Texas Firefighter Salary 2026: What 180 Departments Pay
Searchable, sortable, and honest about the 33 that publish no certified start.
- Author
- Ready to Serve Editorial
- Updated
- September 3, 2026
- Length
- 22 min read
- Texas
- TCFP
- TMRS
- TLFFRA
- Civil Service
The short answer. There is no single Texas firefighter salary: Alice Fire Department's August 2024 TCFP job posting printed a beginning firefighter salary of $37,633.44 (read 2026-08-12); the city has not published a newer figure. Allen Fire Department publishes Firefighter Paramedic Step 1 at $97,528.75 on the City of Allen FY 2025-26 Fire Pay Plan (effective October 4, 2025, read 2026-08-12). Allen's own NEOGOV bulletin 5046786 printed $97,528.25 for that same step, and this page uses the pay-plan figure rather than combining the two. Denton Fire Fighter step 1 is $86,028.80 on the City of Denton Civil Service Fire Pay Plan FY 2025-2026 (effective 2026-01-03, read 2026-08-11). Confirm the live city document for the department you would work for; the table below is those documents, not a statewide average.
Last verified: 2026-09-03.
This is 180 Texas fire departments, not six off the top of a search result. They are the Career and Mostly career departments whose pay we could verify or partially verify from a primary document. Departments whose pay is not posted anywhere we could find, or that sit behind a portal, a login, or a records request, are not in this table. They are not counted as publishing nothing, because we cannot say that without having found the document. The searchable table lists the 147 that publish a certified starting salary. The thirty-three that publish no certified start are not blank cells inside that table; they are listed with a reason in the gaps section further down. Each row names the document its figures came from, the effective date printed on that document where the city prints one, and the date we opened it. No estimate is ever substituted for a missing figure. No salary aggregator appears anywhere on this page, because an aggregator's number is an average of guesses about a job it cannot name.
If you are deciding whether to do this work, read past the top of the range. Two Texas departments an hour apart routinely start firefighters $20,000 apart, and the reasons are structural: whether the department makes you arrive certified, whether it pays for a paramedic license, which pension system it belongs to, and which metro's labor market it is competing in. All four are worked through below.
For the hiring process itself, start with the pillar guide on becoming a Texas firefighter. For the long-run math on the paramedic decision, see FF/EMT vs FF/Paramedic: which pays more in Texas.
What 180 pay documents actually show
Start with the statewide baseline. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics survey (occupation 33-2011, May 2025) counts 28,170 firefighters employed in Texas at a median annual wage of $60,180, retrieved through the BLS public API series OEUS480000000000033201113 (median) and OEUS480000000000033201101 (employment). Nationally the same survey puts the median at $59,280 across 345,990 firefighters on the OEWS occupation profile (re-read 2026-09-03). Those two measurements are a wage survey of people already working. They are not a starting offer.
That $60,180 is a wage survey of people already working, across every rank and every year of service. The figures in this article are something different and more useful to someone deciding: they are the published entry rate a department will actually pay you on your first day, taken from the schedule the city adopted.
Across the 147 departments that publish one, the median published starting salary for a certified firefighter is $66,461. The middle half runs from $58,337 to $74,010. Twenty-two departments start above $80,000. Ten start below $50,000.
Where the paid fire departments are, and what they start at
Every department in this dataset, placed in its county and coloured by what a certified firefighter starts at.
n = 180 departments, 147 of them publishing a certified starting salary · Sources read August 11, 2026 to August 14, 2026
Certified starting pay
- Under $55,000
- $55,000 to $64,999
- $65,000 to $74,999
- $75,000 and above
- Not published
The table below gives the same figures by region, which is the reading of this map that does not depend on seeing it.
| Region | Departments | With pay | Lowest | Median | Highest |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | 75 | 65 | $61,280 | $73,678 | $97,529 |
| Central Texas | 46 | 39 | $43,390 | $61,676 | $80,790 |
| Greater Houston | 17 | 16 | $53,148 | $66,234 | $84,629 |
| East Texas | 14 | 6 | $55,013 | $55,826 | $67,103 |
| Coastal Bend | 5 | 5 | $37,633 | $50,412 | $53,363 |
| Rio Grande Valley | 5 | 3 | $47,046 | $52,217 | $54,655 |
| Texas Panhandle | 5 | 4 | $46,312 | $55,170 | $80,188 |
| West Texas | 5 | 3 | $38,631 | $58,337 | $58,351 |
| South Texas | 4 | 3 | $39,874 | $55,000 | $77,925 |
| Permian Basin | 2 | 2 | $60,652 | $66,550 | $72,447 |
| Southeast Texas | 2 | 1 | $58,165 | $58,165 | $58,165 |
The geography is the loudest variable in the dataset. The 65 Dallas-Fort Worth departments that publish a starting salary have a median of $73,677.50. The 82 that publish one everywhere else in Texas have a median of $60,140.46. That is a gap of $13,537.04 at hire, for the same certification, in the same state, under the same commission.
Texas firefighter pay, department by department
Three column definitions, because most published comparisons blur roles and the blur is where the misleading numbers come from.
- Starting pay is step 1 for a firefighter who already holds certification on the day of hire. When a department publishes only cadet or academy pay and no certified start, that cadet figure is shown and labeled. When a published cadet rate is more than 10 percent below the certified start, an asterisk on the starting figure discloses both rates (hover, click, or keyboard focus). Cadet pay is a different job at a different rate; it is not a second pay column.
- Top step is the highest step of the firefighter rank, before any promotion to driver, lieutenant, or captain.
- Source is the document title, link, effective date or fiscal year where the city prints one, and the date we read it.
- Every figure is base pay. No overtime, no certification pay, no assignment pay, no education stipend, no ambulance differential.
Open Read the record on any row for cadet pay when it is not asterisked, certification-at-hire policy, paramedic structure, pension system, rank ladder as printed, incentive pay in the unit the city publishes, and the notes that say what the figure does not cover.
Showing 147 of 147 departments that publish a certified starting salary
| Department | Source | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Allen Fire DepartmentAllen · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $97,528.75 | $105,825.47 | City of Allen FY 2025-26 Fire Pay PlanFY 2025-2026 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Grand Prairie Fire DepartmentGrand Prairie · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $88,067 | $105,022 | City of Grand Prairie Fire Department pay scale, as of May 2, 2026May 2, 2026 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Denton Fire DepartmentDenton · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $86,028.80 | $108,014.40 | City of Denton Civil Service Fire Pay Plan FY 2025-2026Jan 3, 2026 · read Aug 11, 2026 |
| McKinney Fire DepartmentMcKinney · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $85,105.56 | $105,787.40 | City of McKinney Fire Step Pay PlanJan 26, 2026 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Coppell Fire DepartmentCoppell · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $84,975 | $103,385.20 | FY25-26 Fire Step PlanOct 1, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Baytown Fire DepartmentBaytown · Greater Houston | $84,629 | $104,103 | City of Baytown Fire & EMS Salary and Benefits pageread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Mesquite Fire DepartmentMesquite · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $83,868.62 | not published | City of Mesquite fire pay plan FY 2025-26Jan 1, 2026 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Haltom City Fire/RescueHaltom City · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex · partial record | $82,754 | not published | City recruiting page "Become a Haltom City Firefighter"read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Frisco Fire DepartmentFrisco · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $82,568 | $90,282 | City of Frisco Fire Pay Plan FY 2026Dec 29, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Garland Fire DepartmentGarland · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $82,478 | $100,214 | FY 2025-26 Civil Service Ordinance No. 7682Oct 1, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Channelview Fire DepartmentChannelview · Greater Houston · partial record | $82,089.72 | not published | Official Paylocity postingread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Lewisville Fire DepartmentLewisville · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $82,034 | $103,641 | City of Lewisville FY 2025-2026 Sworn Fire Pay PlanOct 1, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| University Park Fire DepartmentDallas · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex · partial record | $81,991 | $99,640 | City of University Park, Join the Team, compensation sectionread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Waxahachie Fire-RescueWaxahachie · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $81,934.85 | $99,686.27 | City Salary & Benefits recruitment pageread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Addison Fire DepartmentAddison · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $81,915.47 | $101,322.22 | 2026 Step Pay Planread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Flower Mound Fire DepartmentFlower Mound · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $81,742.96 | $100,511.32 | FY 25-26 Step Plan for Sworn Fire EmployeesFY 2025-2026 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| The Colony Fire DepartmentThe Colony · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $81,702.43 | $97,565 | City of The Colony 2025-26 Fire Department step planread Aug 12, 2026 |
| North Richland Hills Fire DepartmentNorth Richland Hills · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $81,565 | $96,402 | Sworn Fire Pay PlanApr 1, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Richardson Fire DepartmentRichardson · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $81,476 | $104,051 | City of Richardson Public Safety Payplan (online transparency export)read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Plano Fire-RescuePlano · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $80,862 | not published | City of Plano Fire Civil Service Compensation Plan FY 2025-26Oct 1, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Killeen Fire DepartmentKilleen · Central Texas | $80,790.11 | not published | City of Killeen Fire Pay Plan FY26Oct 1, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Plainview Fire/EMS DepartmentPlainview · Texas Panhandle · partial record | $80,188 | $87,123 | Civil Service departmentread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Carrollton Fire RescueCarrollton · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $79,571.08 | $101,879.55 | City of Carrollton Civil Service pay planSep 20, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| The Woodlands Fire DepartmentThe Woodlands · Greater Houston | $79,545 | $92,138.09 | The Woodlands Township 2026 Fire Suppression Pay PlanJan 1, 2026 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Heath Department of Public SafetyHeath · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $79,090.33 | $99,980.18 | NeoGov Public Safety Officer postingread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Arlington Fire DepartmentArlington · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $78,990.46 | not published | City of Arlington FY 2026 Step Plan (2912/2080)Oct 1, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Euless Fire DepartmentEuless · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $78,677 | $101,250 | Official City of Euless job boardread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Laredo Metro Fire DepartmentLaredo · South Texas | $77,925.07 | $81,414.89 | Collective Bargaining Agreement, City of Laredo and Firefighters Local 872, Article 15 Annual Base PayOct 1, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| DeSoto Fire RescueDeSoto · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $77,468.18 | $92,265.84 | FY 2026 Fire pay structureOct 1, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Lancaster Fire DepartmentLancaster · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $76,913 | $89,556 | City DocumentCenter recruiting flyer for Fire Entrance Exam 12/20/2025read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Grapevine Fire DepartmentGrapevine · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $76,707.07 | $93,217.07 | City NeoGov recruiting postingread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Round Rock Fire DepartmentRound Rock · Central Texas | $76,529 | not published | City of Round Rock Fire Department recruiting page, benefits and compensation sectionread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Cedar Hill Fire DepartmentCedar Hill · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $75,411 | $94,781 | Recruiting flyer: six-step pay planOct 1, 2024 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Fairview Fire & RescueFairview · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $75,109 | $95,554 | Town of Fairview GovernmentJobs Firefighter/Paramedic postingread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Forney Fire DepartmentForney · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $74,826.34 | $95,499.48 | CITY OF FORNEY FIRE PAY STRUCTUREread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Burleson Fire DepartmentBurleson · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $74,450 | $94,311.03 | Become a Firefighter recruiting pageread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Azle Fire DepartmentAzle · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex · partial record | $74,010 | $102,103 | City of Azle Employment Opportunities listing Full-Time Firefighter/Paramedicread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Sugar Land Fire - EMS DepartmentSugar Land · Greater Houston | $73,994 | $99,852 | City of Sugar Land Public Safety Salary Structures FY26Jan 3, 2026 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Bedford Fire DepartmentBedford · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $73,958 | $93,514 | City Career Opportunitiesread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Duncanville Fire DepartmentDuncanville · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $73,910 | $95,972 | City recruitment salary tableread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Highland Park Department of Public SafetyHighland Park · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $73,677.50 | $131,063.40 | HPDPS Salary & Benefits for 2024read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Galveston Fire DepartmentGalveston · Greater Houston | $73,046 | $85,761 | City of Galveston Fire Employment "Why Apply?" compensation tableread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Prosper Fire DepartmentProsper · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $73,000 | $87,165.82 | TOWN OF PROSPER FIRE STEP PAY PLANread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Trophy Club Fire DepartmentTrophy Club · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $72,537.72 | not published | Compensation Pay Planread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Odessa Fire RescueOdessa · Permian Basin · partial record | $72,447 | not published | City of Odessa ApplicantPro Firefighter EMT/Paramedic posting 3988617read Aug 13, 2026 |
| Cleburne Fire DepartmentCleburne · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $72,093.80 | not published | Entry notice benefits blockread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Keller Fire-RescueKeller · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $71,868 | $84,157 | City HR firefighter employment + TCFP hiring flyer step tableread Aug 12, 2026 |
| New Braunfels Fire DepartmentNew Braunfels · Central Texas | $71,825 | $94,289 | FY 2025-2026 Fire Department Step Plan + Training & Recruiting compensation tabFY 2025-2026 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Saginaw Fire DepartmentSaginaw · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $71,574 | $89,976 | City of Saginaw firefighter/paramedic hiring flyer, filed with the Texas Commission on Fire Protection, January 2024read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Ovilla Fire DepartmentOvilla · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex · partial record | $71,500 | not published | City of Ovilla Firefighter/EMT-Basic job posting filedread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Williamson County Emergency Services District #4Liberty Hill · Central Texas | $71,400 | $82,727 | Official job opening Firefighter/EMTread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Temple Fire & RescueTemple · Central Texas | $70,971 | $82,365 | Public Safety Pay Chart FY26Sep 26, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Mansfield Fire RescueMansfield · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $70,838.25 | $90,409.55 | Public Safety Step PlanSep 23, 2024 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Corsicana Fire DepartmentCorsicana · Central Texas | $70,720 | not published | City Employment / Fire recruiting salary tableread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Leander Fire DepartmentLeander · Central Texas | $70,695 | $99,877 | City of Leander Fire Department Step PlanJun 28, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Glenn Heights Fire DepartmentGlenn Heights · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex · partial record | $70,555 | $77,250 | FY2025 Salary Plan civilian gradesFY 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Roanoke Fire DepartmentRoanoke · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $70,553.60 | $77,608.96 | Public Safety Pay Plan FY 24.25FY 2024 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Kennedale Fire DepartmentKennedale · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $70,096 | not published | Kennedale FD TCFP hiring flyerOct 1, 2024 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Murphy Fire RescueMurphy · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $70,001.57 | $93,514.62 | City of Murphy Fire Pay PlanOct 1, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Southlake Department of Public SafetySouthlake · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $69,813.88 | $83,776.65 | FY 2026 DPS Pay PlanFY 2026 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Little Elm Fire DepartmentLittle Elm · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $69,118 | $77,090 | FY '25 Fire Pay Planread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Waco Fire DepartmentWaco · Central Texas | $69,014.27 | not published | City of Waco Fire Fighter job postingread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Cedar Park Fire DepartmentCedar Park · Central Texas | $68,962 | $95,681 | Fire Pay Plan FY25FY 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Crowley Fire DepartmentCrowley · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $68,357.20 | $91,834 | City of Crowley Public Safety Step Planread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Pearland Fire DepartmentPearland · Greater Houston | $68,300 | $86,520.40 | City of Pearland FY 2025 Fire Operations Pay PlanOct 1, 2024 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Rosenberg Fire DepartmentRosenberg · Greater Houston | $68,257.28 | $95,542.72 | City of Rosenberg Compensation Planread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Rowlett Fire RescueRowlett · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $68,226.30 | $75,243.90 | Public Safety Step Plan FY2024-2025FY 2024-2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Farmers Branch Fire DepartmentFarmers Branch · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex · partial record | $67,686.48 | $81,686.96 | https://www.governmentjobs.com/careers/farmersbranch/jobs/newprint/3105133read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Humble Fire RescueHumble · Greater Houston | $67,329 | $90,485 | Humble Fire Rescue hiring flyer filedread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Pilot Point Fire DepartmentPilot Point · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex · partial record | $67,256.86 | not published | City NeoGov Firefighter/Paramedic postingread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Denison Fire DepartmentDenison · East Texas | $67,103.40 | $77,791.23 | City of Denison NEOGOV Firefighter postingread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Travis County Emergency Services District #9 (Westlake Fire Department)West Lake Hills · Central Texas | $66,695 | $105,059 | Adopted Pay ScaleOct 1, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Lake Cities Fire DepartmentCorinth · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $66,574.79 | $87,347.09 | City of Corinth Fire Pay Scheduleread Aug 12, 2026 |
| San Marcos Fire DepartmentSan Marcos · Central Texas | $66,461 | $92,998 | 2023–2026 Meet & Confer Attachment AOct 1, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Rockwall Fire DepartmentRockwall · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex · partial record | $66,309 | $80,641 | City NeoGov Firefighter/EMT postingread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Wylie Fire DepartmentWylie · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex · partial record | $66,030.80 | not published | City Fire career page "Pay Scale"read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Watauga Fire DepartmentWatauga · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $65,597 | $78,326 | CITY OF WATAUGA STEP PLAN - FIRE DEPARTMENTFY 2024-2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Sachse Fire RescueSachse · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $65,190 | $69,833.16 | City of Sachse – Fire Pay Plan FY25FY 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| West University Place Fire DepartmentWest University Place · Greater Houston | $65,139.38 | $87,541.89 | Department recruiting flyer / TCFP-hosted job postingread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Forest Hill Fire DepartmentForest Hill · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex · partial record | $65,054.08 | not published | Forest Hill FD hiring flyerread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Hillsboro Department of Public SafetyHillsboro · Central Texas | $65,000 | not published | City NeoGov live postingsread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Conroe Fire DepartmentConroe · Greater Houston | $64,920 | $82,598 | Civil Service career-paths + benefits pagesread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Midlothian Fire DepartmentMidlothian · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex · partial record | $64,903.80 | $88,329.80 | City NeoGov job bulletin Firefighterread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Wilmer Fire DepartmentWilmer · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex · partial record | $64,704 | not published | TCFP job flyerread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Lake Worth Fire DepartmentLake Worth · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $64,600 | $81,740 | City Fire Hiring & Recruitment pageread Aug 12, 2026 |
| City of Terrell Fire DepartmentTerrell · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $64,480 | $80,353.81 | FY 2025 Firefighter Compensation PlanFY 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Bryan Fire DepartmentBryan · Central Texas | $64,297 | $85,176 | City of Bryan Fire Department recruiting page, compensation sectionread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Travis County ESD No. 12 (Manor Volunteer Fire Department)Manor · Central Texas | $64,239 | $72,679 | TCESD 12 Careersread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Missouri City Fire & Rescue ServicesMissouri City · Greater Houston | $64,104 | not published | Official NEOGOV entry postingread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Colleyville Fire DepartmentColleyville · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex · partial record | $64,062 | not published | City NEOGOV job bulletin opening 02/01/2024 – closing 03/08/2024read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Driftwood Fire DepartmentDriftwood · Central Texas | $63,896.30 | not published | TCFP job posting Posting Date 1/17/2025, closing 3/3/2025. Serves Driftwood / Dripping Springs arearead Aug 12, 2026 |
| Harker Heights Fire DepartmentHarker Heights · Central Texas | $63,773.84 | not published | City of Harker Heights NeoGov job Fire07.30.2025read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Bellaire Fire DepartmentBellaire · Greater Houston | $62,363.29 | $84,190.44 | City of Bellaire General Pay PlanFY 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Hutto Fire/RescueHutto · Central Texas | $62,000 | $146,521.19 | Hutto Fire Rescue Adopted Pay Scale (2023)2023 · read Aug 14, 2026 |
| Pantego Fire DepartmentPantego · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex · partial record | $62,000 | not published | Town job board listingread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Red Oak Fire DepartmentRed Oak · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex | $61,983 | $75,412 | Official hiring flyer / DocumentCenter View/6097read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Fate Department of Public SafetyFate · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex · partial record | $61,904.27 | $80,771.03 | City NeoGov Public Safety Officer postingread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Travis County Emergency Services District No. 2Pflugerville · Central Texas | $61,880 | not published | Official Compensation and Benefits pageread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Leon Valley Fire DepartmentLeon Valley · Central Texas | $61,846 | $74,215 | Compensation Pay PlanOct 1, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Schertz Fire DepartmentSchertz · Central Texas | $61,676 | $81,161 | Public Safety Pay TableOct 4, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Wichita Falls Fire DepartmentWichita Falls · Texas Panhandle | $61,405.34 | $81,111.89 | City of Wichita Falls Fire Pay Schedule 2025-2026 (10% COLA)Sep 20, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Richland Hills Fire/RescueRichland Hills · Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex · partial record | $61,280 | $65,012 | City hiring flyer PDFread Aug 12, 2026 |
| La Marque Fire DepartmentLa Marque · Greater Houston · partial record | $60,869.72 | $87,000 | City of La Marque Careersread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Seguin Fire DepartmentSeguin · Central Texas | $60,712.74 | $83,693.19 | City of Seguin Fire Department Step Planread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Midland Fire DepartmentMidland · Permian Basin | $60,652 | not published | City of Midland Salary and Compensationread Aug 13, 2026 |
| Gainesville Fire DepartmentGainesville · East Texas | $60,330.92 | not published | Firefighter Pay Plan FY 2025-2026Oct 1, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Lockhart Fire RescueLockhart · Central Texas | $59,950 | $69,616 | Civil Service Step PlanOct 1, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Travis County Emergency Services District #1Lago Vista · Central Texas | $59,230.08 | $82,001.92 | Pay Scale Approved January 1, 2026read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Montgomery County Emergency Service District #3Montgomery · Greater Houston | $59,060 | not published | Official hiring flyerread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Big Spring Fire DepartmentBig Spring · West Texas | $58,350.76 | $64,556 | Civil Service Notice of Examination Oct 24, 2025read Aug 12, 2026 |
| City of Sweetwater Fire DepartmentSweetwater · West Texas · partial record | $58,336.67 | $62,822.91 | City NeoGov posting Firefighter/EMTread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Orange Fire DepartmentOrange · Southeast Texas | $58,165 | $72,105 | City of Orange Jobsread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Bulverde Spring Branch Emergency ServicesSpring Branch · Central Texas | $58,000 | not published | TCFP job posting applications through Apr 22, 2024read Aug 12, 2026 |
| City of Horseshoe Bay Fire DepartmentHorseshoe Bay · Central Texas | $57,337 | $86,004 | City salary tableOct 1, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Live Oak Fire DepartmentLive Oak · Central Texas | $57,128 | $68,132 | City Fire Department Recruitment pageread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Hewitt Fire DepartmentHewitt · Central Texas | $57,032 | not published | City Recruitment page rates as of 2025-10-01read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Copperas Cove Fire DepartmentCopperas Cove · Central Texas | $57,000 | $72,500 | City Firefighter Recruitment pageread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Belton Fire DepartmentBelton · Central Texas | $56,490 | $74,121 | City of Belton Fire Department Pay ScaleFY 2026 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Athens Fire / RescueAthens · East Texas | $56,452.25 | not published | City of Athens News Flash, Entry-Level Fire Fighter Exam, posted September 10, 2025read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Shavano Park Fire Department/ EMSShavano Park · Central Texas | $55,998 | not published | TCFP job posting applications due Oct 11, 2024read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Nacogdoches Fire DepartmentNacogdoches · East Texas · partial record | $55,200 | not published | TCFP job postingread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Marshall Fire DepartmentMarshall · East Texas | $55,148.66 | not published | City of Marshall "Join Our Team" salary informationread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Van Alstyne Fire DepartmentVan Alstyne · East Texas | $55,013 | not published | City of Van Alstyne TCFP Job Posting 2024-11-25read Aug 12, 2026 |
| La Salle County Fire RescueCotulla · South Texas | $55,000 | not published | TCFP/dept posting 02/09/2024read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Weslaco Fire DepartmentWeslaco · Rio Grande Valley | $54,655 | not published | Official ApplicantPro firefighter postingread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Webster Fire DepartmentWebster · Greater Houston · partial record | $54,269.39 | not published | City of Webster job posting Firefighterread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Port Lavaca Fire DepartmentPort Lavaca · Coastal Bend | $53,363 | $72,039 | Revised City Compensation Plan recommendedMay 1, 2025 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Selma Fire DepartmentSelma · Central Texas | $53,328.27 | not published | City of Selma job board Firefighter/EMTread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Freeport Fire and EMS DepartmentFreeport · Greater Houston · partial record | $53,148 | not published | City of Freeport Fire-EMS / FreeportHR recruiting postsread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Mission Fire DepartmentMission · Rio Grande Valley | $52,217.36 | not published | Salary and Incentive Pay Plan 2025–2026read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Kirby Fire DepartmentKirby · Central Texas · partial record | $52,128 | not published | City employment flyersread Aug 12, 2026 |
| City of Helotes Fire DepartmentHelotes · Central Texas · partial record | $51,000 | $58,195 | City ApplicantPro postingread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Kingsville Fire DepartmentKingsville · Coastal Bend · partial record | $51,000 | not published | City GovernmentJobs Entry Level Firefighter posting Job 202600016 open 01/06/2026–01/27/2026FY 2025-2026 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Stephenville Fire DepartmentStephenville · Central Texas | $51,000 | not published | Official hiring flyer + TCFP job postingread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Hollywood Park Fire DepartmentHollywood Park · Central Texas | $50,855 | not published | Official Town hiring PDFsread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Victoria Fire DepartmentVictoria · Coastal Bend · partial record | $50,412 | $62,000 | City of Victoria NEOGOV Firefighter/EMT postingread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Navasota Fire DepartmentNavasota · Central Texas | $50,127 | $56,963 | City of Navasota NeoGov Firefighter/Driver job 202500007read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Vernon Fire/EMSVernon · Texas Panhandle · partial record | $48,934 | not published | Official city hiring PDF "Now Hiring – Vernon Fire / EMS"read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Mexia Fire DeparmentMexia · Central Texas · partial record | $48,553 | not published | TCFP job posting 2024-05-08read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Edinburg Fire DepartmentEdinburg · Rio Grande Valley | $47,045.62 | not published | Edinburg Fire Department Civil Service Compensation PlanOct 14, 2024 · read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Pampa Fire DepartmentPampa · Texas Panhandle | $46,312 | $50,392 | Official Fire Department Recruitment pageread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Aransas Pass Fire DepartmentAransas Pass · Coastal Bend | $45,450 | not published | Official city hiring flyerread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Marlin Fire DepartmentMarlin · Central Texas · partial record | $44,700 | not published | TCFP-hosted City of Marlin career announcement posted June 4, 2024read Aug 12, 2026 |
| Lampasas Fire DepartmentLampasas · Central Texas · partial record | $43,390.46 | not published | Lampasas FD F/T Firefighter/EMT hiring flyerread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Del Rio Fire DepartmentDel Rio · South Texas · partial record | $39,873.60 | not published | TCFP civil-service job postingread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Graham Fire RescueGraham · West Texas · partial record | $38,630.80 | not published | TCFP job posting PDF for Firefighter/EMTread Aug 12, 2026 |
| Alice Fire DepartmentAlice · Coastal Bend | $37,633.44 | not published | City recruiting PDFread Aug 12, 2026 |
Dataset covers 180 departments (120 verified, 60 partial). The table lists the 147 that publish a certified starting salary. The 33 with no certified start live in the gaps section below. Sources read Aug 11, 2026 and Aug 13, 2026. Texas pay plans change every budget cycle and hiring bulletins close. Confirm the current rate with the department before you make a career or relocation decision on it.
Is the offer in front of you normal?
A single number tells you nothing until you know what it sits next to. Sixty-six thousand dollars is above the median in Central Texas and near the bottom of the Dallas-Fort Worth field. The distribution below is the answer to the only question that matters when a department calls you back.
What a normal Texas starting salary looks like
How many departments start a certified firefighter in each $5,000 band, so an offer can be read against the state rather than against a guess.
n = 147 of 180 departments, the ones publishing a certified starting salary · Sources read August 11, 2026 to August 14, 2026
| Starting salary band | Departments | Share of the 147 |
|---|---|---|
| $35,000 to $39,999 | 3 | 2.0% |
| $40,000 to $44,999 | 2 | 1.4% |
| $45,000 to $49,999 | 5 | 3.4% |
| $50,000 to $54,999 | 13 | 8.8% |
| $55,000 to $59,999 | 18 | 12.2% |
| $60,000 to $64,999 | 25 | 17.0% |
| $65,000 to $69,999 | 22 | 15.0% |
| $70,000 to $74,999 | 25 | 17.0% |
| $75,000 to $79,999 | 12 | 8.2% |
| $80,000 to $84,999 | 18 | 12.2% |
| $85,000 to $89,999 | 3 | 2.0% |
| $90,000 to $94,999 | 0 | 0.0% |
| $95,000 to $99,999 | 1 | 0.7% |
The five largest departments in Texas are not in that table
Houston, Dallas, San Antonio, Austin, and Fort Worth employ more firefighters between them than the bottom hundred departments in the table combined, and none of them are in it. That is not an oversight. Each of those cities sets firefighter pay through a collective bargaining agreement or a civil service schedule that the 180-row collection did not carry. The dollars below come from each department's published pay document. Where the city lists an older figure next to the current schedule, both are named. They are two different numbers.
| Department | Published figures | What the figures are | Document |
|---|---|---|---|
| Houston Fire Department | fire-careers: $37,388 trainee, $54,207 probationary, $58,738 year 1. HR sibling lists trainee $36,000. The two disagree. | posted schedule, Beginning 07/8/2023, which predates the city's 2024 firefighter agreement | HFD fire-careers compensation, re-read 2026-09-03; HR sibling, re-read 2026-09-03 |
| Dallas Fire-Rescue | 2026 schedule: $78,924 market-survey start, $81,232 year 0-1, $102,304 year 9. NEOGOV T44100-FY26 and DFR benefits list $75,397. The two disagree. | adopted Uniformed Fire Rescue Salary Schedule versus the posting and benefits page | 2026 Uniformed Fire Rescue Salary Schedule, effective 2026-01-01, read 2026-08-19; NEOGOV T44100-FY26, read 2026-08-19 |
| Austin Fire Department | $46,904 cadet ($22.55 per hour); $66,019 probationary firefighter after academy | academy pay, then post-academy | AFD cadet employment page, read 2026-08-30 |
| Fort Worth Fire Department | FY2026 schedule: $39,915 trainee, $69,790 after academy, $97,016 at step 11. Recruiting lists $67,000 after graduation and $95,000 top. The FY 2024-2025 projection file lists $67,757 start and $94,190 top. The three disagree. | current civil service schedule versus the recruiting page and the superseded projection file | FY2026 fire salary schedule, effective first full pay period after 2025-10-01, read 2026-08-19; Firefighter Trainee Information, read 2026-08-19 |
| San Antonio Fire Department | Wages & Benefits, monthly as printed: Fire Cadet $3,853.66; probationary firefighter through the 18th month $5,348; 19th through 60th month $5,913; beginning 61st month $6,021. The June 15, 2026 trainee announcement prints cadet pay at $3,853.70. The two cadet cells disagree by four cents. | monthly schedule reached from the recruiting site's salary tile, plus the dated announcement. The city prints monthly; this page does not annualize those cells. | SAFD careers site salary tile, re-read 2026-09-03; Wages & Benefits, re-read 2026-09-03; 2026 Firefighter Trainee Written Examination Announcement, dated June 15, 2026, read 2026-09-03 |
Houston's posted schedule is the one to be most careful with. It predates the city's 2024 settlement with its firefighters, which made an earlier 18 percent increase permanent, added 10 percent on July 1, 2024, and raises pay by up to 34 percent through 2029, per the city's own announcement of the financial terms. Current Houston pay is meaningfully above the posted 2023 rates. The city has not posted the new table.
El Paso is a sixth case: it sits with the thirty-three that publish no certified start, not as a blank row in the main pay table. The department's employment page describes the hiring process and the trainee paths and carries no salary schedule, and no city pay plan for the fire service was found. That absence is recorded with a reason in the gaps section below.
What happens after step 1
A starting salary is the least interesting number on a fire department pay plan. Ninety-three of the 180 departments publish a top step for the firefighter rank. Thirty-two print a dollar on at least one named rank, including firefighter and cadet steps. Seventy-six name a rank ladder. Seven publish how many years it takes to reach top step.
The ladders below are printed as each department prints them. They are not normalized into a common shape, because the shape is the information.
| Department | Firefighter | Driver or engineer | Lieutenant | Captain | Chief officer |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bryan | $64,297 (Firefighter) | $76,527 (Fire Apparatus Operator) | $92,223 (Lieutenant) | no such rank | $111,180 (Battalion Chief) |
| Denton | $86,028.80 (Fire Fighter) | $111,259.20 (Fire Driver) | $123,905.60 (Fire Lieutenant) | $135,470.40 (Fire Captain) | $154,356.80 (Fire Battalion Chief) |
| Irving (monthly, as published) | $7,263 (Firefighter) | $8,992 (Fire Equipment Operator) | $9,868 (Fire Lieutenant) | $10,947 (Fire Captain) | $12,085 (Fire Battalion Chief) |
| Laredo Metro | $77,925.07 (Firefighter) | $91,947.54 (Driver) | no such rank | $104,739.41 (Captain) | $122,446.62 (District Chief) |
| Lewisville | $82,034 (Firefighter) | $112,133 (Driver/Engineer) | no such rank | $129,822 (Fire Captain) | $151,389 (Battalion Chief / Division Chief) |
| Richardson | $81,476 (Fire Fighter) | $107,165 (Driver/Engineer) | no such rank | $126,782 (Fire Captain) | $147,523 (Battalion Fire Chief) |
| Sugar Land | $73,994 (Firefighter) | $86,719 (Fire Engineer / Operator) | $111,966 (Fire Lieutenant) | $125,274 (Fire Captain) | $140,562 (Battalion Chief) |
Departments are listed alphabetically, not ranked. Each ladder is the entry figure for that rank on the department's own plan. The document behind every row is named in that department's row in the table above. Verified 2026-08-13.
Look at the Lieutenant column. Thirty-seven of the 76 named ladders carry a Lieutenant rank. The other 39 do not. Lewisville and Laredo Metro are two of those: they print a driver or engineer rank and then captain, with no Lieutenant. This matters to you in two places: how many promotional exams stand between you and a company officer's pay, and how the pension multiplier lands on your final rank. Laredo also splits the driver step in two, Assistant Driver at $87,687.78 and Driver at $91,947.54, which is a rank most Texas departments do not have.
The other thing the ladders show is where the money actually is. At Richardson the step from firefighter to driver is worth $25,689 a year. The largest paramedic stipend published anywhere on this page is Baytown's $500 a month, which is $6,000 a year. One promotion is worth more than four of those. On every ladder here that publishes both, the first promotion moves more money than any certification stipend in this dataset.
Starting pay is not the number that matters most
Every department that publishes both a starting step and a top step, plotted against the line where the two would be equal.
n = 93 of 180 departments, the ones publishing both a starting and a top step · Sources read August 11, 2026 to August 14, 2026
| Across the 93 | Starting step | Top step | Climb |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lowest | $46,312 | $50,392 | 4.5% |
| 25th percentile | $62,363 | $80,354 | 17.4% |
| Median | $69,814 | $87,347 | 24.3% |
| 75th percentile | $76,913 | $96,402 | 31.3% |
| Highest | $97,529 | $146,521 | 136.3% |
Why two departments an hour apart pay $20,000 apart
Certification at hire, and why the usual rule of thumb does not survive the data
The conventional advice is that departments requiring certification at hire pay more, because you arrived trained and they skipped the academy cost. The full dataset does not support that as stated.
Twenty-five of the 180 departments state that certification is required at hire. Forty-two state that it is not, and run an academy. One hundred thirteen do not state it at all. Among the departments that both state a policy and publish a starting salary, the ones requiring certification have a median start of $58,530 (24 departments) and the ones not requiring it have a median start of $70,707.50 (36 departments). That is the opposite of the rule of thumb.
The honest reading is that the requirement tracks department capacity, not generosity. A small city that cannot run an academy requires certification because it has no other way to staff an engine, and it is also a small city, which is why Alice, Hollywood Park, and Vernon sit near the bottom of the range. A large suburb that pays $85,000 usually does not print a certification policy in its pay plan at all, so it lands in the 113. The comparison is confounded, the confound is not fixable with the data published, and no conclusion should be drawn from those two medians in either direction.
What is true, and what the Texas Commission on Fire Protection governs, is that structural firefighter certification is the gate. Whether you pay for it or the department does, you do not run calls in Texas without it. The TCFP basic fire suppression path is the same standard either way, and civil service and non-civil service departments differ in how they test you, not in whether you need the certificate.
What a certification is worth on day one
The departments that publish both a cadet rate and a certified-hire rate, and the distance between the two.
n = 45 of 180 departments, the ones publishing both figures · Sources read August 11, 2026 to August 14, 2026
Marks
- Cadet or recruit rate
- Certified at hire
| Department | Cadet or recruit | Certified at hire | Premium |
|---|---|---|---|
| Corsicana Fire Department | $44,106 | $70,720 | $26,614 |
| Lancaster Fire Department | $51,453 | $76,913 | $25,460 |
| Rosenberg Fire Department | $45,843.20 | $68,257.28 | $22,414.08 |
| Odessa Fire Rescue | $52,804 | $72,447 | $19,643 |
| Saginaw Fire Department | $52,537 | $71,574 | $19,037 |
| Killeen Fire Department | $62,481.33 | $80,790.11 | $18,308.78 |
| Laredo Metro Fire Department | $63,126.37 | $77,925.07 | $14,798.70 |
| Midland Fire Department | $48,046 | $60,652 | $12,606 |
| DeSoto Fire Rescue | $65,184.70 | $77,468.18 | $12,283.48 |
| North Richland Hills Fire Department | $69,722 | $81,565 | $11,843 |
| Round Rock Fire Department | $65,045 | $76,529 | $11,484 |
| Forney Fire Department | $63,602.39 | $74,826.34 | $11,223.95 |
| Mission Fire Department | $42,000 | $52,217.36 | $10,217.36 |
| Nacogdoches Fire Department | $45,000 | $55,200 | $10,200 |
| Kennedale Fire Department | $60,000 | $70,096 | $10,096 |
| San Marcos Fire Department | $56,492 | $66,461 | $9,969 |
| Temple Fire & Rescue | $61,077 | $70,971 | $9,894 |
| Cedar Park Fire Department | $59,962 | $68,962 | $9,000 |
| Wichita Falls Fire Department | $52,486.72 | $61,405.34 | $8,918.62 |
| Watauga Fire Department | $57,000 | $65,597 | $8,597 |
| Coppell Fire Department | $77,250 | $84,975 | $7,725 |
| Richardson Fire Department | $73,864 | $81,476 | $7,612 |
| Galveston Fire Department | $65,465 | $73,046 | $7,581 |
| Big Spring Fire Department | $51,044.76 | $58,350.76 | $7,306 |
| Cedar Hill Fire Department | $68,340 | $75,411 | $7,071 |
| Crowley Fire Department | $61,505.60 | $68,357.20 | $6,851.60 |
| Plano Fire-Rescue | $74,182 | $80,862 | $6,680 |
| Del Rio Fire Department | $34,382.40 | $39,873.60 | $5,491.20 |
| Gainesville Fire Department | $54,846.22 | $60,330.92 | $5,484.70 |
| Edinburg Fire Department | $41,686.27 | $47,045.62 | $5,359.35 |
| Leander Fire Department | $65,695 | $70,695 | $5,000 |
| Garland Fire Department | $77,575 | $82,478 | $4,903 |
| McKinney Fire Department | $80,850.28 | $85,105.56 | $4,255.28 |
| Flower Mound Fire Department | $77,664.08 | $81,742.96 | $4,078.88 |
| The Woodlands Fire Department | $75,757.14 | $79,545 | $3,787.86 |
| Cleburne Fire Department | $68,660.76 | $72,093.80 | $3,433.04 |
| Grapevine Fire Department | $73,411.07 | $76,707.07 | $3,296 |
| Travis County ESD No. 12 (Manor Volunteer Fire Department) | $61,027 | $64,239 | $3,212 |
| Prosper Fire Department | $70,000 | $73,000 | $3,000 |
| Grand Prairie Fire Department | $85,509 | $88,067 | $2,558 |
| Marshall Fire Department | $52,697.73 | $55,148.66 | $2,450.93 |
| Highland Park Department of Public Safety | $72,280.50 | $73,677.50 | $1,397 |
| Conroe Fire Department | $64,920 | $64,920 | None |
| Southlake Department of Public Safety | $69,813.88 | $69,813.88 | None |
| Sachse Fire Rescue | $67,600 | $65,190 | -$2,410 |
The paramedic differential
Seventy-seven of the 180 departments publish some form of paramedic pay: a separate and higher firefighter/paramedic grade, a monthly certification stipend, or an hourly ambulance differential. Only two require a paramedic license at hire, Grand Prairie and Watauga.
The published structures are not close to each other:
| Department | What the document publishes | Unit |
|---|---|---|
| Plano | Paramedic certification pay $400, plus $50 per ambulance shift | per month, per shift |
| Allen | Paramedic certification $200, on top of a paramedic-only firefighter grade | per month |
| Garland | Paramedic certification $150 | per month |
| Grand Prairie | Paramedic certification $200, and the license is required at hire | per month |
| University Park | Paramedic certification $2,100 | per year |
| Frisco | A separate grade: Firefighter/EMT $82,568, Firefighter/Paramedic $87,250 | annual base |
Every figure above is from the department's own record in the table. Verified 2026-08-13.
Frisco is the structure worth studying, because it is the one that compounds. The paramedic grade is not a stipend bolted onto a firefighter's base, it is a different base, $4,682 higher at step 0. Every percentage raise for the rest of your career is computed on the larger number, and so is the final-average-salary figure your pension multiplier lands on.
The departments publishing a paramedic differential have a median start of $70,553.60 (63 departments) against $64,359.50 for the 76 that state no paramedic policy. Read that as an association between the two, not as a raise: departments that pay for paramedics tend to be the departments that pay.
TLFFRA, TMRS, and the pension you cannot see on a pay stub
Fifty-one of the 180 records identify a retirement system: 37 in the Texas Municipal Retirement System, 8 in a local fund organized under the Texas Local Fire Fighters Retirement Act, and 6 in the Texas County and District Retirement System, which is where emergency services districts land. The other 129 do not name one in the document their pay was read from, which is a gap in what cities publish rather than a claim that those firefighters have no pension.
The difference between the two main systems is worth more than most of the salary gaps on this page.
- TMRS is a statewide retirement system, and each city chooses its own terms: an employee deposit rate of 5, 6, or 7 percent, a city match of 1:1, 1.5:1, or 2:1, and service retirement at 20 or 25 years. A 7 percent deposit with a 2:1 match, which competitive suburbs use to recruit, is an additional 14 percent of pay going into your account every year on top of salary. Two TMRS cities paying identical salaries can differ by that much in real compensation.
- TLFFRA funds are local defined-benefit plans, each governed by its own board of trustees, with its own contribution rates, multiplier, and retirement age, overseen by the Texas Pension Review Board. Eight appear in this dataset: the Corsicana Fireman's Relief and Retirement Fund, the Denton Firemen's Relief and Retirement Fund, the Galveston Firefighters' Pension Fund, the Irving Firemen's Relief and Retirement Fund, the Laredo Firefighters Retirement System, the Midland Firemen's Relief and Retirement Fund, the Odessa Firefighters Relief and Retirement Fund, and the San Angelo Firemen's Relief and Retirement Fund. They are not interchangeable with each other and none of them is TMRS.
- The largest cities run city-specific statutory funds created by state law, which is a third category again.
The practical instruction: when you compare two offers, ask each department which system it belongs to and get that fund's current member handbook. A defined-benefit multiplier applied to a final rank thirty years out is worth more than the $3,000 difference in starting pay you are staring at. The Pension Review Board publishes every fund's actuarial condition, and a fund's funded ratio is a legitimate thing to ask about in a hiring interview.
Incentive stacking
Base pay is where the table stops and where a Texas paycheck does not. Allen publishes seven separate incentives on one plan: paramedic certification, TCFP driver certification, Fire Officer I and II, and associate, bachelor's, and master's degrees, running from $60 to $225 a month each. Plano publishes paramedic pay, three tiers of TCFP certification pay, and ambulance shift pay. Addison, Garland, and Conroe publish their own versions.
Stacked, these are not rounding errors. An Allen firefighter holding a paramedic certification ($200 a month), Fire Officer I ($150), and a bachelor's degree ($110) is earning $5,520 a year off one plan, and none of it appears in the base pay column of any comparison table, including this one. Each row's Read the record panel lists what that department publishes, in the unit it publishes it.
Then there is overtime, which is structural rather than optional. Under the Fair Labor Standards Act section 7(k) rules in 29 CFR 553.230, fire protection employees are owed overtime after 212 hours in a 28-day work period, which prorates to 106 hours per 14 days. A standard Texas 24-on/48-off rotation averages 56 hours a week, about 112 hours per 14 days. Some hours of FLSA overtime are built into most shift firefighters' regular checks before anyone volunteers for a holdover. Cities handle the buffer differently, and some schedule Kelly days to pull hours back under the line, so ask any department how its work period is set.
The metro you are standing in
The last variable is the one you can see from a highway. Dallas-Fort Worth departments compete with each other for the same certified firefighter/paramedics inside a 60-mile circle, and the bidding shows up in the pay plans: 65 DFW departments publish a starting salary, with a median of $73,677.50 and a top of $97,528.75. Central Texas, with 39 departments publishing a certified start, sits at $61,676 (Schertz). The Coastal Bend, with five, sits at $50,412.
Cost of living moves in the same direction but not by the same amount, which is why the DFW premium is real and not an illusion of housing prices. Texas charges no state income tax, so the entire published gap between two Texas departments is a gap in take-home pay, unlike a comparison across state lines. National context and state-by-state comparison live in the national firefighter salary guide, and the BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook covers the occupation's growth outlook. The NFPA U.S. Fire Department Profile is the standard reference for how few of the nation's departments are career departments at all, which is the structural reason a paid Texas fire job is competitive to get.
The table above filters and sorts live. For departments outside Texas, or to compare hiring requirements across services, use the department directory, or start at the fire careers pathway hub.
Method: how these departments were chosen and what the words mean
The universe. The starting list is the Texas fire departments that the U.S. Fire Administration's National Fire Department Registry types as Career or Mostly career. That is the registry's own classification, not ours. The registry landing is a search form and does not print a statewide typed count, so this page does not claim one. Thirteen of those records are removed by the scope rule below. This article carries the 180 departments whose pay could be verified or partially verified from a primary document.
What "full-time paid" means here. A department is in scope when it employs full-time paid firefighters under a municipal, county, or emergency services district payroll and publishes, or could publish, a pay schedule for them. Federal and military installation fire departments are out: their pay comes from the federal General Schedule, not a Texas city, and a GS table has nothing to do with what a Texas municipality will pay you. Volunteer departments with paid chiefs are out, because there is no full-time firefighter schedule to publish. Training academies are out, because they are not employers of firefighters.
Verified and partial. A record is verified when the pay figures come from a primary document that names the classification and the amount. A record is partial when the department was located and a primary source was found, but part of the record is not published: no top step, no rank ladder, no current-year plan. Of the 180, 120 are verified and 60 are partial. A partial record is not a weaker guess; it is a complete statement of a smaller set of facts.
What counts as a source. A civil service pay plan, an adopted pay ordinance, a collective bargaining agreement, a city compensation page, or a dated hiring bulletin filed with the Texas Commission on Fire Protection. That is the whole list. ZipRecruiter, Glassdoor, Salary.com, Payscale, and Indeed are not sources for this article and appear nowhere in the dataset. Neither is a department's own social media post, a local news story about a council vote, or a figure the collector computed rather than read.
Four rules the data follows, and they are why it can be checked.
- Null is a value. A blank cell means the department does not publish that figure, or publishes it only as an hourly rate with no stated schedule hours, a monthly rate, a draft plan, or an expired agreement. It never means we could not find it so here is an estimate.
- Categories stay separate. Cadet pay is not certified-hire pay. Base pay is not base plus built-in FLSA overtime. Step 1 is not top step. Where a city publishes more than one, each goes in its own field and the difference is stated in the record's notes. Bryan publishes $64,297 as firefighter base and $70,000 as starting pay including minimum overtime; the table carries the first, because the second is not comparable to anyone else's base column.
- Rank ladders are recorded as published. Not normalized. Lewisville has no Lieutenant. Laredo has an Assistant Driver. Both are correct, both are sourced, and neither is edited to look like the other.
- Conflicts are named, not averaged. Allen's FY 2025-26 pay plan publishes $97,528.75 for Firefighter Paramedic step 1; the city's NEOGOV bulletin 5046786, for the exam cycle that tested June 12, 2026, advertised $97,528.25. Both are printed by the city. The pay plan figure is used because a pay plan is the step schedule and a bulletin is a posting; the bulletin figure is recorded in the record's notes; the two agree at the top of the grade, $105,825.47; and they are not averaged into a number neither document contains.
How complete the citations are. All 180 records carry a read date, a source URL, and 170 carry the document's own title. Fifty-four carry an effective date or fiscal year printed on the document. The rest are undated city pages and live hiring bulletins, for which the read date is the only honest stamp, and that is what is shown.
One record where the labels look wrong and are not. On Sachse's FY25 fire plan, Firefighter/EMT step 1 is $65,190 and the Fire Recruit rate is $67,600, so the recruit rate sits above the firefighter rate. That is what the plan publishes. The labels are kept as printed rather than reordered into the shape a reader expects.
The departments carrying no starting salary, and why
Thirty-three of the 180 departments have an empty starting salary cell. This is the table that makes the other 147 worth citing. In every case a figure exists somewhere and was deliberately not published here, and the reason is on the row.
| Department | Why there is no figure |
|---|---|
| Balch Springs Fire DepartmentBalch Springs | The Fire Civil Service Pay Plan on the city document center is published as a DRAFT with the effective date marked TBD. Draft figures are not published here as current pay. |
| Benbrook Fire DepartmentBenbrook | The starting figure and the five-year step plan top come from a local publication's coverage of hiring, not from a city pay document, so neither is published here. |
| Bonham Fire DepartmentBonham | The city's benefits page publishes hourly certification differentials but no base pay scale. The 'new step and grade pay plan' ranges appear only on department social accounts. |
| Borger Fire DepartmentBorger | The city publishes bands for Wildland Fire Fighter II and EMT-Basic but no structural firefighter pay plan. A local news figure of about $37,000 is not carried here. |
| Brady Fire DepartmentBrady | Brady's Grade/Step schedule publishes hourly rates: Basic Firefighter Grade 42 Step 1 is $12.32 per hour, Step 12 is $17.05, and the Paramedic Firefighter series sits above it. The schedule states a 2,756-hour basis for the fire and EMS series but publishes no annual salary, so none is shown. |
| Brownwood Fire DepartmentBrownwood | Brownwood publishes its civil service schedule in monthly rates, not annual: Firefighter Step 1 is $4,403.00 per month, top firefighter step is $4,870, Fire Driver $5,430, Lieutenant $5,951, Captain $6,429. No annual figure appears on Ordinance No. 25-12, so none is shown. |
| City of Burnet Fire DepartmentBurnet | The city's career information page did not render pay content on read. The Firefighter/Paramedic range comes from news coverage of a council resolution and from job reposts, neither of which is a city pay document. |
| City of Lufkin Fire DepartmentLufkin | Withdrawn 2026-08-12: the cited source URL returns 404 and the cityoflufkin.com domain no longer resolves, so the figure cannot be re-verified. |
| City of Palestine Fire DepartmentPalestine | The Civil Service ranges and steps for FY 2024-2025 are published in hourly rates ($17.72 at Firefighter Step 1). The annual figure here is the beginning salary printed on the city's own entrance-exam flyer, not a conversion of the hourly rate. |
| City of Paris Fire DepartmentParis | Paris publishes police base pay tables on the city site but not fire. The starting figure of $51,367 plus a $10,000 stipend comes from local news coverage of the February 2026 exam and is not carried here. |
| College Station Fire DepartmentCollege Station | The city's careers page publishes the 48/96 schedule and the hiring process but no pay table. Starting-pay figures circulate on the department's social accounts and are not carried here. |
| Converse Fire DepartmentConverse | The city's posting publishes $22.56 per hour on a 2,756-hour year. It does not publish an annual salary, and none is calculated here. |
| Eagle Pass Fire DepartmentEagle Pass | Eagle Pass is a Chapter 143 civil service department. Its entrance-exam notice publishes no pay figures and no compensation table was found on the city site. |
| El Paso Fire DepartmentEl Paso | HR FAQ links Fire-Pay-Scale-latest.pdf as the Fire Services (FS) schedule. FS1 Fire Fighter / Fire Medic prints Step Two through Step Eleven. Step Two annual is $50,640.56. The PDF header reads Draft Fire Payscale FY26, first pay period after 1 September 2025. Because the posted file is titled Draft, certifiedStart stays null in this table. The directory listing cites the same figure with that draft title so a reader can judge it. Trainee pay is not on the FS table. |
| Ennis Fire DepartmentEnnis | The city fire pages carry no pay table. The uncertified and certified firefighter figures appear only on the department's Instagram account. |
| Ferris Fire DepartmentFerris | The only pay figure found is $14.00 per hour for part-time firefighters on the department's own social account. No full-time schedule is published. |
| Gladewater Fire DepartmentGladewater | The department's employment page content dates to the 2018-2019 hiring cycle. Its $33,265 figure is not treated as current and no current city pay plan was found. |
| Greenville Fire RescueGreenville | The city publishes its civil service lateral-entry rules, which credit up to four years of prior service, but no current pay table. Figures on department social media are not carried here. |
| Harlingen Fire DepartmentHarlingen | Harlingen's published rates come from the collective bargaining agreement with Local 3404 covering FY 2021-22 through FY 2023-24, whose evergreen clause ended September 30, 2025. There is no current published schedule, so no figure is shown. The salary table on the city's recruitment page is for police, not fire. |
| Highland Village Fire DepartmentHighland Village | The posting publishes an hourly band of $25.89 to $27.83 on a 48/96 schedule and does not state the annual hours basis, so no annual figure is shown. |
| Hurst Fire DepartmentHurst | Hurst publishes its testing requirements but no pay figures. The city page states that testing for Entry Fire Fighter requires a Texas certification or license. Dollar figures circulating on the department's Instagram are not carried here. |
| Irving Fire DepartmentIrving | Irving publishes monthly rates. The annual figures here are the plan's own monthly rates multiplied by twelve: Firefighter entry is $7,263 per month. The firefighter schedule runs to $105,924 at 3.5 years. |
| Jacksonville Fire DepartmentJacksonville | The city's firefighter benefits page publishes the incentive schedule and the promotion timeline, Lieutenant after four years and Captain after seven, but no base salary schedule. |
| Lumberton Fire & EMS - Hardin County ESD 2Lumberton | The district's careers page lists open paid positions but publishes no pay figures. An entry figure circulating on Instagram is not carried here. |
| Magnolia Volunteer Fire DepartmentMagnolia | The department operates as Montgomery County ESD No. 10 despite the 'Volunteer' legal name and has a career roster. Its published pay figures come from 2022 and 2023 recruiting documents, too old to publish as current. |
| Oak Hill Fire Department-Travis County Emergency Services District 3Austin | The pay figures in the collection record for this department were read from the City of Austin fire cadet employment page, which covers a different agency. They are not published here. Oak Hill / Travis County ESD 3 pay is unresolved. |
| San Angelo Fire DepartmentSan Angelo | The Civil Service employment packet revised February 4, 2025 publishes a Firefighter Rookie rate of $51,053 and states amounts are subject to annual change. No post-academy or step figure appears in the packet, so none is shown. |
| Smith County Fire Marshal's OfficeTyler | This is a county fire marshal's office, not a municipal suppression department. The only published figure is an archived Deputy Fire Marshal posting, an investigator classification, and it is not comparable to firefighter pay. |
| South Padre Island Fire DepartmentSouth Padre Island | The posting publishes hourly rates only, $14.389 base plus $1.45 paramedic after the orientation year, and does not state the annual schedule hours. No annual figure is calculated from them. |
| Tyler Fire DepartmentTyler | Tyler publishes a Fire Trainee rate of $47,856.85 and a Fire Recruit rate of $61,762.94, both marked as estimates on the city's own page, and asks applicants to confirm by phone. It publishes no certified-firefighter rate and no step ladder, so those cells are empty. |
| Westlake Fire-EMS DepartmentWestlake | No dollar pay plan is published on the town site; the figures circulating come from town social posts. This is the Town of Westlake in Tarrant County, not the Travis County ESD 9 department of a similar name. |
| White Settlement Fire DepartmentWhite Settlement | The city's formal pay scale on the document center is effective 10/1/2021 and is clearly obsolete. Newer figures appear only in a city Facebook hiring post. Neither is published here as current. |
| Woodway Public Safety DepartmentWoodway | Woodway runs a dual-role public safety officer model. The city publishes an hourly band for Public Safety Officer I of $30.36 to $43.79 and no annual figure, and the role is not a firefighter-only classification. |
The departments excluded from the universe
Thirteen departments in the Career / Mostly career list are out of scope, with one additional exclusion recorded that was never in that list and therefore does not change the working set.
| Department | Counted in the 280 | Why it is out of scope |
|---|---|---|
| Alton Volunteer Fire DepartmentAlton | Yes | USFA "Mostly career" (14 career / 8 volunteer). Exclude only if later confirmed volunteer+paid chiefs only. Third-party Indeed/Glassdoor discarded. |
| Angelina College Fire AcademyLufkin | Yes | Academy-only training program, not a municipal/career fire department employer for roster denominator. |
| Fort Bliss Fire & Emergency ServicesFort Bliss | Yes | Federal/military installation fire (U.S. Army Fort Bliss DES). GS/DoD civilian fire tables, not Texas municipal civil service. Outside RTS municipal paid-core denominator. |
| Fort Hood Fire DepartmentFort Hood | Yes | Federal/military installation fire (Fort Hood / Fort Cavazos DoD). Outside municipal paid-scope roster denominator. |
| Fulshear Simonton Volunteer Fire DepartmentFulshear | Yes | Ambulance by Fort Bend County EMS (FSFD fire/rescue). Job flyer PNG exists but binary not scrapable; $ from official careers HTML. |
| Goodfellow Air Force Base Fire Emergency ServicesGoodfellow AFB | Yes | Federal/military installation (Goodfellow AFB). Out of municipal paid-core scope |
| Lackland Air Force Base Fire ProtectionLackland AFB | Yes | Federal/military installation fire protection (Lackland AFB / JBSA). Out of municipal paid-core scope |
| Laughlin AFB Fire & Emergency ServicesLaughlin AFB | Yes | Federal/military installation F&ES (Laughlin AFB, Val Verde). Out of municipal paid-core scope. |
| League City Fire DepartmentLeague City | No | Volunteer structure with paid chiefs and staff only. The city's own FAQ lists the Fire Chief, Deputy Fire Chief, executive assistant and quartermaster as paid positions alongside a volunteer stipend program, and the join page recruits volunteer firefighters. There is no full-time paid firefighter schedule to publish. League City was never in the USFA Career and Mostly-career export, so excluding it does not change the denominator. |
| Naval Station Ingleside, TexasIngleside | Yes | Federal/military (naval station) fire. Out of municipal paid-core scope. Installation largely realigned historically; still federal/military class |
| New Waverly Volunteer Fire DepartmentNew Waverly | Yes | Volunteer Fire Department by name and public identity. Seed "Mostly career 21/19" does not override volunteer agency scope for paid-core denominator. Exclusion reason: volunteer (not paid municipal career pay plan). |
| Red River Army Depot Fire and Emergency ServicesTexarkana | Yes | Federal/military installation (RRAD). Out of municipal paid-core scope |
| Sheppard AFB Fire & Emergency ServicesSheppard AFB | Yes | Federal/military installation (Sheppard AFB, Wichita Falls area). Outside municipal paid-scope roster. |
| Village of Pleak Fire DepartmentRichmond | Yes | Village of Pleak Fire Services handled by Rosenberg Fire Department as of September 1, 2024. Also historically associated with Pleak Volunteer Firefighter Association grants. No independent municipal paid pay plan. |
Frequently asked questions
What is the starting salary for a firefighter in Texas?
There is no single figure. Two different measurements. BLS OEWS May 2025 puts the Texas firefighter (SOC 33-2011) median at $60,180 across 28,170 jobs: a wage survey of people already working, all ranks. Across the 147 departments in this table that publish a certified starting salary, the median published certified start is $66,461, low $37,633.44 (Alice, August 2024 TCFP posting, read 2026-08-12), high $97,528.75 (Allen, FY 2025-26 Fire Pay Plan, read 2026-08-12). The middle half of those published starts runs $58,337 to $74,010. Cadet pay is a separate field (47 departments publish one) and is not the certified-start column.
Which Texas fire department pays the most?
Among the 180 records in this table, Allen publishes the highest certified start: $97,528.75 on the FY 2025-26 Fire Pay Plan (Firefighter Paramedic step 1), topping out at $105,825.47. The city's NEOGOV bulletin 5046786 advertised $97,528.25 for the June 12 2026 exam cycle. Both figures are the city's. They are fifty cents apart. Grand Prairie follows at $88,067. Irving is not ranked: it publishes monthly rates and converting them would be our arithmetic. Houston, Dallas, San Antonio, Austin, and Fort Worth sit outside this table; their published figures are in the five-largest block, not this ranking.
What is the average firefighter salary in Texas?
There is no useful average on this page. The BLS median for Texas firefighters is $60,180 (May 2025 OEWS). The median published certified start in this table is $66,461. Those are not the same job and not the same survey. A Dallas-Fort Worth OEWS metro median is not published here: that series did not resolve on retrieval, so this page does not invent one.
Do Texas firefighters get paid overtime?
Yes. Under the Fair Labor Standards Act section 7(k) rules in 29 CFR 553.230, fire protection employees are owed time and a half after 212 hours in a 28-day work period (106 hours in 14 days). That is a federal maximum-hours standard, not a city's shift policy.
Do I need to be certified before I apply?
Not everywhere. In this table: 25 departments state certification is required at hire, 42 state it is not and run an academy, 113 do not state a policy in the document their pay was read from. Cadet pay and certified-hire pay are different jobs. The table's starting column is the certified figure when published.
Sources
Every department-level figure in this article carries its own source in its row of the table: the document's title, its URL, the effective date or fiscal year printed on it, and the date it was read. Those 180 citations are the primary sources and are not repeated here. What follows are the statewide references, the documents behind the tables written in prose, and the standard the collection was held to.
Aggregator estimates from ZipRecruiter, Glassdoor, Salary.com, Payscale, and Indeed were not used anywhere in this article or in the dataset behind it. Where a city keeps more than one pay document reachable, the current plan is cited and said to be current, rather than the older file that happens to rank better or sit at a more stable URL. A link that resolves to a different fiscal year is worse than no link, because it looks verified and is not.
- U.S. Fire Administration National Fire Department Registry, Texas departments typed Career or Mostly career. The landing is a search form; a statewide typed count is not printed on that page and is not claimed here.
- BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, occupation 33-2011 (Firefighters), May 2025, national employment 345,990 and median $59,280, re-read 2026-09-03. Texas $60,180 / 28,170 from api.bls.gov series OEUS480000000000033201113 (median) and OEUS480000000000033201101 (employment). The retired oes332011.htm and oes_tx.htm pages now land on the OEWS tables index and are not cited as the carrier of any cell. A Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington firefighter median is not published: that series did not resolve.
- Texas Commission on Fire Protection, which issues structural firefighter certification. Dated hiring bulletins in this dataset are cited from their own URLs, including Alice's August 2024 TCFP GetPdf posting.
- Texas Pension Review Board, TLFFRA overview and TMRS Member Benefits Guide
- 29 CFR 553.230, FLSA section 7(k) maximum hours standards
- NFPA U.S. Fire Department Profile, for national career and volunteer department composition
- Houston Fire Department fire-careers compensation, Beginning 07/8/2023, Trainee $37,388 / Probationary $54,207 / 1st Year $58,738, re-read 2026-09-03; HR sibling, same stamp, Trainee $36,000, re-read 2026-09-03; City of Houston announcement of firefighter agreement financial terms, 2024
- City of Dallas 2026 Uniformed Fire Rescue Salary Schedule, effective January 1, 2026, market-survey start $78,924 / year 0-1 $81,232 / year 9 $102,304, read 2026-08-19; NEOGOV T44100-FY26 and Dallas Fire-Rescue recruiting benefits list $75,397, read 2026-08-19
- Austin Fire Department cadet employment page, Cadet $46,904 ($22.55 per hour) and probationary $66,019, read 2026-08-30
- City of Fort Worth FY2026 fire salary schedule, trainee $39,915 / firefighter start $69,790 / step 11 $97,016, read 2026-08-19; Firefighter Trainee Information lists $67,000 after graduation and $95,000 top, read 2026-08-19
- SAFD careers site salary tile, re-read 2026-09-03, which opens Wages & Benefits: Fire Cadet $3,853.66 / probationary through 18th month $5,348 / 19th through 60th $5,913 / beginning 61st $6,021, monthly as printed, re-read 2026-09-03; 2026 Firefighter Trainee Written Examination Announcement, dated June 15, 2026, cadet $3,853.70 per month during training, read 2026-09-03. The two cadet cells disagree by four cents.
Texas pay plans change every budget year and hiring bulletins close. If a linked document has been superseded, the department's current posting controls. Confirm any figure with the department before you make a decision on it.
Related Articles
Ready to start your Fire Service career?
Create a free account and get a personalized path: guidance, progress tracking, and a readiness profile that stands out to agencies.