Talk to an audience on radio, television or a podcast feed, and hold their attention without seeing them.
Click through it
Pay, the path, pros and cons and the facts on one printable page. Good for a wall or a guidance counsellor.
Or read the whole thing here
What you earn and what it costs to get there.
Median
$47,340
Small market
$28,190
Top tenth
$138,440
The national median is $47,340 a year and the bottom tenth earn about $28,190. Read that carefully: many announcers are paid by the shift or the hour and do not work full-time all year, so the low end is real and common. The top tenth are major market and network names.
$13 to $18 an hour
Weekend or overnight shift at a small market station
Most people start part-time while working another job. Small market pay has not kept up, which is why so many talented people leave in their first three years.
$100,000 and up
Morning show hosts and anchors in large cities, play-by-play for a professional team
Those jobs exist in very small numbers and are usually won after a decade in smaller markets. Do not plan a career on the assumption that you will get one.
Tuition, fees, exams and kit. Not rent, food or travel
The low end is a one year community college broadcasting certificate plus a decent microphone, interface and headphones to record at home. The high end is a four year journalism or communications degree at an in state public university. A demo reel is free if you record it at a campus station, and the reel is what actually gets you hired. Borrowing heavily here is risky, because starting pay is low and the industry is shrinking, so file the FAFSA (Free Application for Federal Student Aid) and take the grants rather than the loans.
File the FAFSA (Free Application for Federal Student Aid) for Pell Grants and federal loans. Borrowing heavily for this field is risky, because starting pay is low and the industry is shrinking.
Hourly or per shift
The normal arrangement for part-time announcers and weekend hosts.
Salary with a contract
Full-time hosts and anchors, usually on two or three year contracts.
Appearance and commercial work
Voicing advertisements, hosting events and reading sponsor copy adds real money.
Your own podcast or stream
Ad revenue and subscriptions, tiny at first, and a genuine route for some people now.
The exact path from high school to qualified.
Nobody hires you off a transcript. They hire you off a recording of you doing the job.
High school
Grades 11 and 12
Speech, drama, English and journalism. Start a podcast now. It costs almost nothing and it is the reel.
Campus or community station
From year one
A college radio or television station is the single most valuable thing in this path. Some journalism schools operate full commercial stations staffed by students.
Certificate or degree
1 to 4 years
A one year broadcasting certificate or a four year journalism or communications degree. Neither is legally required, but most newsroom jobs expect the degree.
Internship and a demo reel
During school
Three to five minutes of your best work: a newscast, an interview, a live read. This is what gets listened to.
First small market job
2 to 3 years
Overnight or weekend shifts in a town you have never heard of. Two or three years there, then a bigger market.
English
You write almost everything you say.
Drama or speech
Breath control, pacing and not freezing when something goes wrong.
Journalism
Where the facts come from, and how to check them.
Government or history
You cannot explain the news if you do not know how anything works.
A second language
Spanish language stations are a large and growing part of the industry.
The Federal Communications Commission licenses broadcast stations and regulates what can go out over the air, including rules on indecency, political advertising and sponsorship disclosure. There is no license or exam for the person holding the microphone. What can end a career instead is breaking those station rules, so what you say on air is the employer's legal problem as well as yours.
Things you don't need, but that help.
Editing your own audio and video
Stations expect one person to report, record, edit and post. That is the job now.
Play-by-play
Sports is one of the few growing corners of live broadcasting. Call high school games to learn it.
Social media and short video
Your audience numbers off air are now part of your value on air.
Voice-over work
Commercials, audiobooks and narration pay well and can be done from a closet at home.
A published reel and a personal site
Make it easy for a program director to hear you in under a minute.
Student awards
The Radio Television Digital News Association runs student awards that hiring managers recognize.
Willingness to move anywhere
The people who get hired are the ones who will take the job in a town of 30,000.
A thick skin
Audience feedback is public, immediate and often personal.
Day to day, pros and cons, where you'd work.
In at 4am for a morning show. Read overnight wires, pick stories, write them in spoken English, check the weather and traffic. On air you talk, run the console, take calls and hit every break on the second. After the show you cut commercials, record promotions, post clips and plan tomorrow. Then you go to a station event at a car dealership, because that is part of the job too.
The good
The hard parts
Things people don't tell you.
Station groups record a host's links in advance and drop them into local broadcasts, a practice known as voice tracking. It is a big reason the number of on air jobs has fallen even though the number of stations has not.
Broadcast stations east of the Mississippi River generally have call signs starting with W and those west of it start with K, a convention set in the early days of American radio licensing.
There are well over two hundred local television markets and more than ten thousand radio stations in the country. Almost every famous anchor started in one of the small ones.
Last checked September 2026. Pay figures are typical full-time annual amounts in United States dollars, based on Bureau of Labor Statistics wage data and published pay scales. They vary by state, employer and experience. Tuition is for in-state students at public schools unless the card says otherwise.