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Plumber shortage in Montana: the licensed-supply numbers
What the Montana register actually shows, by tier and per capita, updated nightly.
As of 2026-08-09, Montana carries 1,900 licensed plumbers
on its state register, or 167.7 per 100,000 residents.
1,900
licensed plumbers
167.7
per 100k residents
#22
density rank of 42
Montana 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.
By credential tier
Every plumber license on the Montana register, normalized to one ladder.
Tier
Licensed
Share
Journeyman
990
52%
Master
910
48%
Against comparable states
States nearest Montana on licensed plumbers per capita.
State
Licensed plumbers
Per 100k
Montana
1,900
167.7
Rhode Island
1,901
173.5
Wisconsin
10,198
172.5
Oklahoma
6,985
172.3
Utah
5,722
167.4
Alabama
7,867
154.0
Oregon
6,346
149.9
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 Montana?
Reporting on the shortage rarely states how many are actually licensed. Montana carries 1,900 licensed plumbers on its register as of 2026-08-09, or 167.7 per 100,000 residents. Readers can weigh that supply against demand directly.
How many licensed plumbers does Montana have?
1,900 on the state register as of 2026-08-09, including 910 at master level.
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.