Take the cases that patrol officers hand over and work them until they close. You patrol first, for years.
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Pay, the path, pros and cons and the facts on one printable page. Counsellors: send it to a student from your own email in one click.
Programs in the fields this career usually comes through. Each has its own page: what it takes to get in, the courses you need and what it costs.
The median pay is about $93,790 a year. Across everyone in the job it runs from about $55,390 at the lower end to about $160,540 at the upper end. The source is listed under Sources at the end of this page.
4 to 8 years after high school, on the usual route.
From nothing up to about $48,000, depending on the route, for tuition, fees, exams and kit. Living costs are not counted.
It depends where you work. You need a license, certificate or registration in Alaska, Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Maryland, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Mississippi, Montana, North Carolina, North Dakota, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, Nevada, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Vermont, Washington, Wisconsin, West Virginia and Wyoming. Elsewhere there is none to hold, though many employers still ask for training or a certificate.
Limited demand nationally, from government outlook data. Demand varies by region, so check your area.
Or read the whole thing here
What you earn and what it costs to get there.
Median
$93,790
Bottom tenth
$55,390
Top tenth
$160,540
The 2025 national median is $93,790 a year, and the bottom tenth earn $55,390 or less. Read the top of that range carefully: the federal survey counts city detectives and federal criminal investigators as one occupation, so the range covers both.
$120,520 a year or more
The 75th percentile of detectives and criminal investigators, 2025
It is a promotion, not a starting job: you are hired as a patrol officer, paid as one, and test for detective later. The survey does not say who is at the top, and federal investigators are in the same group.
Base pay plus availability pay
Criminal investigators at federal agencies
Federal criminal investigators are expected to be available for unscheduled duty, and the law pays them an extra 25% of base salary for it. Grade 13 of the General Schedule starts at $90,925 in 2026 before that top-up and before locality pay.
Roughly, all in
Nothing to $48,000
Tuition, fees, exams and kit. Not rent, food or travel
Detective is a promotion, not a separate qualification, so the low end is zero: a department hires you as an officer, pays you through the academy, and pays for the investigator training on department time after you are promoted. The high end is a self sponsored academy paid for up front plus a four year degree at an in state public university, which is optional at most city departments but effectively required for federal agencies. Application and testing fees are small and many agencies charge nothing at all. If you do go to college first, file the Free Application for Federal Student Aid and remember that police work at a government agency counts toward Public Service Loan Forgiveness.
You can enter this career with no debt at all. If you do go to college first, file the FAFSA (Free Application for Federal Student Aid) and remember that police work at a government agency qualifies for Public Service Loan Forgiveness.
Pension
Police jobs usually come with a defined-benefit pension.
Overtime and court time
Detectives are paid to testify, and trials run on the court's calendar, not yours.
Public Service Loan Forgiveness
City, county, state and federal agencies all qualify.
Paid specialist training
Interview technique, digital forensics, financial crime. The department pays and you keep the skill.
The exact path from high school to qualified.
Hired first, trained second, promoted years later. Almost nobody starts here.
High school diploma or equivalent
Grade 12
That is the legal minimum in most states. Keep your record clean: the background investigation looks at everything, including school discipline.
College, optional but useful
0 to 4 years
Not required by most city departments. Effectively required by federal agencies, which usually want a bachelor's degree or equivalent experience. Criminal justice, accounting, computer science and languages all pay off later.
Get hired and pass the academy
1 to 2 years including hiring
Written test, physical test, background investigation, medical and psychological screening, then a state-certified academy. Expect roughly six months of academy plus months of field training.
Patrol
Several years
Several years answering calls. This is where you learn to talk to people, write reports that stand up, and handle a scene. Detectives who skipped it are obvious.
Promote or transfer to investigations
Ongoing
By examination, interview or assignment, depending on the department. Then specialist training in your unit: property, robbery, homicide, financial crime, digital forensics.
English
Your reports become court evidence. Bad writing loses real cases.
Psychology
Interviewing is the core skill of the job.
Computer science
Most modern cases contain a phone, an account or a camera.
Spanish or another second language
It makes you far more useful in many cities.
There is no national police license. In 49 states a commission sets the minimum standards every officer must meet and certifies them; California's is the Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training. Hawaii only starts certifying officers in July 2028, and DC (the District of Columbia) has no certificate. It sets selection standards, certifies academies and can decertify an officer for misconduct. Your certification is state-specific, so moving usually means extra training or a new academy. Federal criminal investigators are outside this system entirely and train at their own academies.
Things you don't need, but that help.
Homicide
The most senior assignment in most departments, and the hardest to leave behind at the end of a shift.
Financial crime and fraud
Accounting skills matter more than anything else. Fewer bad nights.
Digital forensics
Phones, drives and accounts. Certifications here transfer to private sector jobs.
Special victims
Sexual assault and child abuse. Vital work with the heaviest emotional cost in policing.
Federal task forces
City detectives are often assigned to joint federal task forces, which is a common route into a federal agency.
A spotless personal record
Drug history, debt, driving record and social media are all examined. Start protecting this now.
An accounting or computer degree
The two backgrounds that most reliably turn into a specialist unit.
Military or emergency medical service experience
Weighted by many agencies, and veterans get preference in federal hiring.
Real physical fitness
The entry test screens for it, and the job quietly demands it for 25 years.
Agencies that employ criminal investigators post their openings on USAJOBS (the official federal hiring site). They usually want a bachelor's degree or equivalent experience, they run far longer background checks, and they expect you to move anywhere in the country on assignment. In exchange you get the published federal pay ladder plus a 25% availability top-up, a federal pension, and the kind of cases a city department never sees.
Day to day, pros and cons, where you'd work.
Not much like television. Morning is your caseload: a stack of open files, many of them property crime. You read overnight reports, pull video, request phone records, chase a lab result, and call victims back who have not heard from anyone. Afternoons are interviews, which is where the job is actually done. Then writing, because everything you found has to survive a defense attorney. Court appearances come whenever the court says so, including your day off.
The good
The hard parts
Things people don't tell you.
Federal criminal investigators receive availability pay, an extra 25% on top of base salary. On grade 13 of the General Schedule, which starts at $90,925 in 2026, that is more than $22,000 a year before locality pay is added.
Federal projections expect little or no change in the number of detective and criminal investigator jobs from 2025 to 2035, but still about 7,800 openings a year as people retire.
The national median for this work is $93,790, and the Los Angeles Police Department advertises entry-level officer pay of $93,730 to $127,660 before anyone makes detective. Pay depends a great deal on the city.
Every list is built from the same numbers shown above, so you can see where this career sits next to the others.
Police and fire first, then the rest of the field. See every career in law and public safety.
Last checked October 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. How every figure on this site is sourced and checked.
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