Athletic Trainers

Minimal Risk
Low High

Explore safer careers (1)

Lower estimated automation risk

Recreational Therapists
4% automation risk | Minimal Risk
8.9 pts lower View career
Why it fits

Applies activity planning, functional goals, rehabilitation teamwork, patient motivation, safety, and documentation.

Alternative careers

Related career paths that build on similar skills and experience

Occupational Therapy Assistants
20% automation risk | Low Risk
Pays better Higher growth
View career
Why it fits

Uses functional assessment, adaptive exercises, patient support, safety, progress notes, and care-team communication.

Physical Therapist Assistants
18% automation risk | Minimal Risk
Higher growth More jobs
View career
Why it fits

Applies injury rehab, therapeutic exercise, patient monitoring, documentation, safety, and therapist collaboration.

Coaches and Scouts
10% automation risk | Minimal Risk
More jobs
2.9 pts lower View career
Why it fits

Transfers athlete communication, practice coverage, performance feedback, injury awareness, conditioning, and team routines.


Share your results with friends and family.

Occupation snapshot

What does this snowflake show?
The Snowflake is a visual summary of the five badges: Automation Risk (calculated), Risk (polled), Growth, Wages and Volume. It gives you an instant snapshot of an occupations profile. The colour of the Snowflake relates to its size. The better the occupation scores in relation to others, the larger and greener the Snowflake becomes.
JOB SCORE
7.5/10
What's this?
Job Score (higher is better):

We rate jobs using four factors. These are:

- Chance of being automated
- Job growth
- Wages
- Volume of available positions

These are some key things to think about when job hunting.

Risk & user votes

Calculated automation risk

13% (Minimal Risk)

Minimal Risk (0-20%): This occupation appears difficult to replace end-to-end with current or near-future automation, including AI software and robotics. Roles in this range usually depend on human judgement, creativity, care, leadership, specialist expertise, or adapting to messy real-world situations. AI and machines may still change parts of the work, but the occupation is likely to remain a distinct human role.

More information on what this score is, and how it is calculated is available here.

Human strengths important in this job

These are human abilities and work contexts that are important in this occupation. They may help explain why parts of the role are harder to replace end-to-end, but they are not the only inputs into the automation score.

Assisting and caring for others

Very important
Why this matters
Provide hands-on help, emotional support, or personal care to people—work that depends on empathy, trust, and responding to individual needs in the moment.
Jobs that also use this strength

Decision-making and problem solving

Very important
Why this matters
Analyze information, weigh tradeoffs, and choose the best solution—especially when situations are ambiguous, high-stakes, or have real-world consequences.
Jobs that also use this strength

Psychology knowledge

Very important
Why this matters
Understanding human behavior, motivation, and individual differences to assess needs, respond appropriately, and support behavior change or mental health.
Jobs that also use this strength

Thinking creatively

Quite important
Why this matters
Coming up with original ideas and designs—creating new concepts, products, systems, or artistic work. This kind of open-ended invention and taste-based judgment is harder to automate end-to-end than routine, rule-based tasks.
Jobs that also use this strength

Persuasion

Quite important
Why this matters
Influencing people to change their minds or behavior through conversation, trust, and negotiation.
Jobs that also use this strength
Show 4 more strengths

Developing objectives and strategies

Quite important
Why this matters
Sets long-term goals and chooses strategies and actions to reach them, weighing tradeoffs and adapting plans as conditions change.
Jobs that also use this strength

Communicating with people outside the organization

Quite important
Why this matters
Represents the organization to customers, the public, or government—handling questions, concerns, and relationship-building through conversations, writing, calls, or email.
Jobs that also use this strength

Active learning

Quite important
Why this matters
Keeps learning from new information and applying it to make better decisions now and in the future, especially when situations change.
Jobs that also use this strength

Education and training expertise

Quite important
Why this matters
Designing and delivering instruction—adapting lessons to different learners and measuring whether training actually works.
Jobs that also use this strength

What users think

Based on 104 votes

26% chance of full automation within the next two decades

Our visitors have voted there's a low chance this occupation will be automated. This assessment is further supported by the calculated automation risk level, which estimates 13% chance of automation.

What do you think the risk of automation is?

What is the likelihood that Athletic Trainers will be replaced by robots or artificial intelligence within the next 20 years?

Sentiment

Based on user votes over time

View sentiment trend

How opinions have changed over time

Pay & outlook

Wages

Moderately paid relative to other professions

In 2024, the median annual wage for Athletic Trainers was $60,250 ($29 per hour).

The median annual wage for Athletic Trainers was 21.7% higher than the national median annual wage, which stood at $49,500.

View wage trend

Wages over time

* Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics

Growth

Very fast growth relative to other professions

The number of 'Athletic Trainers' job openings is expected to rise 11.1% by 2034

View employment trend

Total employment, and estimated job openings

* Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics for the period between 2023 and 2033
Updated projections are due 09-2025.

Volume

Lower range of job opportunities compared to other professions

As of 2024 there were 28,950 people employed as 'Athletic Trainers' within the United States.

This represents around < 0.001% of the employed workforce across the country

Put another way, around 1 in 5 thousand people are employed as 'Athletic Trainers'.

People also viewed

Lawyers Computer Programmers Actors Graphic Designers Web Developers

What people are saying (4)

Rebekah (Low)
30 Mar 2021 16:48
This is Athletes we are talking about. And how does a machine replace the emotional and human interactions that is required for this job?
joe (Highly likely)
25 May 2023 16:37
you don't get it, there are other ways the machine can aid in emotional interactions ;-)
Alan
28 Jul 2024 21:53
No, you don’t get it, doing it with a machine doesn’t count ;-)

Sorry bud, but machines, hentai pillows, or AI generated images can never replace real human interaction. If you think they can, you need to go out and touch some real grass, because only someone really socially inexperienced would think so. Once you leave your little anti social cave and pull a real woman for once you’ll understand.
Lukas With a K
04 Sep 2025 17:16
Cold

Leave a reply about this occupation
0/8000

Job description

Evaluate and treat musculoskeletal injuries or illnesses. Provide preventive, therapeutic, emergency, and rehabilitative care.

O*NET-SOC code: 29-9091.00