Marine Biologist
Also known as: Ocean Scientist, Marine Scientist
Study ocean life and ecosystems, from coral reefs to deep sea creatures, to protect marine environments.
Salary Range
The highest-paid specialization or seniority level for marine biologists.
About 1 in 71 reaches this level
About 19,500 zoologists and wildlife biologists (BLS Employment Projections, SOC 19-1023, 2025) — the standard proxy for marine biologists; only ~270 reach Lab Director / senior research scientist at NOAA or top research universities at ~$180K, roughly 1.4% of the field.
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 master's degree. Here are the top colleges for it:
Cost to Qualify
A two-year science master's typically adds about $41,000 in borrowing on top of a bachelor's, but the spread by field is about two and a half to one: chemistry graduates borrow a median of $25,000, geosciences $31,000, general biology $35,500, genetics $41,000, bioinformatics $47,000, and ecology, evolution and marine biology $62,600 - the most expensive of the lot. Read that spread as indicative rather than measured: the figures come from the federal Scorecard and several rest on a handful of programmes, one for genetics and two for chemistry. Unlike a PhD, an assistantship that waives tuition is something you might win, not something to count on; plan to pay unless a specific programme puts funding in writing before you accept.
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 is taking over the slow, screen-bound part of marine biology: sorting through huge piles of images, video and sound. NOAA Fisheries, the federal fisheries agency, says fish-survey video "traditionally" had to be watched by a scientist counting every fish, and it is now using AI to identify the species, count them and judge their health (April 2025). It is also training machine-learning models to count seals in aerial photos and to pick whale calls out of years of recordings, because "computers are faster than humans" at that job. Our read is that this hits hardest the routine counting and labeling that junior staff often do.
The rest of the job is harder to automate: planning studies, working at sea, diving, tagging and sampling animals, and deciding what the data mean for how a fishery or species is managed. The Bureau of Labor Statistics groups marine biologists with zoologists and wildlife biologists, and projects that group to grow 4% from 2025 to 2035, about average, with about 1,400 openings a year. It is a small field, about 19,500 jobs, and BLS warns that growth "may be limited by budgetary constraints" because much of the money comes from government. Our read is that for someone starting out, funding is a bigger risk than AI.
This stays at 2: AI speeds up analysis, but fieldwork and scientific judgment stay with people. What would change the score: if AI-processed surveys (drones, underwater cameras, acoustic sensors) let agencies run monitoring programs with noticeably fewer field and lab staff, this moves to 3.
Sources
Ratings reflect a 10-year outlook based on 2025-2026 research, weighted toward entry-level impact. Individual outcomes will vary.
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