Clinical Psychologist
Also known as: Therapist, Psychotherapist, Licensed Clinical Psychologist
Assess, diagnose, and treat mental health conditions using evidence-based therapeutic techniques.
Salary Range
The highest-paid specialization or seniority level for clinical psychologists.
About 1 in 50 reaches this level
About 81,300 clinical & counseling psychologists in the US (BLS Employment Projections, SOC 19-3033, 2025); ~1,500 are board-certified neuropsychologists (ABPP), and those in busy private/forensic practice can clear $300K (~2%).
Salary data based on 2025 BLS, Glassdoor, and industry reports. Actual compensation varies by location, experience, and employer.
How to Become One
This career typically requires a doctoral/professional degree. Here are the top colleges for it:
Cost to Qualify
Two different routes lead to this job, and they cost very different amounts. Neither one is the answer on its own.
If you get into a research-oriented clinical PhD, you are very unlikely to pay tuition: about 89% of students in these programmes get a tuition waiver AND an assistantship or fellowship, with stipends usually $20,000-$35,000 a year. The catch is getting in - these programmes admit around 7% of applicants. Half of psychology doctorate recipients finish with no graduate debt at all, and the median for those who borrow is $65,000. This is a five-to-six year doctorate plus a one-year paid internship, on top of a bachelor's. Two things to weigh: the 89% funding figure and the 7% admission rate come from the most recent free national PhD-versus-PsyD funding comparison, which dates from 2010, and psychology is the worst-funded field in NSF's doctorate survey - only half of psychology doctorate recipients finish with no graduate debt, against three-quarters across all fields.
A PsyD is the practice-focused route to being a clinical psychologist, and you almost always pay for it. Only about 17% of students at university-based PsyD programmes get a tuition waiver plus a stipend, and at free-standing PsyD schools - the ones not attached to a university - it is 1%. Nobody publishes an average tuition for these programmes, so the best measure is what graduates borrow. At the 49 private universities and professional schools in the federal data, where nearly all PsyD programmes sit, the median programme's graduates borrow $151,353, with a quarter of programmes under $113,951 and a quarter over $193,747; at public universities, where most doctorates are funded PhDs, it is $56,616. That private median is 2.3 times a clinical psychologist's $65,000 starting salary. The same job is reachable through a funded clinical PhD at close to zero cost - the trade is that research-focused PhD programmes admit around 7% of applicants and free-standing PsyD schools around 50%.
Sticker price, not what most people pay — scholarships, aid and in-state status all move it. Room and board is shown separately on each college's page. Where no body publishes a tuition average we show what graduates borrow instead, and say so — that figure leaves out anyone who did not borrow, so it is not the same measure as a tuition price.
AI Risk Assessment
AI chatbots are being promoted as therapists, but careful tests show they are not safe replacements yet. In a 2025 study led by Stanford researchers, human therapists gave appropriate responses to test scenarios 93% of the time. General AI models such as GPT-4o managed less than 80%, and commercial therapy chatbots only about half the time, sometimes going along with a client's delusions. The study was small (16 therapists) and AI models improve quickly, so treat it as a snapshot, not a final verdict.
Psychologists are using AI, mostly for paperwork and running their practices. In the American Psychological Association's 2025 survey of 1,742 psychologists, 56% had used AI for their work at least once in the past year, and 29% used it at least monthly, up from 11% the year before. Worry is rising, though: 38% fear AI may make some or all of their duties obsolete, up from 27% a year earlier.
Demand is the strongest factor. The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects jobs for clinical and counseling psychologists to grow 12% from 2025 to 2035, about four times the 3% average for all jobs. The federal health workforce agency (HRSA) projects a shortage of about 99,840 full-time psychologists in 2038 just to meet today's level of use, and more if unmet need is counted. Nearly half of psychologists (46%) say they have no openings for new patients, though that share has been falling since 2021. On the rubric this is a 2: AI takes on the admin, and demand absorbs the time it saves.
What would change the score: large trials showing chatbot therapy is safe and works as well as a human for common conditions, followed by insurers paying for it instead of sessions, would move this to 3. So would new psychologists starting to struggle to find jobs.
Sources
Ratings reflect a 10-year outlook based on 2025-2026 research, weighted toward entry-level impact. Individual outcomes will vary.
Related Careers
Is Clinical Psychologist right for you?
Take our free 20-minute assessment to find out if clinical psychologist matches your personality, interests, and strengths.
Take the Free Assessment