Quality assurance technician vs quality assurance specialist

The differences between quality assurance technicians and quality assurance specialists can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. It typically takes 2-4 years to become both a quality assurance technician and a quality assurance specialist. Additionally, a quality assurance specialist has an average salary of $63,443, which is higher than the $40,027 average annual salary of a quality assurance technician.

The top three skills for a quality assurance technician include food safety, GMP and lab equipment. The most important skills for a quality assurance specialist are GMP, patients, and FDA.

Quality assurance technician vs quality assurance specialist overview

	Quality Assurance Technician	Quality Assurance Specialist
Yearly salary	$40,027	$63,443
Hourly rate	$19.24	$30.50
Growth rate	3%	6%
Number of jobs	81,534	83,505
Job satisfaction	-	-
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 52%	Bachelor's Degree, 58%
Average age	45	44
Years of experience	4	4

What does a quality assurance technician do?

Quality assurance is an essential part of a company that offers products and services. It is critical that the company's output remains consistent and up to par with community standards. It is the assistant quality assurance manager's role to inspect, monitor, and evaluate the quality of every product. The goal is to establish customer satisfaction and trust. The assistant quality assurance manager works with the head manager and helps generate reports of daily activities for executive evaluations.

What does a quality assurance specialist do?

A quality assurance specialist is an individual who is responsible for monitoring, inspecting, and proposing measures to correct and improve a company's product. Quality assurance specialists need to outline quality assurance policies and procedures, making sure that quality standards are assured. It is important that a quality assurance specialist should have strong attention to detail and is excellent in data collection. This work may require a minimum of bachelor's degree and certification to get certified.

Quality assurance technician vs quality assurance specialist salary

Quality assurance technicians and quality assurance specialists have different pay scales, as shown below.

	Quality Assurance Technician	Quality Assurance Specialist
Average salary	$40,027	$63,443
Salary range	Between $26,000 And $60,000	Between $41,000 And $97,000
Highest paying City	Baltimore, MD	San Francisco, CA
Highest paying state	Hawaii	Rhode Island
Best paying company	SMTC	Apple
Best paying industry	Technology	Pharmaceutical

Differences between quality assurance technician and quality assurance specialist education

There are a few differences between a quality assurance technician and a quality assurance specialist in terms of educational background:

	Quality Assurance Technician	Quality Assurance Specialist
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 52%	Bachelor's Degree, 58%
Most common major	Biology	Business
Most common college	Purdue University	Stanford University

Quality assurance technician vs quality assurance specialist demographics

Here are the differences between quality assurance technicians' and quality assurance specialists' demographics:

	Quality Assurance Technician	Quality Assurance Specialist
Average age	45	44
Gender ratio	Male, 57.6% Female, 42.4%	Male, 42.8% Female, 57.2%
Race ratio	Black or African American, 9.5% Unknown, 4.9% Hispanic or Latino, 16.8% Asian, 8.2% White, 59.8% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.7%	Black or African American, 6.2% Unknown, 4.7% Hispanic or Latino, 8.8% Asian, 12.0% White, 67.7% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.5%
LGBT Percentage	6%	11%

Differences between quality assurance technician and quality assurance specialist duties and responsibilities

Quality assurance technician example responsibilities.

Track and manage CAPA's.
Train test personnel and manage QC test technicians in a fast pace environment.
Train newly hire technicians and used strong math and computing skill for data entry and records.
Approve NCR investigations and CAPA records.
Assist math, reading and other product teams with testing and reporting of any issues find during new product development.
Perform quality control experiments such as HPLC favor testing for the company's main ingredient produce within their leading product.

Quality assurance specialist example responsibilities.

Manage all NDT relate gauges to ensure calibrations requirements are meet.
Provide employee training and manage all NDT certification records per ASNT SNT-TC-1A.
Lead the HACCP team to ensure full compliance with regulatory and industrial food safety standards.
Manage product and environmental sampling for chemical and microbial analysis to meet HACCP requirements.
Lead cross functional project team to build user-friendly windows base customer support applications which interface with the OmniPlan/OmniPlus mainframe application.
Execute quality processes in tissue banking and medical device, FDA requirements 21 CFR 1271 and 21 CFR 820.

Quality assurance technician vs quality assurance specialist skills

Common quality assurance technician skills

Food Safety, 9%
GMP, 7%
Lab Equipment, 5%
Quality Products, 4%
Quality Standards, 4%
HACCP, 4%

Common quality assurance specialist skills

GMP, 6%
Patients, 5%
FDA, 5%
CAPA, 4%
Corrective Action, 4%
CFR, 4%

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Quality Assurance Technician vs Quality Assurance Specialist

Updated January 8, 2025

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