How To Become A Seismic Engineer: What It Is and Career Path

What is a seismic engineer 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 seismic engineer. For example, did you know that they make an average of $42.37 an hour? That's $88,120 a year! Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 2% and produce 100 job opportunities across the U.S.

ScoreSeismic EngineerUS Average

Salary

6.9

Avg. Salary $88,120

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

6.8

Growth rate 2%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

5.8

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.28%

Asian 26.66%

Black or African American 3.54%

Hispanic or Latino 8.58%

Unknown 4.50%

White 56.43%

Gender

female 9.68%

male 90.32%

Age - 42

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 - 42

Stress level

6.8

Stress level is high

7.1 - high

Complexity level

7.9

Complexity level is challenging

7 - challenging

Work life balance

3.8

Work life balance is poor

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a seismic engineer

Explore seismic engineer education requirements

Most common seismic engineer degrees

Bachelor's

67.7 %

Master's

21.0 %

Doctorate

6.5 %

Start to develop specific seismic engineer skills

Skills	Percentages
Technical Support	27.20%
Stress Analysis	24.62%
Retrofit	17.53%
Nuclear Power	11.44%
R	7.28%

Complete relevant seismic engineer training and internships

Accountants spend an average of 2-4 years on post-employment, on-the-job training. New seismic engineers 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 seismic engineer based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real seismic engineer resumes.

Research seismic engineer duties and responsibilities

Authore substantiation documents in compliance with FAA regulations and customer requirements to achieve type certifications and supplemental type certifications.
Cover all aspects of QC and in-file processing.
Company's algorithms have been develop for streamer data and are not appropriate for an OBC project.
Supervise a team which design and construct the first 1 11/16"3 axis VSP tool for Schlumberger.

Prepare your seismic engineer resume

When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your seismic engineer 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 seismic engineer resume. You'll find resume tips and examples of skills, responsibilities, and summaries, all provided by Zippi, your career sidekick.

Choose from 10+ customizable seismic engineer resume templates

Build a professional seismic engineer 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 seismic engineer resume.