Average salary in Puerto Rico: $38,840 a year
The mean annual wage across every job BLS counts in Puerto Rico, with the median, the pay spread, the job groups and the occupations behind it.
The average salary in Puerto Rico is $38,840 a year ($18.68 an hour): that is the mean annual wage across 938,710 jobs in the BLS May 2025 survey. The median is $28,680 ($13.79 an hour), so half of those jobs paid less and half paid more. The mean sits above the median because a smaller number of very high wages pulls it up.
How Puerto Rico compares with the United States
Puerto Rico's mean salary is $30,930 (44.3%) below the U.S. figure of $69,770; its median is $22,300 (43.7%) below the U.S. figure of $50,980. BLS publishes Puerto Rico separately; it is not ranked with the 50 states and DC here.
| Measure | Puerto Rico | United States |
|---|---|---|
| Mean (average) salary | $38,840 | $69,770 |
| Median salary | $28,680 | $50,980 |
| Mean hourly wage | $18.68 | $33.54 |
| Median hourly wage | $13.79 | $24.51 |
| Jobs counted | 938,710 | 155,495,730 |
What jobs in Puerto Rico pay, from low to high
One job in ten in Puerto Rico paid less than $21,840 a year, and one in ten paid more than $64,420. A quarter paid less than $22,490; a quarter paid more than $44,090.
| Area | 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Puerto Rico | $21,840 | $22,490 | $28,680 | $44,090 | $64,420 |
| United States | $31,200 | $37,590 | $50,980 | $80,520 | $128,560 |
Pay by job group in Puerto Rico
The largest group in Puerto Rico is office and administrative support, with 150,690 jobs (16% of the total, calculated). The best-paid group by median is management ($79,530); the lowest-paid is building and grounds cleaning and maintenance ($22,040). Where BLS does not release a figure, the table says so.
| Job group | Jobs | Median salary | Mean (average) salary |
|---|---|---|---|
| Office and Administrative Support | 150,690 | $28,510 | $32,590 |
| Sales and Related | 104,780 | $22,960 | $29,960 |
| Food Preparation and Serving Related | 81,110 | $22,540 | $25,880 |
| Transportation and Material Moving | 70,470 | $24,710 | $29,680 |
| Business and Financial Operations | 61,340 | $45,970 | $53,980 |
| Production | 60,900 | $25,180 | $29,940 |
| Educational Instruction and Library | 57,240 | $51,320 | $51,880 |
| Healthcare Practitioners and Technical | 53,450 | $39,580 | $52,130 |
| Protective Service | 51,750 | $23,670 | $32,670 |
| Building and Grounds Cleaning and Maintenance | 42,450 | $22,040 | $25,380 |
| Management | 39,640 | $79,530 | $94,500 |
| Construction and Extraction | 37,070 | $28,090 | $31,090 |
| Installation, Maintenance, and Repair | 34,120 | $27,650 | $34,020 |
| Healthcare Support | 19,230 | $22,600 | $27,820 |
| Community and Social Service | 15,150 | $36,150 | $39,630 |
| Computer and Mathematical | 14,530 | $48,600 | $56,030 |
| Architecture and Engineering | 12,570 | $60,980 | $67,710 |
| Personal Care and Service | 10,270 | $22,590 | $25,820 |
| Life, Physical, and Social Science | 8,210 | $50,630 | $60,040 |
| Legal | 6,030 | not released | not released |
| Arts, Design, Entertainment, Sports, and Media | 5,840 | $37,130 | $43,350 |
| Farming, Fishing, and Forestry | 1,850 | $24,290 | $31,200 |
The occupations with the most jobs in Puerto Rico
10 of the 12 largest occupations in Puerto Rico with a published annual median paid a median below the all-jobs median of $28,680 (calculated from the BLS figures).
| Occupation | Jobs | Median salary |
|---|---|---|
| Retail Salespersons | 41,230 | $22,560 |
| Janitors and Cleaners, Except Maids and Housekeeping Cleaners | 29,030 | $21,890 |
| Cashiers | 27,320 | $22,140 |
| Fast Food and Counter Workers | 26,440 | $22,030 |
| Security Guards | 26,100 | $21,840 |
| Registered Nurses | 21,270 | $39,880 |
| Customer Service Representatives | 20,330 | $26,700 |
| Office Clerks, General | 20,190 | $23,860 |
| Stockers and Order Fillers | 19,230 | $25,030 |
| Secretaries and Administrative Assistants, Except Legal, Medical, and Executive | 17,810 | $25,730 |
| First-Line Supervisors of Office and Administrative Support Workers | 16,400 | $42,840 |
| Miscellaneous Assemblers and Fabricators | 12,850 | $24,610 |
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Questions people ask
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How this page is built
Every pay figure is a BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) May 2025 estimate for all occupations in Puerto Rico (occupation code 00-0000), copied from BLS's data file; the job-group and occupation rows come from the same file. The average is BLS's mean wage (total wages divided by jobs); the median is the wage in the middle. OEWS wages are straight-time gross pay: they include commissions, tips, production bonuses and cost-of-living allowances, and leave out overtime premiums, shift differentials, nonproduction bonuses and benefits. BLS turns hourly wages into annual ones at 2,080 hours (40 hours for 52 weeks). Ranks, differences and shares are TryHired calculations from the BLS figures. BEA does not publish a Regional Price Parity for Puerto Rico, so this page shows no price level.
- Household income: this page reports pay per job, not household or family income, which the Census Bureau measures differently.
- Starting pay: the figures include experienced workers. Entry-level pay is usually lower.
- Take-home pay: every figure is before taxes and deductions.
- Self-employment and farm work: not covered by OEWS (see the FAQ).
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS), May 2025 estimates: national, state and metropolitan-area data files (public domain).
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, OEWS technical notes: what the survey counts as wages and jobs.
- U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, Regional Price Parities, 2024 (released Feb 19, 2026).