Medical Assistant Salary: 2026 Data

Medical assistants earn a median salary of $45,690 a year, or $21.97 an hour, in the latest federal wage data, and the top 10% earn more than $59,310. The median rose $3,690 in two years, yet 56% of practices say hiring medical assistants got harder over the past year.

We matched federal compensation releases to 2026 practice survey data and checked every figure against the page that first published it. The sections below follow salary from the national figure down to individual states, then show what your practice pays once benefits are factored in.

Key Takeaways

The national median medical assistant salary reached $45,690 in 2025, an 8.8% increase over the $42,000 median from 2023.
Outpatient care centers pay a median of $48,560, which beats physician offices by $3,040 even though physician offices employ 56% of medical assistants.
Washington pays medical assistants a median of $59,290, which is $23,930 above Mississippi’s $35,360 median.
Health care employers add 39.6% in benefits, turning a $45,690 salary into a $63,784 annual cost per seat.

National Medical Assistant Salary Benchmarks for 2026

Medical assistant salaries span more than $23,000 between the lowest and highest earners nationwide, so one posted wage rarely fits every candidate. Our data indicates the national picture below, with every figure taken from the most recent federal survey.

Salary benchmark	Figure
Median annual salary	$45,690
Median hourly wage	$21.97
Lowest 10% earn less than	$36,050
Highest 10% earn more than	$59,310
Median annual salary two years earlier	$42,000
Two-year change in median salary (calculated)	$3,690, up 8.8%
Medical assistant jobs nationwide	833,900

Key Insights:

A $23,260 spread separates the bottom tenth of earners from the top tenth, so local market rates shape an offer more than the national median does.
The two-year increase of $3,690 adds about $1.77 an hour to the wage your practice budgets for each medical assistant.

Medical Assistant Salary by Work Setting

Physician offices employ most medical assistants, yet two smaller employers pay more for the same work. The table below compares median salary against each setting’s share of medical assistant jobs.

Work setting	Share of medical assistant jobs	Median annual salary
Outpatient care centers	10%	$48,560
Hospitals (state, local and private)	17%	$46,910
Offices of physicians	56%	$45,520
Offices of other health practitioners	8%	$38,400

Key Insights:

Outpatient care centers pay $3,040 more per year than physician offices, putting private practices in direct competition with larger employers for the same applicants.
Offices of other health practitioners, including chiropractic offices, pay the lowest median at $38,400, which is $7,120 less than physician offices.

Medical Assistant Salary by State

Location lowers a medical assistant salary further than work setting does, and the top-paying state pays 68% more than the lowest state on our list. The table below lists the highest and lowest state medians, along with California, Texas, and Florida.

State	Median annual salary	Median hourly wage	Difference from national median (calculated)
Washington	$59,290	$28.50	29.8% higher
Alaska	$52,560	$25.27	15.0% higher
District of Columbia	$51,050	$24.54	11.7% higher
California	$49,660	$23.88	8.7% higher
Massachusetts	$49,460	$23.78	8.3% higher
Florida	$43,680	$21.00	4.4% lower
Texas	$39,520	$19.00	13.5% lower
Mississippi	$35,360	$17.00	22.6% lower

Key Insights:

Washington’s median beats the Mississippi median by $23,930 a year, an amount equal to two-thirds of the Mississippi salary itself.
The Vallejo metro area in California pays a median of $77,410, so metro data can push an offer well past the state figure.

Medical Assistant Pay Growth and Hiring Pressure

Rising salaries have not made the role easier to fill, and practice survey data now tracks both trends year over year. The table below pairs medical assistant pay growth with the hiring conditions practice leaders report in 2026.

Indicator	Figure
Median total compensation growth in one year	4.67%
Total compensation growth over five years	24.6%
Hourly rate increase since 2020	$3.63
Practices reporting harder medical assistant hiring	56%
Practice leaders naming medical assistants the hardest role to recruit	47%
Projected job growth, 2025 to 2035	13%
Projected openings each year	109,700

Key Insights:

Medical assistant pay climbed 24.6% in five years, yet 56% of practices still report that hiring got harder over the past year.
Federal projections show 109,700 openings every year through 2035, which keeps employers bidding against each other for the same candidates.

What a Medical Assistant Salary Costs Your Practice

An offer letter understates what a medical assistant costs, because health care employers spend $13.73 an hour on benefits for every $34.67 in wages. Our data indicates the full annual cost of one seat at three pay levels below, with a DocVA virtual medical assistant at $10.95 an hour for reference.

Pay level	Annual salary	Benefits at 39.6% (calculated)	Total annual cost (calculated)
Lowest 10% nationally	$36,050	$14,277	$50,327
National median	$45,690	$18,094	$63,784
Washington median	$59,290	$23,480	$82,770
DocVA virtual medical assistant, 2,080 hours	$22,776	Practice pays none	$22,776

Key Insights:

Benefits add $18,094 to a median medical assistant salary, so a budget built on wages alone misses the true cost of each seat by nearly 40%.
A DocVA virtual medical assistant costs $22,776 for 2,080 hours, which comes in $41,008 below the full cost of a median in-house seat.