What to Pay a Psychiatrist
Budgeting for a psychiatrist starts with better data than any other behavioral hire: the Bureau of Labor Statistics has an occupation that is exactly psychiatrists, so no proxy or blended series is involved.
What complicates the number is everything around it.
The federal wage survey counts employees only, while many psychiatrists own their practices; the setting you run moves the median by six figures; and the pay model — salary, productivity incentive, hourly, or contract — is a bigger part of the deal than it is for other clinicians.
This guide gives the May 2025 figures, where they move by setting, and the pay structures the federal rules allow physicians.
At a glance
BLS OEWS May 2025 · all industries
National median (SOC 29-1223)
$281,870
BLS OEWS May 2025 · national
Middle half (P25–P75)
$154,150–$362,740
median, May 2025 · largest setting, 8,680 jobs
Offices of physicians
$299,670
Doximity 2026 · full-time physicians, top-60 metros, 2025 data
Survey average (context)
$350,786
Read the percentiles before the average.
In May 2025 the national median wage for psychiatrists (SOC 29-1223) was $281,870 across 27,980 wage-and-salary jobs, with the middle half between $154,150 (25th percentile) and $362,740 (75th) and a published span running from $84,060 at the 10th percentile to $446,520 at the 90th.
BLS publishes the percentiles but does not explain what drives that wide a spread.
These are employee wages: the survey excludes the self-employed and practice owners, a group that matters more in psychiatry than in most of the roles on this site.
All figures BLS OEWS May 2025, national.
Setting moves the number by six figures, and not in the direction most employers guess.
Among the large settings, offices of physicians paid the highest median ($299,670, 8,680 jobs), followed by psychiatric and substance abuse hospitals ($294,890), hospitals overall ($273,560, 8,050 jobs) and outpatient mental health and substance abuse centers ($272,370).
Offices of mental health practitioners — the setting that pays other behavioral clinicians well — was the lowest large cell for psychiatrists at $217,380 (1,880 jobs).
Two cells are too small to budget from: residential facilities ($314,350, about 330 jobs) and individual and family services ($285,900, 760 jobs).
The pattern differs by occupation, so never assume "hospitals pay more" carries over from other hires.
BLS publishes a state median for 46 of the 51 jurisdictions — none for Alabama, Massachusetts, Montana, North Dakota or Wyoming — and the state-by-state table is on our psychiatrist salary by state page.
Two named national surveys add context the wage survey cannot, because both survey full-time physicians and capture total compensation rather than wages.
Medscape's Psychiatrist Compensation Report 2026 (2025 data, published May 2026) put psychiatrists' average total compensation at $331K, down from $341K the year before — psychiatrists reported a drop of roughly 3% on average — on a modeled survey of 5,916 full-time US practicing physicians across 29-plus specialties, with respondents reporting an average 45-hour week.
Doximity's 2026 report (2025 data) put the psychiatry average at $350,786 from nearly 23,000 surveys of full-time US physicians working at least 40 hours a week in the 60 top metros, regression-adjusted for specialty, metro, gender, years in practice and hours.
Neither survey publishes a psychiatrist-specific respondent count, neither is "the salary," and neither should be blended with the other or with the wage survey.
One Doximity signal is worth noting for budgeting: it ranks psychiatry third of the top ten specialties by demand, based on its recruiting data.
Ways to structure the pay
Fixed salary
Best for: full-time psychiatrists in a practice or program that wants predictable cost and a stable medication-management caseload
A fixed annual amount paid in regular installments.
There is no federal floor to meet: for physicians, the salary-basis and salary-level requirements of the overtime rules do not apply at all (29 CFR 541.304(d)), so the number is set by the market data above and your negotiation, not by a regulation.
Trade-off: You carry the full cost of a slow ramp-up and empty slots, and the psychiatrist has no built-in upside for volume.
When to use: The default for employed psychiatrists; simplest to administer and to explain in an offer.
The exemption physicians get is not shared: therapists, social workers and psychologists must meet the salary-or-fee test — at least $684 a week, the level DOL restored in May 2026, paid on a salary basis or a true fee basis (29 CFR 541.602, 541.605) — to be exempt (29 CFR 541.600(e)).
If your practice employs both, you are running two different pay-rule systems.
Salary plus wRVU productivity incentive
Best for: hospital-employed and larger group settings that want to reward measured clinical output
A base salary plus a dollar amount for each work RVU the physician produces above a threshold.
The work RVU is CMS's relative measure of physician effort per service (42 CFR 414.22); a wRVU plan pays only that work component, at a dollar-per-wRVU rate the employer sets as a contract term.
The CY2026 Medicare work RVUs are your measuring stick: a 90791 diagnostic evaluation carries 3.84, a 99214 established-patient visit 1.92, a 90833 psychotherapy add-on 1.71, a 90837 60-minute psychotherapy 3.78 and a 90853 group session 0.67 (CMS physician fee schedule relative value file RVU26D, released August 2026, national, before locality adjustment).
Trade-off: You must set the threshold and the rate with no public benchmark to check against, and a target that ignores the visit mix — medication management plus add-ons versus 60-minute therapy — will measure different psychiatrists differently.
When to use: When productivity reporting already exists in your billing stack; overkill for a solo hire.
Work RVUs are not dollars and are not what the physician is paid; totals vary by locality (GPCI) and facility setting, and the Medicare conversion factor ($33.5675 or $33.4009 for CY2026) prices the whole fee schedule, not physician pay.
No named public source publishes a psychiatrist dollar-per-wRVU rate — MGMA's psychiatry compensation data is behind a login — so treat any circulating "$X per wRVU" median as unsourced.
One thing that does not move your 2026 measuring stick: CMS's −2.5% CY2026 efficiency adjustment to work RVUs exempts time-based codes, including behavioral health services and E/M visits.
Hourly or per-visit pay
Best for: part-time schedules, telepsychiatry blocks, or coverage roles where the caseload starts thin
Pay for hours worked or visits completed.
Because the salary-basis requirement does not apply to physicians (29 CFR 541.304(d)), a psychiatrist paid hourly or per visit can still be exempt from federal overtime — unlike therapists, social workers and psychologists, who generally lose the exemption without a salary guarantee or a true fee basis.
Trade-off: Payroll rises with volume, and hourly pay gives the psychiatrist less reason to build the schedule to a full panel.
When to use: Evening, weekend and telepsychiatry coverage, and physicians phasing toward retirement.
The practice-of-medicine exemption covers physicians licensed and practicing in the field of medical science and healing (29 CFR 541.304(b)) — confirm with employment counsel before extending it to a role that is not clinical practice, and remember state wage laws add requirements on top of the federal floor.
Independent contractor (1099) or locum tenens
Best for: established psychiatrists with their own practices, or bridging a defined coverage gap
The psychiatrist is paid per shift, per clinic day or a share of collections, and controls how the work is done.
The IRS says doctors who are "in an independent trade, business, or profession in which they offer their services to the general public are generally independent contractors" — but that whether they are contractors or employees "depends on the facts in each case," judged on behavioral control, financial control and the type of relationship; a contract label alone is not sufficient.
No named, dated source publishes locum tenens psychiatry rates, so anchor your number to your own collections per clinic day rather than an industry figure.
Trade-off: No payroll taxes or benefits, but you control far less of the work, and misclassification is expensive: without a reasonable basis for contractor treatment the IRS can collect employment taxes, and the usual relief is unavailable if you have treated substantially similar workers as employees.
When to use: For genuinely independent physicians — a 1099 arrangement for someone whose schedule, supervision and equipment you control is the misclassification pattern.
Under DOL Fact Sheet #13 — the guidance WHD enforces as of May 2025 — neither the medical license nor the mode of pay decides employee versus contractor.
A 2024 DOL rule remains in the Code of Federal Regulations for private lawsuits, DOL no longer applies it in its own investigations, and a proposed replacement (announced February 2026) is not final as of September 2026.
In California, physicians are carved out of the ABC test and judged under the older Borello test (Lab.
Code §2783(b)), a different standard than the one that applies to MFTs, LCSWs, LPCCs, nurse practitioners and behavior analysts there.
The Psychiatrist Hiring Market Right Now
The psychiatrist openings you are competing with, from the 727 active listings on BehavioralHires as of October 29, 2026.
Employers with the most openings
Where the openings are
Pay employers post
- Median $348,500 a year; the middle half of posted pay runs $326,500 to $350,000 (180 listings that state a salary; 103 of them from LifeStance Health)
- 25% of psychiatrist listings state any pay at all, so posting a range helps yours stand out.
Benefits and work arrangement
- 24% remote or telehealth and 51% hybrid; the rest are on-site
- 401k Matchnamed in 58%
- Health Insurancenamed in 54%
- Dental & Visionnamed in 50%
- Flexible Schedulenamed in 41%
- Malpractice Insurance Coverednamed in 23%
Source: active psychiatrist listings on BehavioralHires, updated daily. Pay figures use only listings that state pay (midpoint of each posted range). Benefits count listings that name the benefit; a listing that doesn’t mention one may still offer it.
See the listings →Questions employers ask
How much should I budget for a full-time psychiatrist?
Anchor on the wage survey: the May 2025 national median for psychiatrists (SOC 29-1223) was $281,870, with the middle half between $154,150 and $362,740 (BLS OEWS May 2025) — employee wages that exclude practice owners.
The two named national surveys put average total compensation higher, $331K (Medscape 2026 report, 2025 data) and $350,786 (Doximity 2026 report, 2025 data), because they survey full-time physicians, capture total compensation rather than wages, and are self-reported and modeled; neither is "the salary."
Set your offer against your setting — the large-setting medians ran from $217,380 (offices of mental health practitioners) to $299,670 (offices of physicians) — and your pay model, since a productivity component changes what the base needs to be.
Can I pay a psychiatrist hourly and still treat them as exempt?
Yes, under federal rules.
Physicians are exempt from the salary-basis requirement (29 CFR 541.304(d)), so hourly or per-visit pay does not by itself break the exemption — a meaningful difference from therapists, social workers and psychologists, who must meet the salary-or-fee test (at least $684 a week, restored May 2026, paid on a salary basis or a true fee basis) to be exempt under 29 CFR 541.600(e), 541.602 and 541.605.
The physician must still be licensed and practicing in the field of medical science and healing, and state law can add its own requirements, so confirm the specific arrangement with employment counsel.
What dollar-per-wRVU rate should I offer a psychiatrist?
There is no public benchmark.
MGMA publishes physician compensation and productivity data, but its psychiatry figures are behind a login and its public 2026 page does not say whether psychiatry is among the 23 specialties whose work RVUs fell.
No named public survey publishes a psychiatrist dollar-per-wRVU rate; the rate is a contract term you set.
What you can measure precisely is the work itself: in the CY2026 Medicare relative value file, a 90791 diagnostic evaluation carries 3.84 wRVUs, a 99214 established-patient visit 1.92, and a 90833 psychotherapy add-on 1.71 — which is why psychiatric productivity is usually discussed in E/M-plus-add-on terms.
Do psychiatrists earn more in hospitals or in private practice?
There is no across-the-board answer, and the psychiatrist pattern is its own: in May 2025 the lowest large-setting median was offices of mental health practitioners ($217,380), while offices of physicians paid $299,670, psychiatric and substance abuse hospitals $294,890, hospitals overall $273,560 and outpatient mental health and substance abuse centers $272,370 (all BLS OEWS, SOC 29-1223, national).
Compare against your own setting rather than the all-industry median, and skip two cells that are too small to budget from: residential facilities ($314,350 on about 330 jobs) and individual and family services ($285,900 on 760).
More hiring resources
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Post it on BehavioralHires with the pay model and range stated up front.
This page is career information, not legal or clinical advice, and it is not for someone seeking treatment.