Bachelor's · earnings grade

Is a Physics degree worth it?

Graduates earn a median $43,240 two years after finishing, more than 55% of bachelor's majors. Measured across 792 US programmes by the Department of Education — real graduate pay, not survey answers.

C

The verdict on the money

It pays around the middle. What you earn will depend more on where you study and what you do with it than on the subject label.

Median earnings $43,240 2 years after finishing · per graduate
Typical range $34,847–$48,432 middle half of US programmes
Over no degree +$3,720 vs $39,520 high-school median
Graduates a year 7,710 792 programmes

Where a Physics degree pays best US programmes ranked on their own graduates' median earnings two years out.

#University1 yr out2 yrs out3 yrs outGraduates/yr
1 Massachusetts Institute of Technology cost & debt at this university → not published $84,653 $83,335 79
2 Cornell University cost & debt at this university → $38,630 $74,531 not published 48
3 Northeastern University not published $74,200 not published 27
4 Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute cost & debt at this university → $42,448 $69,338 $79,810 42
5 DePaul University cost & debt at this university → not published $69,338 not published 5
6 University of Notre Dame cost & debt at this university → not published $67,660 not published 32
7 University of Arizona cost & debt at this university → $66,451 $64,791 $59,846 71
8 California Polytechnic State University-San Luis Obispo cost & debt at this university → $30,120 $61,516 $76,364 35
9 Portland State University cost & debt at this university → not published $60,161 not published 18
10 College of the Holy Cross cost & debt at this university → not published $59,417 not published 13
11 California State University-San Marcos cost & debt at this university → not published $57,318 $65,899 16
12 The University of Texas at Dallas cost & debt at this university → not published $57,318 not published 30

What this figure does and does not tell you

Two medians are worth separating. $43,240 is what the typical graduate earns — each programme counted in proportion to how many students it graduates. $41,193 is what the typical programme reports, counting a class of twenty the same as a class of two thousand. The weighted figure is higher here, which means the larger programmes in this field are the better-paying ones.

It is the median of what real graduates of this exact major earned, taken from tax records two years after they completed. It is not a starting salary, not an average of job adverts, and not a projection. The median bachelor's major in this dataset reports $36,497, so Physics sits above the middle by $6,743.

Two years is early in a career. Fields with long training pipelines — medicine, law, research — look weaker at this point than they will at ten, while trades and applied technical fields peak sooner. Read a low figure in a long-pipeline subject as "slow start", not "bad degree".

There is no debt figure here on purpose. The Department of Education publishes earnings by field of study but not borrowing, so nobody can honestly tell you the debt of a specific major. Debt is published per institution — that is where our university cost pages carry it.

Physics at other levels

Master's — $66,207 (B)

Scholarships for Physics students

Whatever the subject pays, the money you do not borrow is the money you keep.

For Chile Students CAS-CONICYT Postdoctoral Fellowship for Int... Gran Sasso Science Institute (GSSI) PhD Scholarship Program 20...
See all Physics scholarships →

Majors that pay more at this level Closest first — useful if you are still choosing.

Business Management — $41,725 Business Administration — $41,937 Business — $42,154 Marketing — $42,154 Systems Science and Theory — $42,425 Agricultural Business and Management — $42,682

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Physics: the questions people ask

How much do Physics graduates earn?
The median bachelor's graduate earns $43,240 two years after finishing (weighting each programme by how many students it graduates), across 93 US programmes that publish the figure. One year out it is $38,470.
Is a Physics degree worth it?
It pays around the middle. What you earn will depend more on where you study and what you do with it than on the subject label. The median graduate earns $3,720 a year more than a US worker whose highest qualification is a high-school diploma.
What is the salary range for Physics?
Half of US programmes report medians between $34,847 and $48,432. Where you study moves this figure more than most applicants expect.
How many people graduate in Physics each year?
About 7,710 students complete a bachelor's in this field each year across 792 US programmes.
Does this include student debt?
No — and deliberately. The Department of Education publishes earnings by field of study but not debt, so any "debt by major" figure you see elsewhere is an estimate. Debt is published per institution, which is why our university pages carry it and this page does not.
All degree grades Highest paying majors Most popular majors University costs & payback

Source: US Department of Education College Scorecard, field-of-study earnings (median earnings of graduates who received federal financial aid, measured 1–3 years after completion). Figures are per major and credential level, pooled across US programmes. Information only, not financial advice.