As of April 01, 2025, the average hourly pay of ICU Nurse in the United States is $44. While Salary.com is seeing that the highest pay for ICU Nurse in the US can go up to $52 and the lowest down to $35, but most earn between $39 and $48. Salary.com shows the average base salary (core compensation), as well as the average total cash compensation for the job of ICU Nurse in the United States.
| Annual Salary |
Monthly Pay |
Weekly Pay |
Hourly Wage |
|
| 75th Percentile | $48 | $4 | $1 | $0 |
| Average | $44 | $4 | $1 | $0 |
| 25th Percentile | $39 | $3 | $1 | $0 |
As of April 01, 2025, Salary.com is seeing that an entry-level ICU Nurse with under 1 year experience makes about $87,582. With less than 2 years of experience, a mid-level ICU Nurse makes around $87,875. After 2-4 years, the ICU Nurse pay rises to about $91,516. Those senior ICU Nurse with 5-8 years of experience earn roughly $95,528, and those ICU Nurse having 8 years or more experience is expected to earn about $95,815 on average.
| Levels | Salary |
|---|---|
| Entry Level ICU Nurse | $87,582 |
| Intermediate Level ICU Nurse | $87,875 |
| Senior Level ICU Nurse | $91,516 |
| Specialist Level ICU Nurse | $95,528 |
| Expert Level ICU Nurse | $95,815 |
| Entry Level | 4% |
| Mid Level | 3% |
| Senior Level | 1% |
| Top Level | 5% |
| Experienced | 6% |
Salaries in the United States can vary significantly from state to state due to a multitude of factors, including cost of living, local economic conditions, and industry presence.
For example, as of April 01, 2025, the average yearly salary of ICU Nurse is $100,200 in California and in Massachusetts, the average annual salary goes to $98,800. While in New Jersey, an ICU Nurse earns $98,400 per year.
What Am I Worth?
Salaries in the United States can vary significantly from city to city due to a multitude of factors, including cost of living, local economic conditions, and industry presence.
For example, as of April 01, 2025, the average yearly salary of ICU Nurse in San Francisco, CA is $113,400 and in New York, NY, the average annual salary goes to $105,200. While an ICU Nurse earns $101,300 per year in Boston, MA.
For those exploring the changing dynamics of ICU Nurse salaries, Salary.com offers detailed insights through our Job Trending in CA Labor Market analysis. As of April 01, 2025, our research highlights a notable shift in ICU Nurse compensation over the past six years. For instance, the median salary has moved from $209,336 in 2023 to about $211,584 in 2024 (for a comprehensive analysis of ICU Nurse salary trends, click here). It's crucial to consider several elements, including geographical location, experience level, industry demand, and economic development, as they play a significant role in influencing salary variations.
Salary.com job board provides millions of ICU Nurse information for you to search for. Click on search button below to see ICU Nurse job openings or enter a new job title here.
Here are companies hiring for ICU Nurse and their salaries, click below for more details.
| Core Compensation | ||||
| Core Compensation | Median | % of Total | ||
| Base Salary | $90,800 | 72.4% | ||
| Bonus | $0 | 0.0% | ||
| Value of Benefits | ||||
| Core Compensation | Median | % of Total | ||
| Social Security | $6,946 | 5.5% | ||
| 401K/403B | $4,449 | 3.5% | ||
| Disability | $1,453 | 1.2% | ||
| Healthcare | $6,371 | 5.1% | ||
| Pension | $3,814 | 3.0% | ||
| Time Off | $11,525 | 9.2% | ||
| Total Compensation | $125,357 | 100% | ||
| Degree Level | % of user with this level of education |
|---|---|
| No Diploma | 0.4% |
| High School | 1.6% |
| Associates | 32.0% |
| Bachelors | 59.4% |
| Masters | 6.5% |
| Doctorate | 0.2% |
What Am I Worth?
The ICU Nurse performs various diagnostic tests, administers medications, and develops patient care plans in conjunction with other medical professionals. Provides professional nursing care to assigned patients in the intensive care unit. Being an ICU Nurse observes patients' progress, records observations in patient medical record, and updates attending physician directly when necessary. Assists physicians during examinations and procedures, operating and monitoring medical equipment as necessary. In addition, ICU Nurse requires of graduation from an approved nursing program. Typically reports to a manager or head of a unit/department. Requires a state license to practice. ICU Nurse's years of experience requirement may be unspecified. Certification and/or licensing in the position's specialty is the main requirement.
Specify the abilities and skills that a person needs in order to carry out the specified job duties. Each competency has five to ten behavioral assertions that can be observed, each with a corresponding performance level (from one to five) that is required for a particular job.
Planning: An act or process of making or carrying out plans. Establishment of goals, policies, and procedures for a social or economic unit city planning business planning.
Acute Care: Acute care is a branch of secondary health care where a patient receives active but short-term treatment for a severe injury or episode of illness, an urgent medical condition, or during recovery from surgery. In medical terms, care for acute health conditions is the opposite from chronic care, or longer term care. Acute care services are generally delivered by teams of health care professionals from a range of medical and surgical specialties. Acute care may require a stay in a hospital emergency department, ambulatory surgery center, urgent care centre or other short-term stay facility, along with the assistance of diagnostic services, surgery, or follow-up outpatient care in the community. Hospital-based acute inpatient care typically has the goal of discharging patients as soon as they are deemed healthy and stable. Acute care settings include emergency department, intensive care, coronary care, cardiology, neonatal intensive care, and many general areas where the patient could become acutely unwell and require stabilization and transfer to another higher dependency unit for further treatment.
Basic Life Support: BLS is a level of medical care which is used for patients with life-threatening illnesses or injuries until they can be given full medical care by advanced life support providers. It can be provided by trained medical personnel.
