Sheet metal apprentice pay is built to rise: every registered apprenticeship program must pay a progressively increasing wage schedule tied to the skill you acquire, with an entry wage not below the FLSA minimum wage where one applies.
BLS publishes no apprentice-only wage, so the honest numbers pair the occupation's published pay with the wage schedule in your program's standards.
Here is what sheet metal apprentices make, how the raises step up, and how union and merit-shop pay differ.
Typical sheet metal apprentice pay
Start with the honest caveat: BLS publishes no apprentice-only wage and no starting-pay statistic, so there is no BLS-published sheet metal apprentice salary to quote.
Its sheet metal series — Sheet Metal Workers (SOC 47-2211) — covers everyone in the occupation, not only new hires, so it cannot price the apprentice rung.
If you want a published number near entry level, the all-trades helper category — Helpers--Installation, Maintenance, and Repair Workers (SOC 49-9098), not a sheet metal series — earned a median of $19.05 an hour, or $39,630 a year, in May 2025.
Within plumbing, heating and air-conditioning contractors (NAICS 238220) — an estimate that covers plumbing and HVAC contractors together — that category counted 25,180 jobs at a $39,550 annual median.
Neither figure prices a sheet metal apprentice.
For the occupation itself: Sheet Metal Workers (SOC 47-2211) held 119,770 wage-and-salary jobs nationally in May 2025, with a median of $29.71 an hour, or $61,800 a year.
That is the trained occupation apprentices step toward — not apprentice pay.
The spread runs from $18.57 an hour at the 10th percentile ($38,630 a year) and $22.99 at the 25th ($47,830 a year) up to $39.24 at the 75th ($81,610) and $50.79 at the 90th ($105,650); BLS does not label which rungs of that spread are apprentices.
Where the work sits matters too: building equipment contractors (NAICS 2382 — a group that also includes electrical contractors) employed 53,690 of those workers, and fabricated metal product manufacturing (NAICS 3323 and 3324 only) another 20,780 — so one national number cannot fit both a shop fabricator and a field installer.
The full percentile tables, national and by state, live on our sheet metal worker salary page.
How sheet metal apprentice pay steps up
Apprentice raises are set by a written schedule, not one-off decisions.
The federal rule for registered apprenticeship programs (29 CFR 29.5) requires a progressively increasing schedule of wages consistent with the skill acquired, with an entry wage not below the FLSA minimum wage where applicable — or a higher rate where another law or a collective bargaining agreement requires one.
If you are new to the structure itself, our guide to the sheet metal apprenticeship explains how the registered programs work.
What the federal rule does not do is set the percentages.
The familiar ladders — start at a share of the journeyman rate and step up each period — are conventions of each program's registered standards or its collective bargaining agreement; the regulation itself contains no percentage of the journeyworker rate.
For sheet metal specifically, our research did not verify a standard SMART step-percentage schedule to quote.
The ladder runs across a set term: sheet metal apprenticeships in the International Training Institute's network run four or five years, and the ITI reports more than 14,000 registered apprentices in the United States and Canada.
Training runs through ITI-affiliated local training centers — ask yours for the wage schedule in writing.
One place the federal government does tie apprentice pay to your registration: Davis-Bacon prevailing-wage work — federally funded or assisted construction contracts over $2,000, where workers must receive at least locally prevailing wages and fringe benefits.
On those jobs an apprentice may be paid below the journeyworker rate only if individually registered in a program registered with the Department of Labor or a recognized state apprenticeship agency, with the apprentice rate expressed as a percentage of the journeyworker rate per the registered program.
The apprentice-to-journeyworker ratio on the job may not exceed the program's ratio, and anyone at an apprentice rate who is not registered must be paid the full wage-determination rate for the work done.
What does the ladder lead to?
See what a journeyman sheet metal worker is for how the top rung of that ladder is defined.
Your raise schedule lives in the program standard
Union vs non-union sheet metal apprentice pay
Both kinds of program answer to the same federal floor — a progressively increasing wage schedule and an entry wage at or above the applicable minimum.
The difference is who writes the schedule.
On the union side, the percentage steps come from the registered program's standard or its collective bargaining agreement, and training runs through the International Training Institute, jointly sponsored by SMART and SMACNA, the sheet metal contractors' association.
Our research did not verify a national SMART pay scale to quote.
For how SMART locals and union membership work, see our union sheet metal worker guide.
On the merit-shop side, contractors train apprentices outside a union agreement.
The Associated Builders and Contractors describes itself as founded on the merit shop philosophy and reports more than 24,000 members.
Merit-shop apprenticeships that register do so in the same federal system, and a registered program's wage schedule answers to the same progressive-wage rule — set program by program, in each sponsor's registered standards.
Our research found no verified national number on either side to quote — no universal union pay scale, and no fixed union premium for sheet metal apprentices.
BLS's union table gives only broad occupation groups — there is no sheet-metal-specific rate in it — so the closest measured group for 2025 is construction and extraction occupations, 16.4% union members.
Benefits during a sheet metal apprenticeship
The headline benefit is the paid training itself.
A registered program's wage schedule is owed from the start — an entry wage not below the applicable minimum, rising with skill — and the on-the-job learning it covers is substantial: an apprenticeable occupation has to involve at least 2,000 hours of it, with structured classroom instruction running alongside, through ITI-affiliated centers in the joint programs or whatever arrangement your sponsor's standards set.
The Department of Labor recommends at least 144 hours of related technical instruction per year of apprenticeship.
That 144 is a recommendation, not a federal requirement, though your program or your state may mandate it.
Everything beyond the wage is whatever the sponsor's registered standards — or the collective bargaining agreement behind a union program — provides, so ask for the written benefits summary rather than assuming.
One federally anchored case: on Davis-Bacon work, the required package includes fringe benefits on top of the prevailing wage.
Veterans have a documented layer on top: the Post-9/11 GI Bill pays a housing allowance alongside wages for full-time apprenticeship training, and it steps down as the program runs — 100% of the E-5-with-dependents BAH for months 1 through 6, 80% for months 7 through 12, 60% for months 13 through 18, 40% for months 19 through 24, and 20% after 24 months; it is reduced proportionally in months with under 120 training hours.
Career information, not legal or pay advice. Wage schedules, ratios and benefits come from each program's standards and from law — confirm current rules with your program sponsor or training center, the U.S. Department of Labor or your state apprenticeship agency.