Medical Lab Technician: what the job is, what it pays, and how to get hired.
The work, the skills that matter, the tools in demand and the pay range, from U.S. government data, plus every TryHired page for the role.
Medical Lab Technicians perform routine medical laboratory tests for the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of disease.
- Preparation
- Job Zone 3 of 5
- medium preparation
Data Government data groups this job as Medical and Clinical Laboratory Technicians (O*NET-SOC 29-2012.00). Figures on this page are for that occupation.
Every page for Medical Lab Technicians
What medical lab technicians do day to day
Data Core tasks rated most important by workers in the role (O*NET).
- Perform quality control analyses to ensure accuracy of test results.
- Conduct blood tests for transfusion purposes and perform blood counts.
- Conduct chemical analyses of body fluids, such as blood or urine, using microscope or automatic analyzer to detect abnormalities or diseases and enter findings into computer.
- Analyze the results of tests or experiments to ensure conformity to specifications, using special mechanical or electrical devices.
- Set up, maintain, calibrate, clean, and test sterility of medical laboratory equipment.
- Examine cells stained with dye to locate abnormalities.
- Prepare standard volumetric solutions or reagents to be combined with samples, following standardized formulas or experimental procedures.
- Supervise or instruct other technicians or laboratory assistants.
Ranked by importance to the job
Data O*NET importance ratings. The first three are core.
Knowledge areas: Chemistry, English Language, Biology, Medicine and Dentistry, Education and Training, Computers and Electronics.
Software medical lab technicians use
Data Examples reported for the role; employer demand flags from O*NET.
- MEDITECH softwareMedical softwareHot technology
- Billing softwareBilling and invoicing software
- Commercial plate reader softwareMedical software
- Electronic medical record EMR softwareMedical software
- Hematology laboratory workflow management softwareMedical software
- Laboratory information system LISMedical software
- Medical digital imaging softwareMedical software
- Medical system integration softwareMedical software
- Microscopic image capturing softwareMedical software
- MinitabAnalytical or scientific software
- Quality control softwareMedical software
- QuizletComputer based training software
Also called: Medical Laboratory Technician, Clinical Lab Tech (Clinical Laboratory Technician), Lab Assistant (Laboratory Assistant), Lab Associate (Laboratory Associate), Lab Tech (Laboratory Technician), Medical Lab Assistant (Medical Laboratory Assistant), Medical Technician (Medical Tech).
How this page is built
Tasks, skills, tools, education and related roles come from O*NET 31.0. Pay and employment come from the BLS OEWS May 2025 national estimates. The skill-match score is our calculation: Skill match is the cosine similarity of the two occupations' skill profiles: for each of 35 O*NET skills (10 essential, 25 transferable) we multiply importance by level and subtract the average across all occupations, then compare the direction of the two profiles. 100 means identical shape; 0 means unrelated or opposite (negative values are shown as 0). Only occupations that O*NET itself lists as related are compared.
- How a specific employer defines the job.
- Pay for self-employed workers (OEWS covers employees).
- Your own chances: data describes the occupation, not you.
- O*NET 31.0 Database, U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA), used under the CC BY 4.0 license. TryHired selected, ranked and combined the data; O*NET is not responsible for these pages.
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025 estimates (public domain).
How TryHired builds this data: sources, methods and downloads. Spotted an error? Report a correction.