Professional license costs by state: every license priced in one place

How to compare states that license different trades

Adding up every fee in a state would reward the states we price least: a state with two licenses always looks cheaper than one with nine. So the comparison below works license by license. For each license a state charges, we divide its first-license fees by the median of that license across every state priced, then average those ratios. A score of 100 means the state charges the median on average; 70 means its fees run about 30 percent below; 200 means they run about double. Only fees paid to the state, its exam vendor and its fingerprint vendor count, at a first exam attempt, as read on official pages.

The ranking names only states with at least 5 licenses priced, since a score built on one or two fees says more about those trades than about the state. Ohio and Louisiana sit at the two ends of the full table, but with only 4 licenses priced each.

The cheapest and the most expensive states overall

Florida scores 72 across 7 licenses: real estate $95, cosmetology $90, esthetician $70, insurance agent $152, pharmacy technician $105, notary $39, CDL $75. Maryland (73) and Colorado (75) follow. At the other end, Washington scores 194 over 8 licenses, the highest of any state with at least 5 priced: its $2,156 in combined fees is the largest sum in the table. Connecticut (178) comes next, then North Carolina (156).

Between the two ends, several states with many licenses priced sit close to the median. Pennsylvania scores 101 over 9 licenses, Oklahoma scores 95 over 7 licenses, New York scores 105 over 7 licenses. A score near 100 with many licenses priced is the steadiest reading in the table, because no single trade can pull it far in either direction.

Single fees explain much of a high score. Connecticut charges $570 for a real estate license on top of an application fee of $80, the highest real estate total we price, and Washington's real estate exam alone is $210. The score says nothing about tuition, the largest bill in most trades, nor about the hours of training, which differ far more between trades than between states.

Texas, license by license

Texas is priced for 8 of the 10 licenses; the certified nurse aide (CNA) has not been priced for Texas yet, and the notary public is missing because one fee of a first license could not be read on an official page. The table gives the Texas fees, the rank of Texas among the states priced for each license (1 is cheapest) and the training hours the state requires.

The Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation issues the cosmetology, esthetician, barber and electrician licenses, and its fee structure is similar for the three beauty trades: a $50 application, then a written and a practical exam, both given by PSI and billed separately; the esthetician and barber totals add a student permit. A Texas real estate applicant pays $206 to the commission, $58 for the exam and $37 for fingerprints. The Department of Public Safety charges $97 for the Class A CDL itself.

How many licenses we price in each state

A license enters this site for a state only when every fee of a first license was read on a board page, a state code or the exam vendor's handbook. Insurance agent (life and health) is priced in the most states, 27; journeyman electrician in the fewest, 9. California has the most licenses priced (10), followed by Pennsylvania with 9. The gap between the cheapest and the dearest state is widest for notary public, where Louisiana charges 20 times what Colorado does, and narrowest for certified nurse aide (CNA), at 1.8 times.

A state missing from a row is not necessarily free of that license. Some board websites could not be read, some exam fees were not printed in the handbook we found, and in Alabama, Georgia and Tennessee notary fees are set by probate judges or counties rather than the state. The renewal page adds what each license costs to keep, and the training time page what it takes in hours.