Start here: what travel therapists make, and where the figures come from

This site is for travel therapists, and therapists thinking about travel, who want to know what contracts pay by discipline, setting and state. Its weekly figures come from the pinned Travel Therapy Pay Index for October 2026 and its staff-salary comparisons from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, so start with the pay explorer and the state pages.

By ProTherapy Staffing, published October 25, 2026.

Who is this site for?

PTs, OTs, SLPs, PTAs and COTAs comparing travel with a staff job, and travelers checking an offer against the market.

A travel figure here is a weekly gross: taxable pay plus tax-free stipends when you qualify, before tax. A staff salary is a yearly wage, all of it taxable. The pages keep the two apart and say which is which, because setting one beside the other without that note is how pay comparisons go wrong.

The site also answers a narrower question: what a year of travel adds up to. A weekly gross multiplied across a year is not an annual salary, because there are unpaid weeks between contracts, and the annual guide shows how to count them.

Where should you start?

  1. Pay explorer: filter the current contract book by discipline, state and setting; the median and range come straight from it, not from a survey.
  2. Salary by state: the median weekly gross for travel PT contracts in each state with enough contracts to publish one, and open counts for the rest.
  3. Pay by setting: why demand rather than prestige sets the rate, and how to read setting figures before you sign.
  4. How much does a travel therapist make a year? One of the newer guides, turning a weekly package into a yearly figure with the unpaid weeks between contracts counted.
  5. Do the stipends count when you save for retirement? A newer guide on why stipends may not count toward an IRA limit or a workplace plan’s deferral and match.

If you want to know what a contract in your discipline and state would pay you, ask a ProTherapy recruiter: Find my next contract.

What on this site comes from data, and what is written?

The weekly figures on the home page, the pay explorer, the state pages and the state ranking are rendered from one pinned snapshot of current postings, the same one behind the Travel Therapy Pay Index. The current pin is October 2026. Each figure names its discipline and the number of contracts behind it, and a state with fewer than five PT contracts gets no pay figure at all, because a median over a handful of contracts describes only those contracts. Before the site deploys, a checker recomputes the pin figures and stops the deploy if one disagrees.

The staff side comes from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Its handbook says: “The median annual wage for physical therapists was $102,760 in May 2025.” That covers every physical therapist, every experience level and setting, so it is a point of comparison, not a travel figure. The questions at the foot of the home page quote the same handbook for OTs and SLPs, with the date each was read.

The stipends inside a weekly gross are capped by the federal per diem rates that GSA publishes for each locality. The state pages also list open contracts in that state from the job feed, as of each page’s last update. The newer guides are generated from a data file that lists every source, and the setting page, the health insurance page and the new-grad OT answer are written guidance; the pin figure on the new-grad OT answer and the sourced figures on the health insurance page are rendered rather than typed.

How do you reach a recruiter?

Use the “Find my next contract” link on this page or the form at the foot of a guide. It asks your discipline and the states you want, and a recruiter takes it from there. A median tells you where the middle of the market sits; only an offer tells you what a facility will pay you, so ask for it line by line, in writing.

ProTherapy Staffing, which publishes this site, is owned and run by licensed physical therapists. The pin is built from the publisher’s own current contracts, so read it as one agency’s book, not a survey. If you would rather watch postings first, the job alerts page sends new contracts in your discipline by email, daily or weekly as you choose.

Frequently asked questions

Is the median on this site a salary offer?

No. It is the middle of the advertised weekly gross on current contracts in the October 2026 pin. Your offer depends on the facility, setting and state, and on how the agency splits the contract rate.

Why does my state show no pay figure?

Because it has fewer than five current PT contracts in the pin, and a median over so few contracts would describe only those contracts. The state page shows how many assignments are open there instead.

How do I compare a travel package with a staff salary?

Turn the weekly gross into a yearly figure using the weeks you will actually work, remember that part of it is stipends rather than wages, and set it beside the BLS median for your discipline, which covers every experience level.

Sources