What production supervisors are paid in 2026, and why there's no ladder
About a third of US production supervisor postings state pay. Of 3,602 collected in 2026 to August 31, 1,235 stated a figure, with a coverage-adjusted median of $77,500. The as-posted median is 2.6% above the same window in 2025. This page gives the quartiles, pay by state and the method.
$77,500
National Median
Production supervisors in the US are offered a median base salary of $77,500 a year, based on 1,235 job postings that stated pay between January 1 and August 31, 2026 and adjusted for which states disclose pay. Before that adjustment the same postings have a median of $79,500. Only 34.3% of the 3,602 postings collected for the role stated pay at all.
These are base salaries as employers posted them, with bonuses, overtime and shift differentials left out. Postings for this role rarely state a level (59 of the 1,235 do), so this page measures the role as a whole rather than a ladder. Posted pay is 2.6% higher than in the same window of 2025.
How much does a production supervisor make?
A production supervisor in the US makes a median base salary of $77,500 a year in postings collected January 1 to August 31, 2026, coverage-adjusted. That works out to $37.26 an hour, $1,490 a week or $6,458 a month. The hourly figure is the annual median divided by 2,080 working hours, not an hourly rate employers posted. The middle half of postings runs from $69,840 to $86,860 a year, or $33.58 to $41.76 an hour. Rounded to the nearest thousand dollars, half of production supervisor postings pay between $70K and $87K.
| Measure | Annual | Hourly equivalent | Monthly equivalent |
|---|---|---|---|
| 25th percentile | $69,840 | $33.58 | $5,820 |
| Median | $77,500 | $37.26 | $6,458 |
| 75th percentile | $86,860 | $41.76 | $7,238 |
Coverage-adjusted base pay, 1,235 US postings that stated pay, collected January 1 to August 31, 2026. Hourly is annual divided by 2,080; monthly is annual divided by 12.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics puts the median annual wage for first-line supervisors of production and operating workers (SOC 51-1011) at $74,450, or $35.79 an hour, in its Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics for May 2025. The two figures measure different things. BLS surveys employers about everyone already in the occupation, across all industries and every length of tenure, and the occupation covers line supervisors and other first-line production roles beyond the three titles on this page. PayScope's figure is the base pay advertised in 2026 postings, a year later than the BLS reference date.
The figures: a $77,500 median after coverage adjustment
As posted is the median of the 1,235 postings that stated pay. Coverage-adjusted re-weights those postings so each state counts in proportion to its share of all 3,602 collected postings, not its share of the ones that disclosed. For production supervisors the adjustment lowers the median by 2.5%, from $79,500 to $77,500, and pulls the 75th percentile down from $90,000 to $86,860. The coverage-adjusted column is the one this page quotes.
| Measure | As posted | Coverage-adjusted |
|---|---|---|
| 25th percentile | $70,500 | $69,840 |
| Median | $79,500 | $77,500 |
| 75th percentile | $90,000 | $86,860 |
Base pay, annualized, 1,235 US postings that stated pay, collected January 1 to August 31, 2026. Bonuses, overtime and shift differentials excluded.
The manufacturing supervisor title pays more, at $85,000
The three posted titles in this sample pay differently. Manufacturing supervisor postings have a median of $85,000 on 120 postings that stated pay, against $78,750 for production supervisor, the title on 1,098 of the 1,235. Plant supervisor has only 17 postings with pay, too few for a published median. These title medians are as posted, before the state adjustment.
Pay by state: from $73,618 in North Carolina to $90,000 in Colorado
| State | Postings with pay | Median | Middle half (p25 to p75) |
|---|---|---|---|
| California | 158 | $85,000 | $75,000 to $96,096 |
| Illinois | 95 | $81,000 | $72,480 to $90,000 |
| Michigan | 88 | $78,500 | $72,800 to $106,920 |
| Minnesota | 83 | $78,000 | $72,000 to $90,000 |
| New York | 72 | $80,000 | $70,000 to $90,000 |
| Wisconsin | 55 | $77,500 | $66,000 to $85,704 |
| Texas | 53 | $80,000 | $72,500 to $90,000 |
| Ohio | 51 | $75,000 | $70,000 to $84,200 |
| Pennsylvania | 46 | $81,000 | $68,500 to $90,000 |
| New Jersey | 45 | $80,000 | $72,984 to $88,000 |
| Washington | 41 | $81,227 | $80,000 to $88,790 |
| Colorado | 40 | $90,000 | $76,450 to $100,000 |
| North Carolina | 34 | $73,618 | $68,000 to $79,500 |
Base pay as posted, not coverage-adjusted. Postings collected January 1 to August 31, 2026; states with at least 30 postings that stated pay.
Colorado has the highest median in the table at $90,000, on 40 postings, and North Carolina the lowest at $73,618, a gap of $16,382. California, with the most postings that stated pay, sits at $85,000. Five of the 13 rows are Midwest states (Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Ohio), and their medians run from $75,000 to $81,000, close to the national figure. Michigan has the widest upper range, with a 75th percentile of $106,920.
34.3% of production supervisor postings state pay
1,235 of the 3,602 collected postings carried a usable annual figure, 2,366 gave none, and one quoted pay in a currency other than US dollars. How often a production supervisor posting states pay depends heavily on the state. Colorado postings state it 76.9% of the time, Minnesota 65.4% and California 65.3%, while Texas is at 18.9%, Ohio at 22.6%, North Carolina at 23.3% and Wisconsin at 24.9%.
Nationally, postings in the 13 states with pay-transparency laws in force state pay 53.9% of the time against 33.8% elsewhere and pay about 10% more, and across all roles re-weighting by state moves the median by about 1%. For production supervisors it moves it by 2.5%. California supplies 12.8% of the postings with pay (158 of 1,235) but 6.7% of all postings collected (242 of 3,602), so re-weighting roughly halves its pull on the median. States with medians below the as-posted $79,500, such as Ohio, Wisconsin and North Carolina, gain weight.
For the 2,366 postings that give no number, what a DOE listing actually means covers the phrasings employers use instead of a figure.
Posted pay is up 2.6% from a year ago
The comparison with 2025 uses the same titles, the same US filter and the same calendar window, January 1 to early September in each year. In that window the 2025 postings that stated pay had a median of $77,500, and the 2026 postings have $79,500, a rise of 2.6%. Both are as-posted medians, so the $77,500 coverage-adjusted figure for 2026 at the top of this page is a different measure that happens to land on the same number.
The 2.6% change puts the role in PayScope's Balanced market label. Posting counts are not compared across the two years, because collection volume varies too much between months to say anything about hiring.
What production supervisors do, and a 1.8% BLS growth projection
A production supervisor directs the workers on a production line or plant floor and is answerable for meeting production goals safely. O*NET OnLine's profile for first-line supervisors of production and operating workers lists these among the core tasks:
- Plan work schedules, assignments and production sequences to meet production goals
- Read and analyze work orders, production schedules and reports
- Inspect materials, products and equipment for defects
- Enforce safety and sanitation rules
- Keep records of attendance and hours worked
- Coordinate with supervisors in other departments
BLS projects employment of first-line supervisors of production and operating workers to change by 1.8% from 2025 to 2035, with about 61,000 openings a year (Employment Projections, Table 1.2). Employment goes from 679,900 in 2025 to 692,300 in 2035, so growth adds about 12,400 jobs over the decade and most openings come from replacing supervisors who leave the occupation. The same table lists a high school diploma as the typical entry-level education, with less than five years of related work experience.
How production supervisor pay compares with related roles
The medians below are the headline figure on each role's PayScope salary guide, set against $77,500 for production supervisors.
| Role | Median | Data |
|---|---|---|
| General manager | $82,188 | March 2026 dataset |
| Warehouse operations manager | $80,000 | Postings through Aug 31, 2026 |
| HVAC technician | $75,000 | Postings through Aug 31, 2026 |
| Procurement specialist | $70,720 | Postings through Aug 31, 2026 |
| Operations specialist | $57,796 | Postings through Aug 31, 2026 |
| Maintenance technician | $51,802 | Postings through Aug 31, 2026 |
Three posted titles roll into the figures on this page: production supervisor, plant supervisor and manufacturing supervisor.
How these figures were produced
The source is PayScope's collection of US job postings from January 1 to August 31, 2026, deduplicated by posting id. 3,602 postings matched three titles: production supervisor, plant supervisor and manufacturing supervisor. 1,235 stated a usable annual base salary, 2,366 stated no pay, and one was unusable because its pay was not in US dollars.
Only 59 of the 1,235 postings with pay name a level: 16 Entry, 15 Mid, 26 Senior and 2 Lead. Each group is under the 30-posting floor PayScope uses for a published median, so the page reports the role as a whole. The 1,176 postings that state no level have an as-posted median of $79,100, within 0.5% of the role's as-posted $79,500.
The coverage adjustment re-weights each state to its share of all collected postings rather than its share of postings that stated pay, and for this role it lowers the median by 2.5%, from $79,500 to $77,500. Every figure is base pay as the employer wrote it, annualized. Bonuses, overtime and shift differentials are excluded.
The 2026 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. PayScope regenerates the figures monthly with this method.
Frequently asked questions
What is the average production supervisor salary in the US?
The median base salary in US production supervisor job postings is $77,500 a year, coverage-adjusted, from 1,235 postings that stated pay between January 1 and August 31, 2026. Before the state adjustment the median of the same postings is $79,500. PayScope reports the median rather than the mean, so a handful of unusually high or low postings cannot pull the figure.
How much does a production supervisor make per hour?
About $37.26 an hour, which is the coverage-adjusted annual median of $77,500 divided by 2,080 working hours, from postings collected January 1 to August 31, 2026. It is an equivalent, not an hourly rate employers posted. The middle half of postings works out to $33.58 to $41.76 an hour.
How much should a production supervisor be paid?
Half of the US production supervisor postings that stated pay between January 1 and August 31, 2026 offer a base salary between $69,840 and $86,860 a year, coverage-adjusted, with a median of $77,500. Postings titled manufacturing supervisor run higher, at an as-posted median of $85,000. For comparison, BLS puts the May 2025 median for first-line supervisors of production and operating workers at $74,450.
Who gets paid more, a manager or a supervisor?
On PayScope's figures the gap between production supervisors and nearby manager roles is small. Production supervisor postings have a coverage-adjusted median of $77,500 and warehouse operations manager postings $80,000, both from postings collected through August 31, 2026, while the general manager median was $82,188 in PayScope's March 2026 dataset. These are different jobs measured on separate samples, and none of the figures tells you what a move from one to another pays.
Why doesn't this page show production supervisor pay by level?
Few postings state a level. Only 59 of the 1,235 production supervisor postings with pay collected between January 1 and August 31, 2026 name one, and each of Entry, Mid, Senior and Lead falls under the 30-posting floor PayScope uses for a published median. The page reports the role as a whole instead.
Are these production supervisor figures base pay or total compensation?
Base pay only, annualized, as employers posted it in job postings collected January 1 to August 31, 2026. Bonuses, overtime and shift differentials are excluded, so a supervisor who receives any of them earns more in total than the base figures on this page.
What are the responsibilities of a production supervisor?
According to O*NET OnLine, first-line supervisors of production and operating workers plan work schedules and production sequences, read work orders and production reports, inspect materials and products for defects, enforce safety and sanitation rules and keep attendance records. They also coordinate with supervisors in other departments.
How much do production supervisors make in California and Texas?
California production supervisor postings have an as-posted median of $85,000 on 158 postings that stated pay, and Texas $80,000 on 53, both collected January 1 to August 31, 2026. Colorado has the highest median among states with at least 30 postings with pay, at $90,000. Texas postings state pay far less often than California's, 18.9% of the time against 65.3%.