Income percentile by state

$
Where you sit in California
Bottom 48%

52% of households in California earn more than you

State median$100,149
Top 10% from$329,110
Ranks6th of 51
Bottom 10%$20.4kBottom 25%$49.3kYou$95.0kMedian$100kTop 25%$182kTop 10%$329kTop 5%$524kTop 1%$1.5mBottom 10%$20.4kBottom 25%$49.3kYou$95.0kMedian$100kTop 25%$182kTop 10%$329kTop 5%$524kTop 1%$1.5m

Household income at each percentile in the state, read off the Census bracket counts. The band you fall in is marked.

A household income of $95,000 in California sits in about the Bottom 48% of households in the state. The median there is $100,149 and the 90th percentile $329,110, on the 2024 American Community Survey. California ranks 6th of 51 states and DC by median income; the US median is $81,604.

How to use this, and the parts people get wrong
  • Pick the state first: each one carries its own distribution, not a shifted national curve.
  • Enter gross yearly income for one earner, before tax.
  • State medians differ by tens of thousands, so the same salary can be top quarter in one state and middle in the next.

Against the state and the country

The same $95,000 is the Bottom 48% in California and the Top 43% in Texas. Where you live changes the answer more than most people expect.

Bottom 48%of households in California
$100,149the median household there
6thof 51 by median income

Every state, ranked

What the same income ranks in each, and where each state's median sits.

StateMedianYou are inTop 10%
District of Columbia$109,707Bottom 45%$480,357
Massachusetts$104,828Bottom 46%$347,650
New Jersey$104,294Bottom 45%$333,442
Maryland$102,905Bottom 46%$313,746
Hawaii$100,745Bottom 47%$285,677
California$100,149Bottom 48%$329,110
New Hampshire$99,782Bottom 48%$262,339
Washington$99,389Bottom 48%$301,625
Colorado$97,113Bottom 49%$277,858
Utah$96,658Bottom 49%$238,290
Connecticut$96,049Bottom 49%$300,599
Alaska$95,665Bottom 49%$237,492
Virginia$92,090Top 49%$277,489
Delaware$87,534Top 46%$225,367
Minnesota$87,117Top 47%$235,171
New York$85,820Top 46%$284,029
Oregon$85,220Top 45%$223,220
Rhode Island$83,504Top 45%$243,715
Illinois$83,211Top 45%$239,847
Vermont$82,730Top 43%$209,820
Arizona$81,486Top 43%$220,518
Idaho$81,166Top 43%$197,269
Nevada$81,134Top 43%$213,670
Georgia$79,991Top 42%$222,191
Texas$79,721Top 43%$231,733
North Dakota$77,871Top 41%$200,881
Florida$77,735Top 41%$218,999
Pennsylvania$77,545Top 41%$218,340
Wisconsin$77,488Top 41%$196,889
South Dakota$76,881Top 40%$192,540
Maine$76,442Top 40%$203,085
Nebraska$76,376Top 40%$194,334
Wyoming$75,532Top 39%$192,225
Kansas$75,514Top 39%$199,890
Iowa$75,501Top 39%$189,900
Montana$75,340Top 39%$195,863
North Carolina$73,958Top 39%$210,816
Michigan$72,389Top 38%$196,554
South Carolina$72,350Top 38%$197,018
Ohio$72,212Top 38%$195,245
Tennessee$71,997Top 38%$197,094
Indiana$71,959Top 37%$191,058
Missouri$71,589Top 37%$194,700
New Mexico$67,816Top 36%$192,719
Alabama$66,659Top 34%$188,738
Oklahoma$66,148Top 34%$181,964
Kentucky$64,526Top 33%$182,766
Arkansas$62,106Top 32%$174,023
Louisiana$60,986Top 32%$185,701
West Virginia$60,798Top 30%$167,558
Mississippi$59,127Top 30%$168,904

Questions people ask

What is the median household income in California?
$100,149, on the 2024 American Community Survey. That is the middle household: half of households in the state earn less and half earn more. The US median is $81,604, so California sits above the country.
What income puts me in the top 10% in California?
$329,110. The top quarter starts at $182,060 and the top 1% at about $1,547,211.
Is this household income or personal income?
Household. Everyone living at the address is counted together, which is why the figures look high to a single earner comparing their own salary. A two-earner household is being measured against other two-earner households here.
Why does the same income rank so differently by state?
Because incomes differ far more across states than people expect, and the cost of living differs with them. California is 6th in the country by median household income, and the table above prices the same income in all fifty-one.
How recent is this?
The 2024 American Community Survey, published in 2025 and the most recent one-year estimate. It is a survey of about three and a half million addresses, not a sample of a few thousand.

Method and sources

  • US Census Bureau, 2024 American Community Survey 1-year estimates, tables B19013 and B19001Median household income and the sixteen-bracket household income distribution, by state
The calculation

The Census publishes how many households in each state fall into each of sixteen income brackets. A percentile is read straight off those counts and interpolated inside the one bracket your income falls in - no curve is fitted. Above $200,000 the survey stops resolving, so a Pareto tail is used, with its exponent derived from the published shares above $150,000 and above $200,000 rather than assumed. The median shown is the published figure rather than the interpolated one.

What these figures do not cover
  • Household income, not personal. A two-earner household is compared with other households, not with individual salaries.
  • Interpolating inside a bracket assumes incomes are spread evenly within it. Reproducing the published median this way lands within 1.8% at worst.
  • Above $200,000 the answer comes from a fitted tail rather than from counts, so treat a very high percentile as approximate.
  • Before tax, and not adjusted for the cost of living, which varies at least as much between states as income does.

Last updated August 2026.

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