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Opticians

Official title Opticians, Dispensing (SOC 29-2081)

Also called Dispensing optician, Licensed optician, Optical dispenser, Ophthalmic dispenser

In brief

In May 2025, BLS counted 73,530 US opticians, with median pay of $47,260 a year. Of the BLS counts since 2003, the highest was 79,690, in May 2024. The earliest figure here is an estimate of 12,000 from 1900, not measured the same way as today's count. The last full technology era for opticians: Electronic lensometer + pupillometer, 2000 to 2018.

What the sources say

Official outlook

BLS projects employment to grow 4.2% from 2025 to 2035.

BLS Employment Projections 2025-35

AI exposure studies

Data as of BLS OEWS May 2025; BLS Employment Projections 2025-35. BLS publishes these counts as yearly survey snapshots and cautions against reading them as a precise trend. In May 2021 BLS changed how it estimates these counts (a model-based method using three years of survey data) and moved fully to the 2018 occupation codes, so part of a change across 2021 can come from the method rather than the work.

Last updated .

Cite this page
APA

Future History. (2026, October 11). Opticians: jobs and pay since 1900 [Data set; data as of BLS OEWS May 2025; BLS Employment Projections 2025-35]. https://futurehistory.earth/timeline/29-2081

Chicago

Future History. "Opticians: jobs and pay since 1900." Data as of BLS OEWS May 2025; BLS Employment Projections 2025-35. Last modified October 11, 2026. https://futurehistory.earth/timeline/29-2081.

BibTeX

@misc{futurehistory_29_2081, author = {{Future History}}, title = {Opticians: jobs and pay since 1900}, year = {2026}, month = oct, howpublished = {\url{https://futurehistory.earth/timeline/29-2081}}, note = {Last updated 2026-10-11. Data as of BLS OEWS May 2025; BLS Employment Projections 2025-35}, }

The access date is today's date on your device.

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1850187519001925195019752000now
Country
2026
Known then as Optician / Spectacle Maker (artisan-trade era)
Known then as Dispensing Optician / Ophthalmic Dispenser (professionalization era)
Known then as Dispensing Optician / Optical Dispenser (licensing-movement era)
Known then as Licensed Dispensing Optician (state-licensing era)
Known then as Opticians, Dispensing (BLS SOC 29-2081)
Known today as Opticians, Dispensing (BLS SOC 29-2081)
Projected to still be called Opticians, Dispensing (BLS SOC 29-2081)
Data from the May 2025 survey
US Employment
74K
Est.

Stated in source: BLS OEWS

Official statistic
Report an error
Median Annual Wage
$47,260
Est.

≈ $46,048 in 2024 prices (derived by us, CPI-adjusted)

Official statistic
Report an error
Beat · 1826

American Optical Company is founded in Southbridge, Massachusetts, by William Beecher. Starting as a small spectacle-making operation, it will grow into the largest manufacturer of optical products in the United States by the early 20th century. American Optical's Southbridge facility will employ thousands of workers and produce lenses, frames, safety glasses, and optical instruments, forming the industrial backbone of the US optical industry for over a century.

Beat · 1916

The Optical Society of America is founded, providing the first national professional framework for optical sciences including dispensing opticianry. The society's formation represents the professionalization of the optical trade from a craft into a recognized scientific field, laying groundwork for the state licensing campaigns that would follow over the next several decades.

Beat · 1959

Bernard Maitenaz at Societe des Lunetiers (later Essilor) invents the first commercially viable progressive addition lens, launching it as Varilux in France. US commercial availability followed in the early 1960s. Progressives will eventually account for the majority of all eyeglass lens prescriptions in the United States for patients over 45, fundamentally elevating the skill requirements for dispensing opticians who must fit them correctly to achieve the promised optical performance.

Beat · 1978

The Opticians Association of America (now the American Board of Opticianry / National Contact Lens Examiners, ABO-NCLE) establishes its voluntary national certification examination for dispensing opticians. The ABO credential becomes the de facto national professional standard, adopted as the licensing examination by most of the states that enact mandatory licensure laws through the 1980s and 1990s. States that require licensure include California, Florida, New York, Texas, and approximately 18 others; roughly half of US states still allow unlicensed optical dispensing under optometrist supervision.

Beat · 1983

LensCrafters opens its first store in Florence, Kentucky, with the proposition of grinding and dispensing prescription eyeglasses in one hour. The in-store lab model vertically integrates lens grinding with dispensing and transforms consumer expectations for optical retail. By 1990, LensCrafters operates over 600 locations. The chain optical format expands the total number of dispensing optician jobs but shifts employment from independent practices toward corporate settings with standardized pay scales.

Beat · 2010

Warby Parker launches in February 2010, founded by four Wharton MBA students, with the proposition that prescription eyeglasses could be sold direct-to-consumer for $95. Within five years it triggers a wave of DTC eyewear brands and forces a structural rethinking of the in-store dispensing value proposition. Warby Parker goes public in September 2021 via direct listing; by 2024 it operates over 260 retail locations staffed by its own licensed opticians and optometrists, blurring the line between online disruptor and in-person optical retailer.

Beat · 2025

NECO publishes research documenting a growing shortage of licensed dispensing opticians in states with active licensure requirements. The optician workforce is aging: median age is above 50 in most licensing states. Enrollment in optician training programs at community colleges declined significantly between 2000 and 2020 following program consolidations. NECO estimates that the annual throughput of new licensed opticians is insufficient to replace expected retirements in the next decade, particularly in states like Florida and Texas with rapidly growing older populations requiring progressive-lens dispensing.

How to read this number

OEWS is a point-in-time survey snapshot, not a continuous time series; BLS advises against using it for year-over-year trend comparison.

Each dot is a cited figure over time; the dotted line only links them (values between aren't measured). Hollow dots are estimates.

Official statistic: Copied by a script from a statistics agency table or a published study's table, not retyped by hand. BLS figures and the forecast and exposure tables are also re-checked against that table on every data run. Researched context: Researched from the cited source rather than copied from it by a script, so it is not machine-checked yet. Spot a mistake? Each figure has a “Report an error” link.

Cited forecasts · present → 2035

Will AI replace opticians? What the research says

Each figure is stated by the named source; we publish no forecasts of our own. Where sources disagree, we show the disagreement rather than an average.

Each figure is stated by the named source; we publish no forecasts of our own. Where sources disagree, the spread is the honest signal.

What published forecasts say
Forecast change in the number of people doing this work, as published by each named source. Bars share one scale on every role, centred on zero and reaching the end at ±30%. Grey marks a small change, 3% or less either way.
BLS Employment Projections 2025-35
→ 2035
+4.2%
BLS National Employment Matrix, 2025-35 cycle, line for SOC 29-2081 (Opticians, dispensing): 74.3 thousand jobs in 2025, projected 77.4 thousand in 2035, a change of +3.1 thousand (+4.2%). Matrix employment counts all jobs in the occupation, including self-employed workers (1.6% of this occupation in 2025). The average for all occupations in this cycle is +3.5%.
Official statisticReport an error
How exposed is this work to AI (research measures)
Scores as published by each study. Each row says what it measures. These measure what AI could technically do, not forecasts of jobs lost.
Eloundou et al. (2023), "GPTs are GPTs"
2023 study · Share of tasks exposed to LLMs (β, human-rated)
23.8%
of tasks
What this measures

Published occupation-level exposure from the paper's occ_level.csv for O*NET-SOC 29-2081.00 Opticians, Dispensing. Shown: human-rated β = 0.238, the share of the occupation's tasks an LLM could do in at least half the time at equal quality, counting tasks that need LLM-powered software at half weight (β = E1 + 0.5 × E2). Other published measures for this occupation: human-rated α (LLM alone) 0.143 and γ (all LLM-assisted) 0.333; GPT-4-rated β 0.286. This measures how much of the work an LLM could touch, not how many jobs disappear.

Official statisticReport an error
Today, in this role

What's changing day to day for opticians

Three parts of your work where AI is already doing real lifting, and what stays yours.

AI is sitting alongside you hereManage patient records, work orders, insurance pre-authorizations, and payment processing within an optical practice management system (MaximEyes, RevolutionEHR), using AI-assisted billing to reduce claim denials.

Manage patient records, work orders, insurance pre-authorizations, and payment processing within an optical practice management system (MaximEyes, RevolutionEHR), using AI-assisted billing to reduce claim denials.[6],[5]

Tools picking this up
Where your edge is

Learn how to interpret AI billing flags and override them correctly; high-denial rates damage practice revenue and opticians who understand vision plan coding (VSP, EyeMed, Davis Vision) are valued for it.

AI is sitting alongside you hereGuide patients through frame selection using virtual try-on technology combined with face-shape analysis, then confirm the final choice fits facial anatomy and optical prescription requirements.

Guide patients through frame selection using virtual try-on technology combined with face-shape analysis, then confirm the final choice fits facial anatomy and optical prescription requirements.[7],[8]

Tools picking this up
Where your edge is

Use virtual try-on data as a starting point, then apply hands-on judgment for bridge fit, temple tension, and occupational needs that camera-based tools cannot assess.

AI is sitting alongside you hereUse a digital centration system (such as Essilor VisiOffice X+ or Zeiss VISUFIT 1000) to capture pupillary distance, fitting height, pantoscopic tilt, and frame wrap angle, then review AI-flagged anomalies before submitting the work order to the lab.

Use a digital centration system (such as Essilor VisiOffice X+ or Zeiss VISUFIT 1000) to capture pupillary distance, fitting height, pantoscopic tilt, and frame wrap angle, then review AI-flagged anomalies before submitting the work order to the lab.[9],[10]

Where your edge is

Learn the calibration and override protocols for digital centration instruments so you can catch edge cases (high-power prism, monocular PD asymmetry) the automated system can miss.

Where opticians go next

Natural next steps for someone with your foundation: not exits, evolutions.

What each move takes

A direction you could grow

Medical and Health Services Managers

Experienced opticians who manage optical retail departments or multi-location practice operations naturally move into Medical and Health Services Manager roles overseeing staffing, inventory, revenue cycle, and patient-experience metrics. The role draws on both the optical knowledge base and the administrative skills (practice management software, insurance coordination) already in use.

What you'd add
  • · Healthcare business operations and P&L management
  • · Vision plan contracting and revenue cycle management
  • · Staff hiring, scheduling, and performance management
  • · Healthcare compliance (HIPAA, state optician licensing regulations)
What it takesSome new skills to pick up
Tools of the era

How has the work of opticians changed since 1850?

The tools that defined the work, one line per era. Select an era to see how it reshaped the work.

  • Hand tools + millimeter rule (artisan fitting era)

    The dispensing optician of the 19th century worked with a small set of hand tools: a millimeter rule or compass for measuring pupillary distance, trial frames and lens blanks for approximating the correct power, and pliers and a frame warmer for bending metal frames to fit a face. The lenses themselves were ground by a separate lens-making trade, and the optician's job was fitting and dispensing rather than manufacturing. Prescription accuracy depended entirely on the optician's manual skill and understanding of basic optics. No written standards existed for fitting tolerances; quality was determined by whether the patient could see comfortably through the finished pair.

  • Lensometer (Vertometer / Lensometer; AO Lensometer commercialized 1921)

    The lensometer, a device for measuring the exact power of a finished lens, was commercialized by American Optical in 1921 (marketed as the "Vertometer"). Before the lensometer, an optician verified a completed pair of glasses by holding them up to a trial-frame setup or relying on the patient's reported comfort. The lensometer standardized quality control: any completed pair could be checked in under a minute against the prescription, and rejections were returned to the lab with objective power measurements rather than subjective complaints. It became the mandatory verification tool for every optical dispensary and is still in daily use in every optical retail setting today, now in electronic form. The lensometer shifted the optician's role from artisan-judgement work toward a measurable, tolerance-based standard of care.

    Effect on the work

    The lensometer did not displace dispensing opticians; it made their work more auditable and reduced the remake rate for incorrectly ground lenses, improving shop economics. It is one of the few tools in the profession that genuinely amplified quality without reducing headcount.

  • Progressive addition lenses (Varilux 1959; mainstream adoption 1965-1975)

    Bernard Maitenaz at Societe des Lunetiers (later Essilor) invented the first commercially viable progressive addition lens and Essilor launched Varilux in France in 1959; US introduction followed in the early 1960s. Progressive lenses replaced bifocals and trifocals for presbyopic patients by providing a seamless corridor of increasing power from distance to near, but fitting them required a substantially higher level of dispensing skill than single-vision or flat-top bifocals. The optician now had to measure the fitting height (the position of the patient's pupil in the frame) accurately for the progressive corridor to land correctly, and had to counsel patients on the adaptation process, including the limited peripheral vision zones at the sides. Progressives elevated the professional ceiling of dispensing opticians: a poorly fitted progressive caused vertiginous side-effects and demanded a remake, so shops that employed skilled fitters had a measurable competitive advantage over those that did not.

    Effect on the work

    Progressive lenses increased the time-per-patient required for a competent dispensing encounter versus single-vision dispensing. This did not reduce employment but increased the value of skilled, experienced opticians relative to entry-level staff.

  • LensCrafters in-store optical lab (one-hour glasses, 1983)

    LensCrafters opened its first store in Florence, Kentucky in 1983 with the then-radical proposition of grinding and dispensing prescription eyeglasses in one hour in-store. Before LensCrafters, the typical optical dispensary sent lens orders to a remote laboratory and asked patients to return in one to two weeks. The in-store lab model vertically integrated the lens-grinding step with the dispensing step, changing how optical retail was staffed: each LensCrafters location employed both licensed dispensing opticians and licensed laboratory technicians, creating a new two-trade model within a single retail footprint. By 1990, LensCrafters had hundreds of locations. Pearle Vision, the other major chain, adopted similar in-store lab approaches. The "while-you-wait" format became the consumer expectation and restructured independent optical retail as well.

    Effect on the work

    The LensCrafters model increased the total number of optical dispensing jobs by creating large-format stores requiring several opticians per location, but it also concentrated employment in corporate optical chains rather than independent practices, shifting wage-setting away from individual owner-operators toward standardized corporate pay scales.

  • Electronic lensometer + pupillometer (auto-refractor-linked centration)

    Digital lensometers, introduced commercially in the 1990s and widely adopted in the 2000s, automated the lens-power verification step: the optician places a lens in the device and it reads sphere, cylinder, axis, add, and prism in seconds without manual manipulation of a mire target. Digital pupillometers (separate from the lensometer) measured pupillary distance electrically using infrared sensors, replacing the mm-rule-and-penlight technique that had been the standard since the 1850s. These tools sped up the quality-control and measurement workflow per patient, allowing each optician to handle a higher daily patient volume.

    Effect on the work

    Electronic measurement instruments did not reduce optician headcount but allowed fewer opticians to process more patients per day in chain optical settings, mildly compressing staffing ratios at high-volume retail formats.

  • Online eyewear retail disruption (Warby Parker 2010; 1-800-Contacts; GlassesUSA)

    Warby Parker launched in February 2010 with the proposition that stylish prescription eyeglasses did not need to cost hundreds of dollars from an optical retailer and could be bought online for far less. Within five years, it had triggered a wave of direct-to-consumer eyewear brands and forced a significant rethinking of the dispensing optician's role. The segment of the job most easily displaced was the frame-selection consultation: online retailers offered home try-on programs, virtual fitting tools, and liberal return policies that replicated some of what an in-store optician did when guiding frame selection. The parts of the job that could not be replicated online, including physical centration measurement, lens-power verification, and frame adjustment after delivery, proved stickier. The net effect was a bifurcation of optical retail: commodity single-vision glasses shifted substantially toward online and warehouse-club formats, while progressive lenses, high-index lenses, and specialty fits continued to favor in-person dispensing.

    Effect on the work

    Online eyewear did not cause a measured decline in BLS-tracked dispensing optician employment through 2019, but it suppressed growth that would otherwise have occurred and accelerated the transition of employment from independent optical practices to chains and clinical settings where the dispensing encounter was harder to replicate online.

  • AI centration systems + virtual try-on (Zeiss VISUFIT 1000; Essilor VisiOffice X+; Fittingbox)

    The Zeiss VISUFIT 1000, introduced commercially around 2018, used nine synchronized cameras to capture a patient's facial geometry in a single shot, computing pupillary distance, fitting height, vertex distance, pantoscopic tilt, and frame wrap angle simultaneously in about a minute. Essilor's VisiOffice X+ followed with AI-assisted autoboxing that detected the patient's eyes and the frame in a single image and auto-populated the work order. These systems reduced the manual centration measurement step and improved repeatability markedly over the mm-rule technique. Fittingbox and similar virtual try-on platforms extended the frame-selection step to include AI-driven face-shape analysis and photorealistic AR overlay, providing an in-store digital experience that was meaningfully richer than the unaided optician's visual judgment. MaximEyes AI (launched 2025) added AI-powered billing, scheduling, and SOAP-note scribing to the optical practice management workflow, reducing administrative burden per patient per practice. Together these tools represent the current augmentation frontier: the optician's throughput rises and measurement accuracy improves, but the core patient interaction remains in-person.

    Effect on the work

    AI centration and practice management tools have not displaced dispensing opticians at scale but have increased the productivity gap between digitally equipped practices and those still using manual measurement methods, putting competitive pressure on older-format independent optical shops.

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Opticians, Dispensing employment and pay by year

On record since1850
Latest US employment73,530 (May 2025)Source: BLS OEWS May 2025Official statisticReport an error
Latest US median pay$47,260 (May 2025)Source: BLS OEWS May 2025Official statisticReport an error
Outlook+4.2% by 2035Source: BLS Employment Projections 2025-35Official statisticReport an error

In other countries

The latest figure each country's statistics agency publishes for this job. Each uses its own occupation definition, survey basis and currency, so the numbers are not directly comparable with each other or with the US figures.

  • Canada (NOC 32100)

    Employment, 2020
    9,555, Statistics Canada Census 2021 Official statistic Report an errorStatistics Canada Census of Population 2021: number of persons with employment income in NOC 32100 Opticians, Canada, reference year 2020. A recipients basis (anyone with employment income during the year), slightly broader than a point-in-time employed count. Statistics Canada Open Licence.
    Median pay, 2020
    C$52,400, Statistics Canada Census 2021 Official statistic Report an errorStatistics Canada Census of Population 2021 (Table 98-10-0586): median employment income for NOC 32100 Opticians, Canada, reference year 2020, full-year full-time workers (the basis comparable to the US OEWS full-time median). Statistics Canada Open Licence.
View all 28 years of cited US data, each linked to its source
YearUS employmentAnnual pay (median unless marked)SourceReport
190012,000n/aEst., Derived estimate from the 1900 U.S… Researched contextReport
194028,000n/aDecennial Census 1940 Researched contextReport
197054,000$7,800Est., Estimate based on BLS Occupational… Researched contextReport
199065,000$22,400BLS CPS Researched contextReport
200066,580n/aBLS OEWS 2000 Official statisticReport
200363,780$26,350BLS OEWS May 2003 Official statisticReport
200462,350$27,950BLS OEWS May 2004 Official statisticReport
200570,090$29,000BLS OEWS May 2005 Official statisticReport
200665,190$30,300BLS OEWS May 2006 Official statisticReport
200762,420$31,430BLS OEWS May 2007 Official statisticReport
200859,470$32,810BLS OEWS May 2008 Official statisticReport
200960,840$32,740BLS OEWS May 2009 Official statisticReport
201062,200$32,940BLS OEWS May 2010 Official statisticReport
201160,680$33,100BLS OEWS May 2011 Official statisticReport
201264,930$33,330BLS OEWS May 2012 Official statisticReport
201368,390$33,770BLS OEWS May 2013 Official statisticReport
201473,110$34,280BLS OEWS May 2014 Official statisticReport
201573,520$34,840BLS OEWS May 2015 Official statisticReport
201675,270$35,530BLS OEWS May 2016 Official statisticReport
201775,450$36,250BLS OEWS May 2017 Official statisticReport
201872,250$37,010BLS OEWS May 2018 Official statisticReport
201972,330$37,840BLS OEWS May 2019 Official statisticReport
202068,180$38,530BLS OEWS May 2020 Official statisticReport
202173,270$37,570BLS OEWS May 2021 Official statisticReport
202273,460$39,610BLS OEWS May 2022 Official statisticReport
202376,770$44,170BLS OEWS May 2023 Official statisticReport
202479,690$46,560BLS OEWS May 2024 Official statisticReport
202573,530$47,260BLS OEWS May 2025 Official statisticReport
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