How To Become A Contact Lens Fitter: What It Is and Career Path

What is a contact lens fitter and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

2 min read

There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a contact lens fitter. For example, did you know that they make an average of $29.76 an hour? That's $61,893 a year! Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 4% and produce 2,800 job opportunities across the U.S.

ScoreContact Lens FitterUS Average

Salary

4.8

Avg. Salary $61,893

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

6.4

Growth rate 4%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

8.6

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.34%

Asian 8.11%

Black or African American 3.42%

Hispanic or Latino 15.07%

Unknown 3.65%

White 69.41%

Gender

female 58.33%

male 41.67%

Age - 44

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 3.00%

Asian 7.00%

Black or African American 14.00%

Hispanic or Latino 19.00%

White 57.00%

Gender

female 47.00%

male 53.00%

Age - 44

Stress level

6.4

Stress level is manageable

7.1 - high

Complexity level

7.7

Complexity level is challenging

7 - challenging

Work life balance

7.4

Work life balance is good

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a contact lens fitter

Explore contact lens fitter education requirements

Most common contact lens fitter degrees

Associate

41.7 %

Bachelor's

33.3 %

Doctorate

16.7 %

Start to develop specific contact lens fitter skills

Skills	Percentages
R	53.32%
EMR	46.68%

Complete relevant contact lens fitter training and internships

Accountants spend an average of 2-4 years on post-employment, on-the-job training. New contact lens fitters learn the skills and techniques required for their job and employer during this time. The chart below shows how long it takes to gain competency as a contact lens fitter based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real contact lens fitter resumes.

Research contact lens fitter duties and responsibilities

Maintain coating quality using adhesion testing and spectrophotometers, and manage coating hues and reflectance adjustments.
Schedule appointments, insurance filing and pretest patients for exams using various instrumentation.
Utilize schematics to troubleshoot tank electronics.

Prepare your contact lens fitter resume

When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your contact lens fitter resume.

You can use Zippia's AI resume builder to make the resume writing process easier while also making sure that you include key information that hiring managers expect to see on a contact lens fitter resume. You'll find resume tips and examples of skills, responsibilities, and summaries, all provided by Zippi, your career sidekick.

Choose from 10+ customizable contact lens fitter resume templates

Build a professional contact lens fitter resume in minutes. Browse through our resume examples to identify the best way to word your resume. Then choose from 10+ resume templates to create your contact lens fitter resume.