A drilling engineer is responsible for planning and executing operations that drill for gas and oil. They are involved in the entire drilling life cycle, from initial well design to testing to supervising a drilling crew. Drilling engineers often work on teams of geologists, drilling contractors, and other construction managers.
The duties that they perform in this capacity include designing drilling plans, evaluating drilling sites, calculating overhead drilling costs, maintaining stakeholder communication, and monitoring drilling processes. Skills required for the position include data analysis, budgeting, interpersonal, analytical, and leadership. Educational requirements include a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering or a similar field. Prior experience may be given preference.
The average hourly salary for the position is $52.56, which amounts to $109,326 annually. The job requires flexibility at times; however, it compensates graciously. The career is expected to see growth in the near future and create new opportunities all across the United States.
Drilling Engineer Overview
Drilling Engineer Careers
There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a drilling engineer. For example, did you know that they make an average of $52.93 an hour? That's $110,085 a year!
Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 3% and produce 900 job opportunities across the U.S.
What Does a Drilling Engineer Do
There are certain skills that many drilling engineers have in order to accomplish their responsibilities. By taking a look through resumes, we were able to narrow down the most common skills for a person in this position. We discovered that a lot of resumes listed analytical skills, creativity and math skills.
When it comes to the most important skills required to be a drilling engineer, we found that a lot of resumes listed 10.4% of drilling engineers included safety meetings, while 9.4% of resumes included procedures, and 7.6% of resumes included cost estimates. Hard skills like these are helpful to have when it comes to performing essential job responsibilities.
When it comes to searching for a job, many search for a key term or phrase. Instead, it might be more helpful to search by industry, as you might be missing jobs that you never thought about in industries that you didn't even think offered positions related to the drilling engineer job title. But what industry to start with? Most drilling engineers actually find jobs in the energy and manufacturing industries.
How To Become a Drilling Engineer
If you're interested in becoming a drilling engineer, one of the first things to consider is how much education you need. We've determined that 75.8% of drilling engineers have a bachelor's degree. In terms of higher education levels, we found that 11.1% of drilling engineers have master's degrees. Even though most drilling engineers have a college degree, it's possible to become one with only a high school degree or GED.
Choosing the right major is always an important step when researching how to become a drilling engineer. When we researched the most common majors for a drilling engineer, we found that they most commonly earn bachelor's degree degrees or master's degree degrees. Other degrees that we often see on drilling engineer resumes include associate degree degrees or diploma degrees.
You may find that experience in other jobs will help you become a drilling engineer. In fact, many drilling engineer jobs require experience in a role such as engineering internship. Meanwhile, many drilling engineers also have previous career experience in roles such as field engineer or internship.
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Drilling Engineer Career Paths
In addition to switching up your job search, it might prove helpful to look at a career path for your specific job. Now, what's a career path you ask? Well, it's practically a map that shows how you might advance from one job title to another. Our career paths are especially detailed with salary changes. So, for example, if you started out with the role of drilling supervisor you might progress to a role such as supervisor eventually. Later on in your career, you could end up with the title operations vice president.
Drilling Engineer Jobs You Might Like
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Average Salary for a Drilling Engineer
Best Paying Cities
Recently Added Salaries
Job TitleCompany  | Company | Start Date | Salary |
|---|---|---|---|
EOG Resources, Inc. Drilling Engineer II Drilling Engineer II | EOG Resources, Inc. EOG Resources, Inc. | 03/09/2021 03/09/2021 | $135,00003/09/2021 $135,000 |
Northern Star (Pogo) LLC Drill and Blast Engineer Drill and Blast Engineer | Northern Star (Pogo) LLC Northern Star (Pogo) LLC | 02/19/2021 02/19/2021 | $94,84802/19/2021 $94,848 |
Schlumberger Technology Corporation Geomechanical Drilling Engineer Geomechanical Drilling Engineer | Schlumberger Technology Corporation Schlumberger Technology Corporation | 01/14/2021 01/14/2021 | $134,51401/14/2021 $134,514 |
Occidental Petroleum Corporation Drilling Engineer Drilling Engineer | Occidental Petroleum Corporation Occidental Petroleum Corporation | 12/15/2020 12/15/2020 | $96,00012/15/2020 $96,000 |
Occidental Petroleum Corporation Drilling Engineer Drilling Engineer | Occidental Petroleum Corporation Occidental Petroleum Corporation | 12/15/2020 12/15/2020 | $96,00012/15/2020 $96,000 |
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Top Colleges for Drilling Engineers
1. Stanford University
Stanford, CA • Private
2. University of Texas at Austin
Austin, TX • Public
3. Georgia Institute of Technology
Atlanta, GA • Public
4. Cornell University
Ithaca, NY • Private
5. Northwestern University
Evanston, IL • Private
6. Columbia University in the City of New York
New York, NY • Private
7. Johns Hopkins University
Baltimore, MD • Private
8. Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Cambridge, MA • Private
9. Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, PA • Private
10. Pennsylvania State University
University Park, PA • Public
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Top Skills For a Drilling Engineer
The skills section on your resume can be almost as important as the experience section, so you want it to be an accurate portrayal of what you can do. Luckily, we've found all of the skills you'll need so even if you don't have these skills yet, you know what you need to work on. Out of all the resumes we looked through, 10.4% of drilling engineers listed safety meetings on their resume, but soft skills such as analytical skills and creativity are important as well.
- Safety Meetings, 10.4%
- Procedures, 9.4%
- Cost Estimates, 7.6%
- Data Analysis, 6.2%
- BHA, 6.1%
- Other Skills, 60.3% See All Drilling Engineer Skills
Best States For a Drilling Engineer
Some places are better than others when it comes to starting a career as a drilling engineer. The best states for people in this position are Rhode Island, Oregon, New Hampshire, and Delaware. Drilling engineers make the most in Rhode Island with an average salary of $131,064. Whereas in Oregon and New Hampshire, they would average $129,648 and $129,305, respectively. While drilling engineers would only make an average of $125,779 in Delaware, you would still make more there than in the rest of the country. We determined these as the best states based on job availability and pay. By finding the median salary, cost of living, and using the Bureau of Labor Statistics' Location Quotient, we narrowed down our list of states to these four.
1. Oregon
$129,648
Avg. Salary
2. New Hampshire
$129,305
Avg. Salary
3. Delaware
$125,779
Avg. Salary
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