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Plumber shortage in Iowa: the licensed-supply numbers
What the Iowa register actually shows, by tier and per capita, updated nightly.
As of 2026-08-09, Iowa carries 18,092 licensed plumbers
on its state register, or 564.1 per 100,000 residents.
18,092
licensed plumbers
564.1
per 100k residents
#4
density rank of 42
Iowa does not issue a separate apprentice license for this trade, so no pipeline ratio is published here. The tier counts below are what the register itself records.
Against comparable states
States nearest Iowa on licensed plumbers per capita.
State
Licensed plumbers
Per 100k
Iowa
18,092
564.1
Maine
16,869
1208.6
Vermont
4,154
641.6
Idaho
11,107
565.3
New Mexico
8,642
408.7
Colorado
21,082
358.7
North Dakota
2,811
358.6
Counts, not a capacity opinion. We publish the licensed supply and the pipeline
ratio; whether a market can absorb a given project is a judgement for the reader, not a claim we make.
Frequently asked
Is there a plumbers shortage in Iowa?
Reporting on the shortage rarely states how many are actually licensed. Iowa carries 18,092 licensed plumbers on its register as of 2026-08-09, or 564.1 per 100,000 residents. Readers can weigh that supply against demand directly.
How many licensed plumbers does Iowa have?
18,092 on the state register as of 2026-08-09.
Where does the shortage narrative come from?
Industry analyses project national shortfalls of hundreds of thousands of skilled-trades workers against data-center and electrification demand. Those are demand-side estimates; the figure here is the licensed supply on the register today.
New licenses, ladder upgrades, classification changes and lapses, by market and credential tier. Read the quarterly free, or license the underlying data.