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Nanny Salary in 2026

What a nanny earns per hour, per week and per year, state by state, and why the published averages disagree by ten dollars an hour.

Well Paid Babysitter · updated September 2026 · US figures

A professional nanny in the US earns about $27.50 an hour in 2026, which is $1,100 for a 40 hour week and $55,000 for a 50 week year. That is our figure, built as 1.25 times the local babysitting rate. Locally it runs from about $23.90 an hour in the lowest cost states to $30.45 in California. You will find lower numbers quoted elsewhere, and the reason is worth two minutes, because it is the difference between a fair salary and an underpaid one.

Why every nanny salary figure is different

Four numbers get quoted, and they measure four different things.

The government figure is the lowest because it is mostly not nannies. It covers everyone in childcare work, including daycare staff on a center's pay scale, and it is a median across all experience levels. The Care.com figure is what families offer at the start of a search, which is a floor, not what an experienced nanny settles at. The International Nanny Association's survey asked nannies directly and found an average of $27 an hour back in 2022, up 42 percent in five years. Rates have not gone down since.

Our number starts from the babysitting market, which is measured on real completed bookings, and adds the premium a nanny role carries: set hours, more responsibility and usually more than one kind of work. A nanny should not earn less than a babysitter in the same town, and a figure below the local babysitting rate is a sign the offer is wrong, not the market.

Nanny salary by state

Each state is the national figure adjusted for that state's cost of living, using the BEA regional price parities. Weekly is 40 hours. Yearly is 50 weeks, before overtime.

One or two children, 2026, before overtime and extra duties. For a city, use the rate calculator and choose "Professional nanny".

Nanny pay per hour by role

"Nanny" covers a wide range of jobs. The biggest differences come from the children's ages and how much else the job includes.

A newborn care specialist is a different job from a nanny: overnight or around the clock care of a baby in the first weeks, usually for a set term. If the role includes night duty, the rules on sleeping hours in our overnight rates guide apply.

Nanny share pay

In a nanny share, one nanny looks after two families' children together. The nanny should earn more than a single family rate, because there are more children, and each family should pay less than they would alone. Both can be true at once.

Using the same per child percentages as babysitting, two families with one child each is a two child job. At the national rate that is $30.53 an hour for the nanny, or about $15.26 from each family. The nanny is up $3 an hour on a one child job and each family pays close to half. Write down who pays for what, whose house it is in, and what happens when one family is away and the other is not.

Overtime, live-in and guaranteed hours

Overtime

A nanny who lives out is covered by federal overtime rules. Hours over 40 in a week are paid at time and a half. At $27.50, a 45 hour week is 40 hours at $27.50 plus 5 at $41.25, which is $1,306.25, not $1,237.50. The Department of Labor's guidance on hours worked sets out what counts as hours worked, including sleep time on long shifts.

Live-in nannies

A nanny who lives in the family's home can be exempt from federal overtime, but must still be paid at least the minimum wage for every hour worked, according to the DOL fact sheet on live-in domestic workers. Several states go further and require overtime for live-in staff too. Room and board is part of the deal, not a substitute for a salary.

Guaranteed hours

The single term that separates a nanny job from a lot of babysitting is guaranteed hours. The agreed hours are paid whether or not the family uses them, the same as anyone with a shift. A family that takes three unpaid weeks each summer removes about $3,300 from a $27.50 year. If it is not in writing, it does not exist.

Benefits nannies now expect

The INA's 2022 survey is the best picture of what the job includes beyond the hourly rate:

• Paid time off. 80 percent of nannies got paid time off, up from 51 percent in 2017, and 40 percent of those got three to four weeks.
• Overtime. 72 percent were paid for overtime, up from 58 percent.
• Hourly pay. 83 percent were paid hourly rather than a flat salary, which protects both sides when hours change.
• Health insurance. 28 percent got help with health insurance, up from 17 percent.

With two weeks of paid vacation, a 40 hour nanny at $27.50 is paid for 52 weeks, which is $57,200 a year.

Nanny taxes: what the family owes

A nanny is a household employee, not a contractor, and IRS Publication 926 lists nannies by name. In 2026 a family that pays a nanny $3,000 or more in cash wages in the year owes Social Security and Medicare taxes on those wages, and a family that pays $1,000 or more in any quarter owes federal unemployment tax too. The family's share of Social Security and Medicare is 7.65 percent of wages, on top of the salary. States add their own rules.

For a nanny this matters because being paid on the books is what builds Social Security credit, qualifies for unemployment if the job ends and gives a paper trail for a mortgage or a lease. This is general information, not tax advice.

Nanny or babysitter?

A nanny is not a babysitter who works more hours. It is a different job, and in the US a different legal category. Casual babysitting is usually exempt from federal wage law. Regular nannying usually is not. The signs a babysitting job has quietly become a nanny job, and the raise that should come with it, are on our main page under nanny salary vs babysitting rates. For occasional evenings, use the babysitting rates chart instead.