Illinois nurse salary 2026: RN, NP & travel pay

Illinois RNs average $94,360/year — 7.0% below the national mean. But the INA (Illinois Nurses Association) just secured a landmark win: Illinois hospitals now must publicly disclose monthly nurse staffing data by unit, giving nurses real leverage they didn't have before. Add a 77% unionization vote at Rush University Medical Center in May 2026 and Chicago is entering a fundamentally different labor moment than it was two years ago.

Illinois occupies a middle position in U.S. nursing pay — below the national mean at the headline level, with Chicago functioning as one of the top-10 nursing labor markets in the country and downstate Illinois paying 15–25% less. The INA's public staffing disclosure win gives Chicago nurses something rare: verified, publicly available data showing what their hospital actually staffs versus what it plans to staff. That accountability mechanism is already reshaping conversations between nurses and hospital administrators across the city.

Two realities define how Illinois nursing pay actually works. First, Illinois is not an NLC compact state — every travel nurse needs a standalone Illinois license before taking an assignment, adding 4–8 weeks of lead time and a separate application cost. That licensing friction does not suppress Chicago travel rates; demand in specialty units is strong enough that nurses absorb the burden. Second, CRNA pay in Illinois punches 7% below the national mean: Northwestern Memorial, Rush University Medical Center, the University of Chicago Medicine, and Cook County Health all pay top-quartile rates for anesthesia providers.

The signal event for Illinois nursing in 2026 is the Rush University Medical Center union vote on May 18. Nurses voted 1,190 to 350 — 77% — to unionize with the National Nurses United. That margin is not a close call. With NNU already organized at the University of Chicago Medicine and Cook County Health, Chicago now has a concentrated bloc of unionized academic medical center nurses large enough to move the market. First-contract bargaining at Rush will set pay benchmarks that non-union Chicago systems will have to respond to.

Illinois RN Salary — The Numbers

The BLS May 2025 data puts Illinois's RN mean annual wage at $94,360/year ($45.36/hr). That is $12,220 below the national RN mean of $101,420 — a 12.4% deficit. The state figure is pulled down by downstate Illinois wages; Chicago-area academic medical centers are meaningfully above that number. Illinois's 4.95% flat income tax is higher than Pennsylvania's 3.07% and lower than California's top rates, but it applies uniformly regardless of income level.

Illinois's 4.95% flat income tax is not as favorable as Pennsylvania's 3.07%, but it is substantially better than states with progressive income taxes that push into the 8–13% range for higher earners. For a nurse earning $94,360 in Illinois, state income tax runs approximately $4,267/year. For a Chicago-area ICU nurse at $105,726, that figure climbs to $5,234/year — a real cost but not the dominant factor in take-home math. Chicago's cost of living in neighborhoods outside the downtown core is manageable relative to coastal markets. Use the cost-of-living calculator to compare Chicago against your current market before making any move.

Chicago vs. Downstate Illinois

The Illinois nursing market is two markets operating under a single state average. Chicago and its collar counties function as a distinct, competitive labor environment anchored by Level I academic medical centers. Downstate Illinois — which includes Peoria, Springfield, Rockford, and everything else outside the metro — pays significantly less and operates under different supply-demand conditions.

Chicago is anchored by Northwestern Memorial Hospital, Rush University Medical Center, the University of Chicago Medicine, Advocate Aurora Health (the largest system by volume in the metro), and Cook County Health (the public system). These employers set wages at or above the 70th percentile nationally for their respective specialties. Chicago-area academic medical center RNs earn $90,000–$115,000+ for staff positions, with specialty and night shift differentials pushing experienced ICU and OR nurses above $120,000. Union contracts at UCM and Cook County Health establish public pay floors that non-union systems in the market must remain competitive with.

Related: A 2026 workforce survey found 23% of nurses now want to leave the profession entirely — the highest rate on record. See what the data shows →

Downstate Illinois — OSF HealthCare, HSHS, Memorial Health, and smaller regional systems in central and southern Illinois — pays 15–25% below Chicago rates for equivalent positions. An ICU nurse who earns $105,000 at Northwestern might earn $78,000–$88,000 in Peoria or Springfield. Rural hospital staffing shortages across downstate Illinois are significant and drive consistent travel nursing demand in those markets. If your goal is maximizing gross wages, Chicago is where you work. If your goal is maximizing lifestyle-adjusted income, downstate Illinois with its dramatically lower cost of living warrants a serious look.

Travel Nursing in Illinois

Illinois is not an NLC compact state. This is the first and most important thing to know before pursuing an Illinois travel assignment. Every nurse — regardless of which NLC compact state their home license is in — must obtain a standalone, single-state Illinois license before working in Illinois. The Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation (IDFPR) handles nursing license applications, and processing times run 4–8 weeks depending on application volume and endorsement complexity.

The non-compact status is a real burden, but it does not meaningfully suppress Chicago contract rates. Demand in high-acuity Chicago units — Level I trauma ICUs, cardiac surgery services, NICU, and labor and delivery — is strong enough that travelers absorb the licensing friction and still find the contracts worth pursuing. The practical implication is lead time: start your Illinois license application the moment you know you want to pursue IL assignments. Do not wait until you have a contract offer. To get an Illinois RN license by endorsement, you apply through IDFPR with your original state's verification, fingerprinting, and application fee. The state does not accept expedited processing on a guaranteed timeline, so early submission is the only reliable way to meet assignment start dates.

ICU & ER Nurse Salary in Illinois

ICU nursing is where Illinois's compensation picture improves materially above the state average. Illinois ICU nurses average $105,726/year — 24% above the national ICU mean of $85,205. That premium reflects the concentration of Level I and Level II trauma centers in Chicago, the academic medical center environment that rewards specialized critical care expertise, and the presence of union contracts at several major systems that establish higher pay floors for ICU staff.

ER nursing pay in Illinois is slightly below the national mean — a contrast with the strong ICU numbers. The gap between ICU and ER pay in Illinois ($21,676) is substantial and reflects how much academic medical center ICU premium work inflates critical care figures while ER pay tracks closer to the broader state RN average. If critical care is your specialty and you can get into a Chicago academic medical center ICU, Illinois is a strong market. If ER is your specialty, the below-average ER figure means Illinois's non-compact licensing burden needs to be weighed against the market fundamentals more carefully.

Nurse Practitioner Salary in Illinois

Illinois NPs earn approximately $119,026/year (Salary.com 2026) — $18,274 below the national NP mean of $137,300. This is not a coincidence. It is a direct and quantifiable cost of Illinois's scope-of-practice restrictions.

Illinois does not have full NP practice authority. Illinois NPs must operate under a written collaborative agreement with a physician, and that agreement is required to prescribe controlled substances. In FPA states — where NPs practice and prescribe independently — NP wages run $13,000–$25,000 higher on average. Illinois NPs are restricted to the collaborative practice model, and that suppresses both earning potential and practice autonomy in direct proportion.

The Primary Care NP coalition (PCNP) has advocated for FPA legislation in Illinois, but as of May 2026, no bill has passed. NPs in Illinois who want higher earning potential have limited in-state options: move into academic, specialty, or hospital-employed NP roles where the collaborative agreement is structurally embedded and compensation is benchmarked against attending-equivalent functions — or work at federally qualified health centers where FQHC pay scales and loan repayment programs partially offset the scope penalty. NPs who relocate to neighboring FPA states — Wisconsin, Iowa, or Michigan — will find meaningfully higher earning potential.

CRNA Salary in Illinois

Illinois CRNAs earn $240,879/year (TheCRNA.com 2026 blended data) — 3% below the national CRNA mean of $248,320. That near-parity is the strongest showing in Illinois nursing pay. Chicago's concentration of Level I academic medical centers with active cardiac surgery, transplant, and neurosurgical programs creates consistent demand for high-acuity anesthesia providers. Northwestern Memorial Hospital, Rush University Medical Center, the University of Chicago Medicine, and Cook County Health are the dominant CRNA employers in the metro.

Illinois allows independent CRNA practice, which supports stronger compensation structures relative to states where CRNAs must work under physician supervision requirements. For CRNAs considering Illinois, the combination of above-average pay, independent practice authority, and access to some of the most complex case types in the Midwest makes Chicago a market worth targeting. CRNA travel rates in Illinois run $3,400–$5,000/week for specialty anesthesia coverage, with academic medical center and cardiac surgery assignments commanding the top of that range.

Illinois Public Staffing Disclosure Law

Illinois passed a hospital staffing transparency law that the INA (Illinois Nurses Association) championed as one of its top legislative priorities. The law requires hospitals to publicly disclose monthly nurse staffing data by unit. Every covered hospital must post actual staffing levels — the number of nurses assigned per shift per unit — on a monthly basis. The data is publicly accessible, which means nurses, patients, and the press can review it.

This is not a staffing ratio mandate. Illinois hospitals are not required to maintain specific nurse-to-patient ratios the way California hospitals are. What the law creates is public accountability: hospitals must report what they actually staff, and that data can be compared against the hospital's own internal staffing plans, against prior months, and against peer institutions. A hospital that consistently staffs below its own published plan is now documenting that gap for public record.

For working nurses, the practical value of this law is data. If your unit is chronically understaffed relative to the hospital's own staffing plan, that is now documented in public filings. That documentation is useful in grievance processes, in collective bargaining, in OSHA complaints, and in conversations with charge nurses and administrators. The INA maintains resources at illinoisnurses.com to help nurses understand and use the disclosure data. This law represents meaningful progress toward the accountability infrastructure that would be needed before the Illinois legislature could credibly mandate specific ratios.

Rush University Unionization — What It Means for Chicago Nursing Pay

On May 18, 2026, nurses at Rush University Medical Center voted 1,190 to 350 — a 77% margin — to unionize with the National Nurses United. Approximately 2,000 nurses are covered. The vote was not close. A 77% margin in a union election at a major academic medical center reflects deep and organized dissatisfaction, not a swing-vote outcome that management can attribute to temporary conditions.

NNU is now organized at three of Chicago's flagship academic medical centers: Rush University Medical Center, the University of Chicago Medicine, and Cook County Health. That concentration matters for the market. When multiple unionized systems in the same labor market negotiate contracts concurrently or sequentially, the results are additive — each contract sets or updates a benchmark that the next negotiation references. This is how union density translates into broader wage pressure. It is the same dynamic that has played out in New York City, the Twin Cities, and California over the past decade.

First-contract bargaining at Rush will be watched closely by every nurse in the Chicago market. The NNU's stated priorities entering bargaining at similar facilities have included unit-specific staffing ratios, pay transparency, and wage structures that distinguish experience levels more sharply than management's preferred single-band scales. Comparable first contracts in other major markets — at Minnesota academic medical centers in 2023 and New York Health + Hospitals in 2022 — produced average raises in the 15–22% range over contract terms. If Rush follows that pattern, it will create public, documented pay benchmarks that Northwestern, Advocate Aurora, and other non-union Chicago systems will face pressure to match.

The Bottom Line

Illinois is a good state for experienced nurses in the right specialties. ICU nurses and CRNAs in Chicago earn above-average pay, independent CRNA practice is permitted, and the INA's staffing disclosure win creates a real accountability mechanism that most states lack. NPs are penalized directly by the collaborative agreement requirement — $7,060 below the national mean is the measured cost of Illinois's refusal to grant full practice authority, and it will not close until the law changes. Travel nurses face a non-compact licensing burden that adds lead time but not a deterrent to Chicago rates for specialty assignments. The Rush unionization vote and existing NNU presence at UCM and Cook County Health represent genuine upward wage pressure on the Chicago market — first-contract outcomes at Rush will determine whether that pressure translates into documented pay benchmarks over the next 12–18 months.