Offshore pipefitter jobs are pipe-trade work on offshore oil and gas facilities — the corner of the piping trade this page covers.
Our sources carry no offshore-specific duty description, so the page measures the trade behind the title and sorts what the research confirms (TWIC, trade-wide pay data) from what it does not: rotation schedules, offshore training requirements, and any offshore-specific pay line.
What offshore fitters do
Start with what our sources actually carry: no offshore-specific duty description.
Our research holds no description of platform piping work as such, so we will not invent one — what we can state is the trade the title belongs to.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) describes pipefitters and steamfitters as installing and maintaining pipes that may carry chemicals, acids, and gases, mostly in manufacturing, commercial, and industrial settings, and steamfitters as specializing in systems for liquids or gases at high pressure.
The United Association (UA), the piping trades' union, describes its steamfitters as fabricating, installing, maintaining, and repairing high-pressure systems that move steam, hot water, and other industrial fluids, including chilled water and compressed air, with welding, rigging, and hydrostatic and pneumatic testing in the work.
Both descriptions are for the trade in general — neither is an offshore scope of work, and how the platform setting changes the day-to-day is not something our sources say.
On classification, the federal record has one occupation where the titles live: O*NET merged the old plumber and pipe fitter/steamfitter codes into 47-2152.00, Plumbers, Pipefitters, and Steamfitters, and the combined occupation explicitly includes sprinkler fitters.
Our research found no offshore-specific occupation line or wage line, so "offshore pipefitter" and offshore plumbing job postings are names for work inside that one combined occupation as we read the tables — Plumber sits alongside Pipefitter and Pipe Welder in O*NET's sample of reported titles for it.
If the trade itself is new to you, the pipefitter career guide covers the whole occupation first, and the industrial pipefitter guide covers the same trade inside refineries, chemical plants and power stations.
Rotations
The honest answer on rotations: our research did not source offshore rotation schedules, and we will not print a pattern we cannot verify.
Ask the employer how the schedule is structured before you accept, not after — the posting and the hiring office can answer what our research cannot.
What the federal record does carry is survey data for the trade as a whole: in O*NET survey data, 27% of Plumbers, Pipefitters, and Steamfitters report a typical week of more than 40 hours, and 73% report 40 hours.
Those figures describe the combined occupation nationally — not offshore work — so read them as the trade's hours backdrop, not as a description of platform schedules.
Rotation length, travel to and from the facility, and what the pay package covers are all questions to ask the employer directly — and a posting that answers none of them is a posting to question.
Required safety certifications
Split the requirements picture into two layers: craft training on one side, and the site credentials that get you through the gate on the other.
On the craft side, NCCER's Pipefitting curriculum is organized in four levels, Level 1 through Level 4, and our NCCER pipefitter test guide explains how that training and its assessments fit together.
On the site side, the credential our research did verify is maritime.
A TWIC — Transportation Worker Identification Credential — is required under the Maritime Transportation Security Act for workers who need access to secure areas of maritime facilities and vessels, and the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) conducts a security threat assessment — a background check — before issuing it.
Our research did not confirm whether a given offshore job's access falls under that requirement, or what else it involves — read the posting and ask the operator or contractor before you mobilize.
The offshore-specific training list is where our research stops.
BOSIET and HUET — the offshore training names our research note lists — were not sourced, and USCG and STCW rules were not sourced either.
We will not print a certification list we cannot verify: get the exact requirements, including any medical checks, from the operator or the contractor you would work for.
Confirm offshore requirements with the operator or contractor
Offshore pipefitter pay
Searches like "oil rig plumber salary" run into the same wall as any offshore pay question: our research found no offshore-specific wage line in the federal data.
The series to quote is the combined occupation — Plumbers, Pipefitters, and Steamfitters (SOC 47-2152) — which earned a median of $30.67 an hour, or $63,800 a year, in May 2025 per the BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics survey (OEWS, released May 15, 2026).
The 90th percentile was $52.13 an hour ($108,420 a year) and the 10th percentile was $21.22 ($44,150) — the spread the combined trade runs nationally.
State tables live on our pipefitter salary page.
One industry figure we hold comes from within that same survey: petroleum and coal products manufacturing paid Plumbers, Pipefitters, and Steamfitters an annual median of $106,550 in May 2025.
Two limits travel with it: the figure covers the whole combined occupation in that industry, plumbers and steamfitters included, and it is a small niche, not a typical job.
It is an industry benchmark — not an offshore rate, and not a platform premium we can verify.
Read any offer against what the survey measures.
OEWS covers wage-and-salary workers — the self-employed are outside the figures — and its annual wages assume a 2,080-hour year.
Travel money is a question, not an assumption: if a posting includes per diem or a travel allowance, ask what it covers, whether it lasts the length of the job, and how it is taxed.
Our pipefitter per diem jobs guide covers the federal benchmark rates and the tax rules travel pay carries.
Career and pay information, not legal or tax advice — pay on any job is set by the employer's offer or the agreement in force, and the tax treatment of any travel allowance turns on your own situation, so confirm the details with the employer and a tax professional.
What the BLS figures include
How to get hired
Our research did not source offshore hiring programs, so we will not name contractors, staffing offices or hiring halls for offshore calls.
What we can map is the route into the trade itself: the how-to-become guide lays out the trade's routes in and their timelines, and the pipefitter apprenticeship guide covers how apprenticeship works and how pay steps up.
Read each posting's requirements and pay line against the questions above — then browse open pipefitter positions to see what is on the board now.
For the market around the title: BLS projects 6.8% employment growth for Plumbers, Pipefitters, and Steamfitters from 2025 to 2035 (510.6k to 545.2k jobs, a count that includes the self-employed), with about 42,000 openings a year, against a 3.5% average across all occupations.
Those projections cover the whole combined occupation, not offshore demand specifically — for openings near you, the postings are the source.
- Ask the operator or contractor exactly which certifications, medical checks and access credentials the job requires
- Ask how the schedule is structured — the rotation — and what happens if it changes
- Ask what the pay package includes: the wage, how overtime is treated, travel pay, and benefits
- Confirm a credential's current requirements with the agency behind it — TSA for the TWIC