Pipefitter Salary 2026:
$68,000 Median, $120K+ Industrial
Updated 18 May 2026 | Sources: BLS OEWS 47-2152 | United Association Local pay scales
Pipefitting is the highest-yielding split of the UA trades. Industrial and pipeline work pulls journeyman packages well past $120,000, with travel-card Local 798 welders routinely above $150,000 once per-diem and overtime stack. The trade scales steeply: residential fitters near the national median, industrial fitters in the top decile, pipeline + nuclear at the apex.
National Median
$68,000
Industrial Median
$92,000
Pipeline (798)
$104K+
Top 10% Overall
$120K+
Section 01
What a Pipefitter Does (and How That Differs from a Plumber)
A pipefitter installs, fabricates, and maintains piping systems that carry process fluids: steam, chilled water for HVAC central plants, refrigerant, compressed air, fuel oil, natural gas at commercial and industrial scale, hydraulic and pneumatic fluids, and chemical process streams. The work runs from medium-pressure HVAC piping in commercial buildings up through high-pressure piping in oil refineries and nuclear power plants.
Plumbers, in contrast, focus on potable water supply, sanitary drainage, vent piping, and fixture installation in residential and light-commercial buildings. The connection methods differ as much as the scope. Residential plumbing leans on threaded, pressed, or soldered joints at low pressure on copper, PEX, or PVC. Industrial pipefitting leans on welded joints (TIG root + stick or flux-core fill, often with x-ray qualification) on carbon steel, stainless, or alloy materials at much higher pressures and temperatures.
Both trades share an apprenticeship structure under the United Association (UA) in unionised markets, and BLS catalogues them under the same Standard Occupational Classification code (47-2152, Plumbers, Pipefitters, and Steamfitters). The shared code is why aggregate salary surveys often blur the two trades. The pay reality on the ground is that an industrial pipefitter in Houston earns roughly 50 percent more than a residential plumber in Houston, but both show up as "47-2152" in the BLS data.
Within pipefitting, the welder pipefitter (rather than the fitter-only role) is the highest-paid specialty. Welders carry separately tested credentials (AWS qualification + ASME Section IX procedure qualification for code work), and shops that need a 6G-position-qualified TIG welder on stainless or alloy pipe pay a premium that ripples through the entire fitter team. On large industrial projects the welder-fitter ratio is often 1:2 or 1:3, with the welder doing the joining and the fitters doing the layout, cutting, beveling, and tacking.
Section 02
Pay by Sector
Sector is the single biggest determinant of pipefitter pay, more so than geography. A residential pipefitter in NYC earns less than an industrial pipefitter in rural Louisiana.
| Sector | Median Annual | Top 10% | Typical Work |
|---|---|---|---|
| Residential / Light Commercial | $54,000 | $76,000 | Apartment buildings, small commercial mech rooms, retail tenant fit-out |
| Commercial / Healthcare | $72,000 | $104,000 | Office towers, hospitals, universities, central plants |
| Industrial / Process Piping | $92,000 | $140,000 | Refineries, chemical plants, power generation, food processing |
| Pipeline (UA Local 798) | $104,000 | $165,000+ | Cross-country natural gas, oil, water pipelines; travel + per-diem |
| Nuclear (NQA-1 qualified) | $118,000 | $175,000+ | Nuclear plant outages and new construction; security clearance + cert premium |
Annual bands include typical overtime in each sector. Industrial and pipeline figures assume the construction-season hours model (50 to 70 hours per week during active projects). Excludes self-employed contractor income.
Section 03
UA Local Spotlight: Top Pipefitter Locals
UA Local pay scales are public. Each Local publishes its journeyman scale, apprentice ladder, and benefits-package value separately. Below is a representative slice across geographies.
| UA Local | Coverage | Journeyman Scale | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| UA Local 798 | Tulsa-headquartered cross-country pipeline Local | $58 to $72/hr base + 60-100 hrs/wk OT + per-diem | The premier US pipeline Local; constant travel; $150K+ for working welders |
| UA Local 597 (Chicago) | Chicago-area industrial + commercial pipefitters | $54 to $68/hr base + benefits package $35/hr | One of the largest fitters Locals in the country |
| UA Local 250 (LA) | Los Angeles + Orange County pipefitters | $58 to $72/hr base + benefits package $40/hr | Refinery + commercial-tower work; LA refinery cluster |
| UA Local 290 (Portland OR) | Pacific Northwest pipefitters | $52 to $64/hr base + benefits package $32/hr | Semiconductor fab construction (Intel) drives industrial demand |
| UA Local 491 (Greenville SC) | Southeast industrial pipefitters | $42 to $54/hr base + benefits package $24/hr | Auto plant + BMW + Boeing 787 final assembly area |
For the comprehensive Local-by-Local cross-section, see union plumber pay (UA Locals).
Section 04
Local 798: The Pipeline Premium
UA Local 798 is the cross-country pipeline Local, headquartered in Tulsa and chartered across most of the United States. The Local supplies welders and fitters to the natural-gas, crude oil, and large-diameter water pipeline projects that crisscross the country. The work is different in kind from most other Locals: instead of working out of a hiring hall in one city, Local 798 members travel from project to project, often living in RVs or job-site camps for the duration of a construction season.
The economic model that produces the headline-grabbing pay numbers stacks four elements. Base scale is competitive, typically $58 to $72 per hour for a journeyman welder on current projects. Overtime is constant, often 60 to 100 hours per week during the construction season (April through November in northern climates, more or less year-round in southern). The overtime structure is generous: 1.5x after 40 hours, often 2x on Saturday and 3x on Sunday or holidays. Per-diem is paid for living expenses on the road, typically $100 to $150 per day, tax-advantaged. And the work pool is the entire country, so a fit and willing welder can string consecutive projects with minimal downtime.
The result is that a Local 798 welder doing a full-season rotation, including travel and per-diem, frequently earns $150,000 to $200,000 gross in a year. The tradeoff is that pipeline life is hard on the body, hard on family, and concentrated in a working season that runs from April to November in much of the country. Off-season earnings depend on whether you can pick up shutdowns or refinery work to bridge between pipeline campaigns.
Within the pipeline world, the welder is the apex of the pay hierarchy. A pipefitter (non-welding) on the same project earns less than the welder but still well above industrial averages, typically $35 to $50 per hour base with the same overtime and per-diem structure stacked on top. Welders typically need to pass the project-specific procedure-qualified weld test on the first day, often on 6G-position carbon-steel pipe with a specific filler-metal combination. Failing the weld test means going home unpaid, so the trade is selective at the top.
Section 05
Geographic Concentration: Where the Industrial Work Is
Industrial pipefitting clusters around three economic geographies that don't always overlap with major-population metros.
The Gulf Coast (Houston, Beaumont, Lake Charles, Baton Rouge, Mobile) is the densest industrial-pipefitter market in North America. The Houston Ship Channel petrochemical complex, the Louisiana refinery row, and the LNG export terminals being built up from the Gulf coast keep a sustained demand for fitters and welders. Pay in Gulf Coast industrial work runs $35 to $55 per hour base, with refinery-turnaround work commanding a 20 to 40 percent premium during outage seasons.
The Midwest manufacturing belt (Indiana, Ohio, Michigan, western Pennsylvania) employs industrial pipefitters in auto plants, steel mills, chemical plants, and food-processing facilities. Recent battery-plant and EV-supplier investments (Ford, GM, Stellantis, LG Energy, Samsung SDI, Panasonic) have pulled meaningful incremental fitter demand into the region. Pay in the Midwest runs $30 to $45 per hour base, with strong UA Local representation in most submarkets.
The Pacific Northwest (Portland, Seattle, Hillsboro) has emerged as a major industrial fitter market on the back of semiconductor fab construction. Intel's Hillsboro campus, the long-running Boeing aerospace footprint, and now the secondary-wave fab investments (TSMC Arizona pulls some PNW-trained labour) all employ industrial-spec pipefitters at scale. UA Local 290 in Portland is the regional anchor.
Outside those three concentrations, industrial work tracks where the heavy industry is. Power-plant construction and nuclear-plant outages move fitters around the country (Vogtle 3 and 4 in Georgia, Watts Bar in Tennessee, Comanche Peak in Texas have all hosted multi-year nuclear pipefitter mobilisations). Data-centre construction (Northern Virginia, Phoenix, Atlanta, Dallas-Fort Worth) is creating a new commercial-industrial hybrid market for chilled-water pipefitters that pays mid-industrial scale.