What executive assistants are paid in 2026, and how few postings say so
Fewer than half of US executive assistant postings state pay. Of 6,838 collected in 2026 to August 31, 3,213 stated a figure, with a coverage-adjusted median of $79,934. The as-posted median is 6.6% above the same window in 2025. This page gives the quartiles, pay by state and level, and the method.
$79,934
National Median
The median base salary in US executive assistant job postings is $79,934 a year, coverage-adjusted, for postings collected January 1 to August 31, 2026. That median comes from the 3,213 of 6,838 postings that stated pay, a 47.0% disclosure rate. The unadjusted median of the same postings is $80,000.
Every figure here is base pay as the employer posted it, with bonus, overtime and equity left out. The as-posted median of $80,000 is 6.6% higher than in the same window of 2025. Location moves pay further than that: among the 12 states with the most postings that state pay, the median runs from $66,000 in Florida to $90,000 in New York.
How much does an executive assistant make?
An executive assistant in the US makes a median of $79,934 a year in base pay, based on 3,213 job postings that stated pay between January 1 and August 31, 2026. That equals $38.43 an hour, $1,537 a week or $6,661 a month. The hourly figure is the annual median divided by 2,080 working hours, not a posted hourly rate. The middle half of postings pays $62,400 to $95,281 a year, or $30.00 to $45.81 an hour.
| Coverage-adjusted base pay | Annual | Hourly equivalent | Monthly equivalent |
|---|---|---|---|
| 25th percentile | $62,400 | $30.00 | $5,200 |
| Median | $79,934 | $38.43 | $6,661 |
| 75th percentile | $95,281 | $45.81 | $7,940 |
The Bureau of Labor Statistics puts the median for Executive Secretaries and Executive Administrative Assistants (SOC 43-6011) at $76,590 a year, or $36.82 an hour, in its Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics for May 2025.
The two figures measure different things. BLS surveys everyone employed in the occupation, across all industries and all lengths of tenure, and its category also counts executive secretaries. PayScope's figure is the base pay employers advertised in 2026 postings for executive assistant titles. Even so, the middle halves nearly match: $61,390 to $94,390 in the BLS May 2025 data against $62,400 to $95,281 here.
Coverage adjustment moves the median $66 and the 75th percentile $4,580
The table sets the 3,213 postings that stated pay against the same postings re-weighted so each state counts for its share of all 6,838 collected postings, not only the ones that disclosed. The adjustment barely touches the median, which goes from $80,000 to $79,934. It pulls the 75th percentile down $4,580, to $95,281, which means the higher-paying postings come disproportionately from states that disclose more often. The coverage-adjusted column is the one to quote.
| Measure | As posted | Coverage-adjusted |
|---|---|---|
| 25th percentile | $63,000 | $62,400 |
| Median | $80,000 | $79,934 |
| 75th percentile | $99,861 | $95,281 |
Base pay, annualized, from 3,213 US executive assistant postings that stated pay, collected January 1 to August 31, 2026.
Executive assistant pay by state: $90,000 in New York, $66,000 in Florida
New York posts the highest median of the 12 states below, at $90,000, followed by the District of Columbia at $88,928 and California at $87,500. Florida is lowest at $66,000, with Maryland next at $68,640. That puts $24,000 a year between the top and bottom of the table for the same role.
| State | Postings with pay | Median | Middle half (p25 to p75) |
|---|---|---|---|
| California | 590 | $87,500 | $74,880 to $107,500 |
| New York | 454 | $90,000 | $75,000 to $110,000 |
| Texas | 165 | $80,000 | $62,400 to $92,560 |
| Massachusetts | 140 | $85,000 | $75,000 to $107,500 |
| Illinois | 140 | $77,500 | $65,000 to $91,800 |
| Washington | 138 | $79,900 | $65,520 to $103,106 |
| Florida | 112 | $66,000 | $60,000 to $82,500 |
| New Jersey | 87 | $77,500 | $65,000 to $87,360 |
| Colorado | 87 | $80,000 | $64,480 to $95,000 |
| Maryland | 79 | $68,640 | $60,320 to $80,274 |
| Virginia | 77 | $79,934 | $62,400 to $90,000 |
| District of Columbia | 69 | $88,928 | $75,000 to $107,500 |
Base pay as posted, from postings collected January 1 to August 31, 2026. Only states with at least 30 postings that stated pay are eligible; 19 states and the District of Columbia clear that floor, and the 12 with the most postings that stated pay are shown.
47.0% of executive assistant postings state pay
3,213 of the 6,838 collected postings carried a usable annual figure. 3,619 gave no pay information at all, and 6 gave a figure that could not be used: 4 were not in US dollars and 2 annualized to less than $15,000, below the range PayScope accepts as a salary.
Disclosure varies widely by state. More than half of executive assistant postings state pay in Colorado (66.4%), California (56.1%) and Washington (53.7%), while fewer than a third do in Texas (29.3%) and Florida (29.9%). Across all roles, the 13 states with pay-transparency laws in force disclose at 53.9% against 33.8% elsewhere and pay about 10% more, and re-weighting by state moves a typical median by about 1%. For executive assistants the correction to the median is $66, well under that 1%.
Those 3,619 silent postings outnumber the ones that state pay. What a DOE listing actually means covers the phrasings employers use in place of a number.
Posted pay is up 6.6% from a year ago
The median posted base for executive assistants was $75,036 in 2025 and is $80,000 in 2026, both measured from January 1 to early September on the same five titles and the same method. The 2025 median rests on 10,485 postings that stated pay and the 2026 median on 3,213. A 6.6% rise puts the role in the Balanced band of PayScope's market label.
Those posting counts reflect how much the collector gathered in each period, so this page does not compare them across years.
Pay by level: $66,400 at entry, $100,000 at senior
The ladder below is built on the 382 postings that state both a level and a pay figure. The other 2,831 usable postings state no level, and their median of $80,000 equals the as-posted role median, so the headline figure on this page is mostly them. The ladder therefore describes the small share of postings that name a rung.
| Level | Postings with pay | 25th percentile | Median | 75th percentile | Years in role |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Entry | 32 | $53,581 | $66,400 | $80,000 | 2 to 3 years |
| Mid | 64 | $63,440 | $70,551 | $81,120 | 3 to 6 years |
| Senior | 276 | $82,500 | $100,000 | $120,000 | 5 to 8 years |
Entry and mid sit close together, at $66,400 and $70,551, and both top out near $80,000 at the 75th percentile. Entry rests on only 32 postings, just over the 30-posting floor PayScope uses for a publishable median. The real step is to senior, where the median reaches $100,000 on 276 postings. Rounded to the nearest thousand dollars, the three level medians read $66K at entry, $71K at mid and $100K at senior.
Only 10 lead postings state pay, under that floor, so lead is not shown. The stated experience ranges also overlap: 2 to 3 years at entry, 3 to 6 at mid and 5 to 8 at senior.
Executive assistant to the CEO postings pay $85,000 to $95,000
The title on the posting moves pay as well. Plain executive assistant postings, 2,786 of them with pay, have a median of $80,000, while executive administrative assistant postings come in at $70,000 on 271. The three titles that name the CEO post medians of $85,000 (executive assistant to the CEO, 74 postings), $85,000 (executive assistant to chief executive officer, 38) and $95,000 (executive assistant to CEO, 44). These title medians are as posted, January 1 to August 31, 2026.
Duties, skills and outlook: flat employment, 43,300 openings a year
The job is administrative support for senior executives. O*NET OnLine lists the core tasks for executive secretaries and executive administrative assistants as managing executives' schedules and travel, preparing reports, memos, letters, invoices and financial statements, coordinating office services such as records, departmental finances and budget preparation, and answering calls and drafting replies to routine correspondence. Its essential skills, in order, are active listening, reading comprehension, speaking, writing, critical thinking and active learning.
BLS lists a high school diploma or equivalent as the typical entry-level education, with less than 5 years of experience in a related occupation and no on-the-job training (Employment Projections, Table 1.2).
BLS projects employment of executive secretaries and executive administrative assistants to change by 0.0% from 2025 to 2035, from 489,300 jobs to 489,200, with about 43,300 openings a year (Employment Projections 2025 to 2035, Table 1.2). With employment flat, those openings come from people leaving the occupation rather than from new positions.
Related roles and their medians
These guides cover nearby administrative and business roles. The data column shows which dataset each median comes from.
| Role | Median | Data |
|---|---|---|
| HR manager | $100,000 | Postings through Aug 31, 2026 |
| Payroll specialist | $62,500 | Postings through Aug 31, 2026 |
| Account manager | $70,000 | Postings through Aug 31, 2026 |
| Operations specialist | $57,796 | Postings through Aug 31, 2026 |
| Director of administration | $104,000 | March 2026 dataset |
Title variants such as executive assistant to the CEO and executive administrative assistant are counted on this page rather than on separate guides.
How these figures were produced
The source is PayScope's collection of US job postings, deduplicated by posting id. Of 6,838 postings that matched the role, 3,213 stated a usable annual pay figure, 3,619 stated none, 4 quoted pay in a currency other than US dollars and 2 annualized to less than $15,000 and were set aside. The matched titles are executive assistant, executive administrative assistant, executive assistant to the CEO, executive assistant to chief executive officer and executive assistant to CEO.
Coverage-adjusted figures re-weight the disclosing postings so each state counts for its share of all collected postings; for this role that moves the median from $80,000 to $79,934. All figures are base pay as the employer posted it, annualized, with bonus, commission, overtime and equity excluded. Postings with no identifiable state are not shown in the state table.
The posting figures are dated August 31, 2026, the last fully collected month. The collection query ran to early September, so a few September postings are included. The figures are regenerated monthly on the same method.
Frequently asked questions
How much does an executive assistant make?
The median executive assistant salary in the US is $79,934 a year in base pay, coverage-adjusted, from 3,213 job postings that stated pay between January 1 and August 31, 2026. The middle half of those postings pays $62,400 to $95,281. The unadjusted median of the same postings is $80,000.
How much does an executive assistant make per hour?
$38.43 an hour, which is the coverage-adjusted annual median of $79,934 divided by 2,080 working hours, for postings collected January 1 to August 31, 2026. It is an equivalent, not a posted hourly rate. On the same basis the middle half runs from $30.00 to $45.81 an hour.
Is $40 an hour a good salary for an executive assistant?
$40 an hour works out to $83,200 a year at 2,080 hours. That is above the $79,934 median for US executive assistant postings collected January 1 to August 31, 2026, and below the 75th percentile of $95,281. In New York, where the posted median is $90,000, the same rate sits below the middle of the market.
What is the entry-level executive assistant salary?
Postings that name an entry level state a median of $66,400, with a middle half of $53,581 to $80,000, on 32 postings collected January 1 to August 31, 2026. The experience they state is 2 to 3 years. With only 32 postings behind it, the entry figure is the thinnest on this page.
How much do high-end executive assistants make?
Senior executive assistant postings state a median of $100,000, and a quarter of them post $120,000 or more, on 276 postings collected January 1 to August 31, 2026. Postings for an executive assistant to the CEO state medians of $85,000 to $95,000 depending on the exact title, and the executive assistant to CEO title reaches $127,000 at the 75th percentile. All of these are base pay before any bonus.
How much do executive assistants make in California and New York?
California executive assistant postings state a median of $87,500 on 590 postings with pay, and New York postings $90,000 on 454, both collected January 1 to August 31, 2026. New Jersey's median is $77,500 on 87 postings. This page reports states, not cities, so a posting in Los Angeles, San Francisco or New York City can sit above or below these figures.
What does an executive administrative assistant do?
O*NET OnLine lists the core tasks as managing executives' schedules and travel, preparing reports, memos, letters and invoices, coordinating office services such as records and budgets, and handling calls and routine correspondence. Its essential skills start with active listening, reading comprehension and speaking. Postings titled executive administrative assistant state a median of $70,000 on 271 postings collected January 1 to August 31, 2026, against $80,000 for plain executive assistant postings.
Are executive assistant salary figures base pay or total compensation?
Base pay as the employer posted it, annualized, from postings collected January 1 to August 31, 2026. Bonus, commission, overtime and equity are all excluded. Any bonus or other pay an employer adds comes on top of the $79,934 median.