Thoracic Surgeon

Operate inside the chest: lungs, esophagus, airway and chest wall. One of the longest trainings in medicine.

Typical pay: $414,010a year
Time to qualify: 14 to 16 yearsafter high school
Demand: Moderate
License needed: Yesregulated job

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Quick answers

How much does a thoracic surgeon make in the United States?

The median pay is about $414,010 a year. Across everyone in the job it runs from about $80,320 at the lower end to about $655,320 at the upper end. The source is listed under Sources at the end of this page.

How long does it take to become a thoracic surgeon in the United States?

14 to 16 years after high school, on the usual route.

What does it cost to become a thoracic surgeon?

$171,000 to $320,000 all in for tuition, fees, exams and kit. Living costs are not counted.

Do you need a license to work as a thoracic surgeon in the United States?

Yes. It is a regulated job, so you need a license or registration before you can work.

What is the job outlook for a thoracic surgeon in the United States?

Moderate demand nationally, from government outlook data. Demand varies by region, so check your area.

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Thoracic Surgeon salary in the United States

What you earn and what it costs to get there.

What chest surgeons make

Median for the group

$414,010

Bottom tenth

$80,320

Top tenth

$655,320

There is no separate federal wage line for thoracic surgeons. They sit inside a residual group called Surgeons, All Other, a mix of surgical specialties. In the 2025 federal wage survey that group's median is $414,010 a year, the bottom tenth earn $80,320 or less and the top tenth $655,320 or more. These figures describe the whole group, not this specialty alone, and they count only surgeons paid a wage, so surgeons who own part of their practice are missing.

While you are training

$75,651 to $106,814

One teaching hospital's 2026 to 2027 pay for years 1 to 8 after medical school

That is Dartmouth Health's published scale. Each hospital sets its own. You are paid for every year of training, but there are seven or eight of them, on long weeks, while your loans keep growing. Nationally, the AAMC (Association of American Medical Colleges) survey of 345 teaching hospitals puts the average first-year stipend at $68,166 as of July 1, 2025, and about $81,807 in the fifth year. Read from the AAMC's data, downloaded in a browser with Claude in Chrome on 6 November 2026, because aamc.org refuses our checker.

Where pay is highest

$604,890 a year

The median for the Surgeons, All Other group in North Dakota, the highest of any state

Minnesota is next at $568,150 and Ohio at $554,220. The lowest of the states with data is California, at $131,990. State medians from the 2025 federal wage survey, for the whole mixed group.

What it costs to get there

Bachelor's degree, in-state public university: Roughly $12,000 a year in tuition and fees on average
The MCAT (medical school admission test) and applications: Well over $1,000 once you count the test, the application service and interview travel
Medical school: Roughly $30,000 to $45,000 a year in-state public, considerably more at private schools
Licensing examinations: The three steps of the United States Medical Licensing Examination cost several hundred to over a thousand dollars each
Board certification: A written examination and an oral examination after training, each with its own fee

Roughly, all in

$171,000 to $320,000

Tuition, fees, exams and kit. Not rent, food or travel

Four years of undergraduate tuition plus four years of medical school, at in-state public rates, with exams and applications on top. The low end assumes in-state public the whole way; the high end is a private medical school. Residency and fellowship are the following seven or more years, and those are paid jobs rather than tuition, which is why they add nothing here. Interest accumulating across that time is not counted either, and it is substantial.

Most graduates borrow, and the debt is large. Fill in the FAFSA (Free Application for Federal Student Aid) every year. If you train and then work at a nonprofit hospital, Public Service Loan Forgiveness can wipe out a remaining federal balance after 10 years of qualifying payments, and residency years count toward those payments.

Benefits

Full benefits from residency onward
Health insurance, retirement contributions and paid leave start while you are still training.
Malpractice insurance paid
Hospitals cover it. In this specialty the premiums are large, so this matters.
Public Service Loan Forgiveness
Most residency programs and many hospitals are nonprofit employers, so those years count toward the 10 years of qualifying payments.
Signing bonuses and loan repayment
Hospitals outside big cities often offer both to attract chest surgeons, because there are not many.

How to become a thoracic surgeon in the United States

The exact path from high school to qualified.

The path to becoming a thoracic surgeon, step by step

Fourteen to sixteen years after high school. There is no short version of this one.

1
Bachelor's degree
4 years
Any major, but you must complete the science prerequisites: biology, chemistry, organic chemistry, physics and math.
2
The MCAT (medical school admission test) and applications
A year of preparation and applying
Run by the Association of American Medical Colleges, which also runs the shared application service.
3
Medical school
4 years
Two years of science, two years of clinical rotations. You take the first two steps of the United States Medical Licensing Examination along the way.
4
Surgical training
6 to 8 years
Either a general surgery residency followed by a thoracic surgery fellowship, or an integrated thoracic surgery residency entered straight from medical school. Programs are accredited by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education.
5
Board certification
After training
The American Board of Thoracic Surgery runs a written examination and then an oral examination, held in Dallas, Texas, before it will certify you.

High school courses that help you become a thoracic surgeon

Biology
The foundation of everything that follows. Take the hardest version your school offers.
Chemistry
Organic chemistry in college is the course that removes the most people from this path. Start strong.
Physics
Pressure, flow and mechanics turn up constantly in chest and heart physiology.
Math through calculus
Required by most medical school prerequisite lists.
Anything that builds steady hands
Music, model building, sport. Nobody will ask about it, but the dexterity is real.

Time and money, at a glance

Years after high school: 14 to 16
Admission: Extremely competitive at every stage, from medical school to the training match
Total tuition: Roughly $171,000 in-state public, up to about $320,000 with a private medical school
Paid while training?: Yes, from the first year after medical school, but at a resident's salary

Licensed by a state, certified by a board

Two different things have to happen. Your license to practice medicine comes from a state medical board, and it rests on passing all three steps of the United States Medical Licensing Examination. Board certification in thoracic surgery is separate and voluntary in law, but in practice no hospital will let you operate without it. That comes from the American Board of Thoracic Surgery, an independent nonprofit founded in 1948, and it has to be kept up for your whole career.

What the specialty actually covers

General thoracic
Lungs, esophagus, airway, chest wall and the space between the lungs. A large share of it is cancer surgery.
Cardiac
Heart and great vessels. Many surgeons train in both and the boards cover the whole chest.
Lung transplant
A further fellowship on top, done at a small number of centers.
Minimally invasive and robotic
Much chest surgery is now done through small incisions with a camera or a robotic system rather than by opening the chest.

What helps you get ahead as a thoracic surgeon

Things you don't need, but that help.

Further training that changes your career

Lung transplantation
An extra fellowship, and it ties you to a major transplant center for the rest of your working life.
Esophageal surgery
A recognized sub-focus with its own complex cancer operations and a small number of high volume surgeons.
Robotic surgery
Formal training on a robotic platform. Increasingly expected rather than optional in new hires.
Research years
Two years in a laboratory during training is common at academic programs and is close to required for a university job later.

Nice-to-haves

Genuine physical stamina
Operations lasting six hours and longer are normal. You stand for all of them.
The ability to talk about death
You will tell families that an operation did not work. Nobody is born able to do this well.
A partner who understands the hours
Surgeons say this more often than anything else on this list.
Comfort with being watched
Everything you do in the operating room is observed, recorded and audited.

Be honest with yourself about the length

This is fourteen to sixteen years from leaving high school, and most of the later ones are spent working 60 to 80 hours a week for a resident's salary while the debt sits there. People leave surgical training in their late twenties and start over. That is not a failure, it is information, and it is far better learned early. Spend time in an operating room before you commit, through shadowing, hospital volunteering or a job as a surgical technologist, and be sure it is the room you want rather than the title.

What being a thoracic surgeon is really like

Day to day, pros and cons, where you'd work.

What a thoracic surgeon does day to day

In before six to see the patients you operated on yesterday, most of them in the intensive care unit with chest tubes and monitors. First case starts at seven thirty: perhaps removing a lung lobe for cancer, three or four hours through small incisions with a camera. A break, then a second case. Afternoon is clinic, where you meet the people you will operate on next month and explain honestly what the operation can and cannot do. Evening rounds, notes, and then the phone, because chest injuries and bleeding do not keep office hours.

The honest pros and cons of being a thoracic surgeon

The good

The Surgeons, All Other group had a 2025 median of $414,010 a year
The operations genuinely extend lives, often by years
Technically demanding work that stays interesting for a whole career
You are paid throughout training, and nonprofit hospital years count toward loan forgiveness

The hard parts

Fourteen to sixteen years before you are fully qualified
Large debt carried through most of your twenties
Long operations, night call and a high rate of burnout across the specialty
Patients die, sometimes on your table, and you have to tell their families

Work life

Typical hours: 60 to 70 a week in practice, more in training
Remote work: None
Physical demand: High: long hours standing, precise hand work
Unionized: Rarely, though resident unions are growing

Similar paths

Things nobody tells you about being a thoracic surgeon

Things people don't tell you.

A small group of surgeons

Thoracic surgeons are counted in Surgeons, All Other, a group of only about 27,500 people (2025). The federal projection expects average growth and about 700 openings a year across the whole group.

There is an oral exam, and you travel for it

The American Board of Thoracic Surgery certifies in two parts: a written examination and then an oral examination held in Dallas, Texas. The 2026 oral exam ran on June 5 and 6.

Certification does not end

The board runs continuing certification for the whole of your career. Certificates expiring from 2027 to 2032 move to a 5 year milestone process, replacing the older 10 year cycle.

How a thoracic surgeon compares

Every list is built from the same numbers shown above, so you can see where this career sits next to the others.

More health careers in the US

Surgeons first, then the rest of the field. See every career in health.

Where these numbers come from

Last checked November 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.