Career guides · Every trade, every market
Pick your trade and your state and we'll show you exactly how to get in — where to train, what you're legally required to hold, what each level pays, and how long the whole route really takes. No course to buy at the end of it.
Type it or choose from the list below. Aliases work — type sparky or HVAC.
Rules, pay and training routes all change by market, so this is the part that matters.
Skill levels, training, requirements and timings for that exact combination.
Same structure for every trade and every state — so you can compare two of them properly.
The three levels of the trade, what you're allowed to do at each one, and how you move up.
Apprenticeships, trade colleges and employer routes in your state, with cost and length.
The licences, registrations and safety cards you're required to have before day one.
From no experience to a licensed rate, stage by stage, with realistic timings.
Open a trade to see its career guide, then narrow it to your state.
The route is broadly the same whichever trade you pick. You get taken on under a licensed hand, you accumulate documented supervised hours, you complete classroom instruction alongside the work, and you sit an exam that changes what you may legally do on your own. What varies is how long each stage takes, who pays for the instruction, and how strictly your state tracks the paperwork.
A registered apprenticeship pays you from your first day, documents your hours for you, and leaves you holding a licence with no training debt. A college programme costs money up front but can get you hired faster, and it suits anyone changing career who cannot start at helper wages. Decide the trade first, then find which route your local market actually offers.
The same licence earns very differently depending on what work exists nearby. Texas runs on plant work, Arizona on semiconductor construction, Ohio on data centres. Those industries decide which specialisms pay, what shifts exist and how much overtime is real, and cost of living then decides what the rate is worth. A national average tells you almost nothing about the market you will work in.
Four to five years to a licensed trade, and you are earning throughout. The licence is the step that changes your pay, not the years before it, so the people who get there fastest track their hours carefully and sit the exam the month they become eligible. Career changers are common and the requirements do not shift with age.
Open two guides side by side and compare what they pay, how long they take and what the day actually looks like. Nothing here is trying to sell you a course.
Takes two clicks. No account needed.