RN vs LPN Salary in Indiana: 2026 Comparison

Indiana is, by BLS occupational employment data, in the top five states for LPNs per capita, alongside West Virginia, Louisiana, Tennessee, and South Dakota. The reason is structural and worth understanding because it shapes both the job market and the pay landscape. Indiana has a large and well-developed long-term care, skilled nursing, and assisted living sector, with roughly 500 licensed nursing facilities statewide and a state Medicaid programme that historically has supported substantial LPN staffing in those facilities. The state also has a strong network of community-college LPN programs (Ivy Tech Community College has the largest LPN-program footprint in the state, with multiple campuses graduating cohorts every term), which keeps the supply pipeline well-fed.

The result is that Indiana LPNs have a relatively deep job market, with statewide LPN wages averaging $49,000 (a touch above the national LPN median) and Indianapolis-metro LPN pay approaching $51,000. The job market for LPNs is broader than in most states because of the long-term care concentration, and the Indiana State Board of Nursing allows LPNs a fairly wide scope including IV therapy after a Board-approved course. Hospital LPN employment is less common in Indiana acute care than in Arizona or Florida but more common than in Massachusetts or California.

The Indianapolis Hospital Wage Map

Indianapolis is the centre of Indiana RN employment and the labour market is shaped by a roughly even split among four major systems: IU Health (the academic medical centre system anchored by IU Health Methodist and IU Health University Hospital), Ascension St. Vincent, Community Health Network, and Franciscan Health. Each runs a multi-hospital network in metro Indianapolis, and the competitive dynamic among them keeps base RN pay reasonably competitive without any one system being able to set wages unilaterally. New-graduate RN base in Indianapolis at the major systems was in the $58,000 to $66,000 range in 2025, with experience curves bringing senior staff RNs to the high $70,000s and specialty-certified nurses to the low to mid $80,000s.

IU Health, as the academic medical centre, runs a meaningfully more structured nurse residency programme and a stronger specialty certification incentive structure than the community-based competitors. For nurses interested in academic-medical-centre depth (transplant, neurosciences, cancer), IU Health is the dominant option in Indiana. For nurses prioritising a more community-hospital working environment with broader practice variety, the Community Health Network and Franciscan Health systems are competitive.

The Smaller Indiana Metros and Their Hospital Anchors

Outside Indianapolis, Indiana's nursing employment is anchored by a handful of regional hospital systems that effectively dominate their local markets. Parkview Health is the dominant system in the Fort Wayne and northeast Indiana region. Deaconess and Ascension St. Vincent dominate the Evansville and southwest Indiana market. Beacon Health (associated with the Memorial Hospital of South Bend) and Saint Joseph Health System share the South Bend market. Each of these regional systems runs base RN pay roughly $4,000 to $6,000 below Indianapolis but with corresponding lower cost of living, so real purchasing power is competitive.

The Indiana LPN Scope: Broader Than Most

Indiana's LPN scope of practice is among the broader in the United States. Indiana LPNs may administer IV fluids, IV medications via established lines, and certain IV push medications after completing a Board-approved IV therapy course and specific protocol-driven training. This broad scope is part of why hospital LPN employment in Indiana is more common than in many states, and it widens the practical job market for LPN graduates beyond the long-term care core. The Indiana State Board of Nursing maintains the IV therapy curriculum approval list and publishes scope-of-practice clarification documents on a regular cycle.

Compact Licence Status and the Border Markets

Indiana is a Nurse Licensure Compact state. This is meaningful because Indiana borders four other states (Illinois, Ohio, Michigan, and Kentucky), with Ohio and Kentucky being compact states and Illinois and Michigan not. Indiana nurses living in the Chicago suburbs (Lake, Porter, LaPorte counties) often commute or contract into Illinois, which requires an Illinois licence by endorsement because Illinois is not in the compact. Indiana nurses living in the south (Clark and Floyd counties, opposite Louisville) benefit from Indiana's compact status when working at Norton Healthcare or UofL Health in Louisville (Kentucky is a compact state and accepts the Indiana compact licence). The Indiana compact licence also covers Cincinnati metro work for nurses living in southeast Indiana.

The Ivy Tech Pipeline and the LPN-to-RN Bridge

Ivy Tech Community College runs the largest combined LPN and LPN-to-RN bridge program footprint in Indiana, with campuses in Indianapolis, Fort Wayne, Evansville, South Bend, Lafayette, Bloomington, Columbus, and most other major Indiana metros. Standard in-state Ivy Tech tuition is roughly $164 per credit, putting total bridge cost in the $7,000 to $11,000 range, which is competitive nationally. The University of Southern Indiana (USI) in Evansville and Indiana University Indianapolis run BSN programs that accept transfers from the Ivy Tech ADN pipeline, creating a relatively cheap end-to-end path from LPN to BSN for a working nurse. See the bridge cost framework for the broader analysis of Indiana programs in national context.

For neighbour comparisons see Illinois, Ohio, and Michigan. Salary figures cite the BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics for Indiana (May 2024 release).