Salaries / Automotive Service Technician
Skilled Trades · SOC 49-3023
Automotive Service Technician salary
Automotive service technicians and mechanics inspect, maintain, and repair cars and light trucks.
Median annual
$47,000
Median hourly
$22.60
Typical range
$30,000 to $79,000
Source: National estimate (to be replaced by live BLS data). Figures are gross pay and vary by location, employer, and experience.
The pay range, visually.
Low end (about the 10th percentile), median, and high end (about the 90th percentile).
By state, at a glance
These at-a-glance figures are estimates derived from the national median and a state wage index, shown to give a rough sense of local differences. Pick any state (here or in the selector above) to look up its real figures.
Your skills are a business
Ideas we have for people in skilled trades.
The same experience that earns a paycheck as a automotive service technician can start a business. Here are real ideas from our marketplace that fit this field.
Start an Independent Reconditioning Center
Perform inspection, detailing, and light repair on trade-in and auction-sourced inventory before resale, getting cars front-line ready fast for dealers who outsource recon.
Start a Mobile Car Detailing Business
Bring the car wash to driveways and office parking lots. Subscriptions for busy professionals turn one-time jobs into routes.
Start a Fleet and Commercial Car Detailing Business
Detail cars by the fleet for dealerships, rental agencies, rideshare and delivery drivers, and company vehicles, winning recurring contracts instead of chasing one driveway at a time.
Build the Field Service Platform for Mobile Detailers
Route-aware booking, card-on-file invoicing, and automatic follow-up designed around how mobile detailing actually runs: vehicle-specific pricing, water and power constraints, and the recurring maintenance plan that turns a one-off wash into a monthly customer.
You could hire automotive service technicians, not just be one.
We have a staffing calculator to price the work and a full course on how to start a staffing agency, so you can turn a field you already know into a business that puts other people to work.