The median advertised pay for a travel OR (operating room) contract in California is $3,016 per week, with the middle half between $2,877 and $3,268. Measured across 23 active travel OR contracts in California at 20 facilities, as of 2026-09-15.
Advertised weekly totals, taxable base plus tax-free stipends. Not take-home.
That is 16 percent over the $2,601 national median for travel OR contracts.
California is not a Nurse Licensure Compact state, so you need a California license to work here even if you hold a multistate license. The compact state list explains which states issue one.
| Weekly rate | Open contracts |
|---|---|
| Under $2,700 | 1 |
| $2,700 to $2,800 | 3 |
| $2,800 to $2,900 | 2 |
| $2,900 to $3,000 | 3 |
| $3,000 to $3,100 | 6 |
| $3,100 to $3,200 | 1 |
| $3,200 to $3,300 | 3 |
| $3,300 and up | 4 |
All 23 open contracts, banded by advertised weekly rate. The outer bands are open-ended so nothing falls outside the chart.
California has the highest price level of the 51 states and territories the Bureau of Economic Analysis measures: 11 percent over the national average overall. The premium is concentrated in housing, at 54 percent over, while goods sit 6 percent over and services 3 percent over. That matters more than the headline number, because housing is the part a tax-free stipend is meant to cover and the rest comes out of taxed wages.
| Metro | Open contracts | Median weekly | Rent, 1 bed |
|---|---|---|---|
| San Francisco | 4 | $2,938 | $2,680/mo |
| Chico | 2 | $2,803 | $1,120/mo |
| Oakland | 2 | $3,003 | $1,920/mo |
| San Diego | 2 | $3,267 | $2,530/mo |
| Hanford | 1 | $2,908 | $1,120/mo |
| Long Beach | 1 | $3,645 | $2,115/mo |
| Los Angeles | 1 | $3,289 | $2,150/mo |
| Orange | 1 | $3,248 | $2,430/mo |
| Petaluma | 1 | $3,046 | $2,555/mo |
| Redding | 1 | $2,620 | $1,230/mo |
| Redwood City | 1 | $3,299 | $2,860/mo |
| San Pedro | 1 | $3,040 | — |
Rent is the one-bedroom Fair Market Rent HUD publishes for that metro, which is what a housing stipend is trying to cover. The open-contract count beside each metro is the sample its median rests on, and outside the largest markets that sample is small: a median over one or two contracts is a single posting's rate rather than a market rate, so read the count first.
Browse the board for current OR assignments in California.
Drawn from the postings that state a requirement, which is not all of them, so each figure carries the number it was measured from. Your recruiter confirms the specifics for a given contract before submission.
All 44 states with OR openings