79,517
Level II 409 23.8% $85,000 $90,000 $100,000
Level III 114 6.6% $102,376 $112,754 $120,750
Level IV 32 1.9% $125,339 $143,760 $160,000
H-1B job titles

Salaries by job title in Architects, Except Landscape and Naval

The 21 most-filed job titles inside SOC 17-1011, from 1,717 H-1B filings. Seniority words and level numbers are grouped (“Senior Data Engineer II” counts as Data Engineer). Tap a title for its full range, wage levels and the exact titles employers used.

Job title LCAs Share P25 Median P75 YoY
Architectural Designer 362 21.08% $68,500 $74,670 $85,000 -0.21%
Designer generic 249 14.5% $68,016 $75,000 $85,000 +2.14%
Architect generic 203 11.82% $70,058 $82,680 $93,000 +6%
Design Professional 60 3.49% $65,750 $69,035 $78,812 +2.55%
Project Architect 51 2.97% $85,348 $95,000 $110,445 +5.56%
Project Manager 39 2.27% $88,899 $100,112 $115,000 +0.62%
Project Designer 36 2.1% $66,560 $75,500 $88,150 -4.43%
Architectural Staff 29 1.69% $68,000 $75,000 $81,999 +7.84%
Intern Architect 27 1.57% $65,686 $66,040 $77,147 -2.31%
Architectural Associate 27 1.57% $65,343 $72,000 $79,970 +5.89%
Job Captain 26 1.51% $79,826 $85,000 $97,648 +0%
Associate generic 23 1.34% $82,320 $88,715 $96,500 -0.32%
Intermediate Designer 20 1.16% $69,921 $74,000 $75,176 -4.07%
Design Coordinator 20 1.16% $72,857 $79,164 $85,072 -4.73%
Project Specialist 18 1.05% $65,582 $65,582 $73,148 +5.27%
Project Coordinator 18 1.05% $71,908 $79,650 $88,182 +10.62%
Emerging Professional 15 0.87% $64,574 $67,309 $69,326 +11.61%
Technical Designer 11 0.64% $67,980 $85,696 $90,348 +31.84%
Architectural Intern 11 0.64% $64,666 $72,000 $72,582 +10.77%
Designer, Architectural 10 0.58% $68,288 $79,250 $83,675 +2.39%
Staff Architect 10 0.58% $72,850 $78,000 $80,000 +5.41%

Titles are cleaned from the employer's own LCA text (codes and typos removed, nothing invented). Rows need 10+ filings in this SOC.

Skills & tools

Skills needed for Architects, Except Landscape and Naval

How important each skill and knowledge area is for this job, rated by O*NET on a 1–5 scale from surveys of workers and occupational analysts.

Top skills
  • Critical Thinking4.3
  • Operations Analysis4.1
  • Complex Problem Solving4.0
  • Reading Comprehension4.0
  • Speaking4.0
  • Active Listening3.9
  • Judgment and Decision Making3.9
  • Monitoring3.9
  • Writing3.9
  • Active Learning3.8
Top knowledge areas
  • Design4.7
  • Building and Construction4.6
  • Engineering and Technology4.0
  • Customer and Personal Service3.9
  • Public Safety and Security3.9
  • English Language3.9
  • Law and Government3.8
  • Administration and Management3.7
Software and technology used
Adobe Creative Cloud softwareAdobe IllustratorAdobe InDesignAdobe PhotoshopAutodesk AutoCADAutodesk RevitMicrosoft Office softwareTrimble SketchUp ProChaos EnscapeMcNeel Rhinoceros 3DAdobe AcrobatAmazon Elastic Compute Cloud EC2Amazon RedshiftAmazon Web Services AWS softwareApache CassandraApache HadoopApache HiveApache Maven

Highlighted = in demand: frequently listed in employer job postings for this occupation (O*NET).

Source: O*NET 31.0 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA), used under the CC BY 4.0 license. O*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA.

About the job

What architects, except landscape and naval do

  • Prepare scale drawings or architectural designs, using computer-aided design or other tools.
  • Plan or design structures such as residences, office buildings, theatres, factories, or other structural properties in accordance with environmental, safety, or other regulations.
  • Meet with clients to review or discuss architectural drawings.
  • Prepare contract documents for building contractors.
  • Develop final construction plans that include aesthetic representations of the structure or details for its construction.
  • Conduct periodic on-site observations of construction work to monitor compliance with plans.
  • Consult with clients to determine functional or spatial requirements of structures.
  • Integrate engineering elements into unified architectural designs.
Also called
ArchitectArchitectural DesignerDesign ArchitectProject ArchitectPlannerSpecifications Writer
More job titles for this occupation (16)
Building ArchitectBuilding ConsultantBuilding Information Modeling Specialist (BIM Specialist)Commercial Green Building ArchitectCommercial Green Building DesignerCommercial Green Retrofit ArchitectFacilities PlannerGreen Building ArchitectGreen Building Design SpecialistHealthcare ArchitectHealthcare Project ArchitectInterior ArchitectLicensed ArchitectRegistered Architect (RA)Space PlannerStructural Architect

Source: O*NET 31.0 (USDOL/ETA, CC BY 4.0). These are general job titles, not H-1B filings; for titles employers actually filed, see “Job titles” above.