How Much Do Roo Relief Vets Make?

From shift cards to hospital profiles, we’re all about transparency here at Roo because we believe that, armed with the right knowledge, no one can make a better decision for you than, well, you. So it’s time for this purple kangaroo to put our money where our mouth is, literally, so veterinarians everywhere can learn exactly how much they can expect to make from their Roo relief shifts.

Our hope is to give you a good sense of what kind of money you can make working as a relief veterinarian in your home city — or any Roo location you feel like traveling to for that matter. If you’ve got the license, we’ve got the shifts.

We crunched the numbers, did the math (it wasn’t very hard math), and updated all our data for 2024! And we’ll continue updating this article annually to ensure you always have the latest numbers. In fact, to best reflect what you can earn with Roo right meow, we’ll be using the averages from the last three months of 2024. Cue the infographics!   

How much money do vets make?   

First thing’s first, let’s throw down some baseline facts:  

• $65.63 per hour is the mean national hourly wage for veterinarians in 2023 according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. While these are probably the most accurate numbers, they’re not the most current, so-- 
• $79.58 per hour is ZipRecruiter's estimate of the average veterinary wage as of December 2nd, 2024 based on job postings and other data. 
• $144 per hour is the average wage for Roo relief vets nationwide in 2024! This is up quite a bit from the $135 average hourly rate for Roo vets in 2023. 

That means you can make roughly one-and-a-half to two times as much per hour working relief through Roo than you can in a traditional full-time role. I told you, it wasn’t very hard math. 

The average Roo veterinarian shift pays $1,290 for 9 hours of work, which isn’t bad for a day’s work. That’s up from $1,238 last year. 

That said, there are other factors to consider when it comes to working relief, specifically regarding where some of that extra money is going. The biggest is taxes, which can crash the party, but only if you’re unprepared (check out our new-and-improved 1099 taxes article for the latest & greatest tax tips).

All the numbers you see above are pre-tax — even the ZipRecruiter full-time wages, if we’re being fair. However, as a full-time veterinarian, taxes come out of your pay directly, so you’ll see a lower take-home salary. With Roo, you’re an independent contractor, which means we don’t take taxes out of your pay, you get the whole dang thing — rad! Your paycheck is gonna feel HUGE, but pump the brakes a little — you’ll still have to pay taxes on that income at some point, either quarterly or at the end of the year, so we recommend setting money aside for tax season. 

We can help with that! For all our great tax resources and info, head on over to our Tax Center in Vet Concierge, which should answer most of your questions.

The next big thing to consider is how often you want to work. That’s the beauty of relief work: the power is in your hands. Transparency is nothing without autonomy.   

Roo beats or bolsters the average veterinarian salary  

How much does a Roo Vet make a year? Well, that’s up to you.

Roo’s set up so you’re free to use the platform however you want. This means some vets use Roo to work as a full-time relief vet while others only use Roo to add extra income by picking up relief shifts here and there. This makes it hard to estimate an average relief veterinarian salary that’s meaningful because that number depends on how you use Roo. What we can share is what’s possible:

First off, let’s set that baseline: the average annual veterinarian salary nationally in 2024 is estimated at $165,527 by ZipRecruiter and $136,301 by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. It should be noted the BLS data lags a year behind so the true average is likely higher than that, which is why we rely mostly on ZipRecruiter numbers to give you accurate comparisons.

In 2024, the top-earning Roo relief veterinarians earned over $300,000 while a few overachievers earned over $400,000! Again, that’s double the earnings or more (I can keep doing this math all day), but there’s a few more things to consider: I think it’s safe to assume these particular vets are probably working relief full-time, so what does that mean in practice?

Health benefits & professional liability coverage

If you’re working relief full-time, you won’t get health benefits from your employer like you would as an associate vet employed by a clinic. This means you’ll be responsible for getting your own health insurance. Guess what? Roo can help with that too, thanks to our partnership with Stride Health. 

The cost of health insurance varies based on your age and where you live. For a 30-year-old, you’re looking at roughly $483 per month. If you’re in your 40s, you’re looking at $544 a month (according to Forbes) before subsidies if you’re eligible. That comes out to around $5000 - $7000 a year. This will put a dent in your Roo income, sure, but it’s a pretty small dent given we’re looking at nearly double wages here. With the average Roo shift paying $1,290, you’ll cover your healthcare for the entire year with about 5 to 6 shifts.

Professional liability and license defense insurance are not required for Roo shifts, but we highly recommend both as you won’t be covered under the hospital’s policy as an independent contractor. We’ve teamed up with the AVMA PLIT to get you best-in-class coverage at crazy low prices. Our recommended plan will run you $434 for the entire year for both professional liability and license defense coverages — that’s only one third of what you’ll earn from a single Roo shift (on average). And these same plans will cover you for any independent veterinary work you do (including volunteering and consulting) — so it’s not limited to just relief!

We will confess, it feels not-so-great to pay that much out of pocket for something that normally just happens out of sight. Nobody bats an eye when taxes and healthcare get deducted from your paycheck automatically, but having to actually pay those bills — it leaves you feeling kinda bleh. That’s something to consider when making the decision to work relief full-time. With great independence comes great responsibility — you’ll have to plan ahead so these bills don’t catch you by surprise.

Of course, if you don’t want to deal with the hassle of getting individual health coverage, you can always take a full-time veterinarian job, giving you the benefits you need, and work relief on the side to bolster your income whenever you like. Win-win. No stress, no mess.  

The cost and benefits of work-life balance

Relief vets have the freedom to work as much or little as they want, which means balancing free time with the amount of money you’d like to earn in a year, especially if you go the full-time relief route. 

With Roo’s higher hourly rates, you could earn the equivalent of a full-time salary with a lot more time off while paying your own health benefits and taxes. Earning nearly twice as much an hour means you only need to work about half as much to earn that same amount (you guys, I’m on math-fire today). 

So what’s the annual salary of a Roo veterinarian? It can be anything you want, it’s up to you to show us what’s possible. Though if we’re being honest, for us it’s less about how much you earn and more about how happy you are.

How much do Roo vets make in my city?

Alright, we’re good on background; let’s dive a little deeper. What does this mean for you? The best way to see what you can expect to earn as a Roo vet is to break these numbers down by the cities we live and work in (check out the graph above). 

When we break it all down by city, it’s easy to see how much you can expect to make working Roo shifts and how that compares to the hourly pay of full-time vets in your area. We used ZipRecruiter’s higher numbers for comparison here because we thought that’d be the cool thing to do.  

New York City is the big winner this year (shocker!) with average hourly rates of $176 an hour. Los Angeles and Philadelphia are right behind with average hourly rates of $173 and $172 respectively. That’s some good cream cheese on that bagel right there (the cream cheese and bagel being Philadelphia and New York respectively, obviously)! 

We actually saw the highest State-wide average rates in New Jersey at $179 an hour, so the whole tri-state area is kinda blowing up if you want to invest in triple licenses. We’re here to help with that too!

Of course, these are just averages. You can see exactly how much you’ll make for every vet shift we have available by signing up for Roo or simply logging in. Our goal is to arm you with the knowledge you need to succeed, so we’ll also let you know how long the shift is and give you lots of other details like how many appointments you should expect to see. Transparency is kind of our thing, remember? 

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All this data includes boosted shift prices, which pay out at higher rates and bring these averages up, so if you’re looking to make an even bigger chunk of change, keep an eye out for those top-rate opportunities, which can get over $2,000 for a single shift! These are hospitals who need help urgently, so you’re actually doing them and Roo a huge solid by picking these shifts up. And of course, average full-time wages may be higher or lower based on your specific experience, skill-set, speciality, and hospital.  

If you’re looking to become a traveling relief veterinarian, the above bar graph can let you know what to expect in new cities you might be traveling to. However, we highly recommend choosing destinations you want to visit and not letting pay drive this decision. Cost of living tends to fluctuate with these wages, so if hourly rates are lower, you can generally expect things like food, rent, and entertainment to be cheaper in that city too. It all balances out in the end so do what makes you happiest.      

Roo veterinarians earn more working less

The numbers don’t lie, and the message is clear: Relief veterinarians are in high demand, and this is reflected in their pay. It’s a premium service for hospitals that fills a (sometimes desperate) need. It’s no wonder Roo relief vets can make nearly double the hourly wage in many cities. 

As always, relief work is what you make of it. A relief veterinarian may be able to earn more per hour, but if you work fewer hours, your annual salary will reflect that. It’s not about how much you earn (it never has been), and it’s not about how often you work, it’s about striking the balance that’s right for you.

The high hourly veterinarian wages you see above only represent an opportunity. For some vets, Roo can help pay off student loans a bit faster or build up savings for a first home while keeping the job security and benefits a full-time veterinarian job provides. For others, relief work offers an escape from the traditional way of doing things where vets can earn more and control their own schedule for greater work-life balance. However, they’ll need to be comfortable being independent and managing their own taxes and benefits. 

Whatever you choose, do what’s best for you. Roo’s just here to help.