Teacher Burnout Statistics (2026)

Fifty-five percent of US public school teachers said they experienced frequent job-related stress in RAND's 2026 State of the American Teacher survey, against 34% of similar working adults. Fifty-three percent reported burnout in 2025, down from 60% in 2024, and the 2026 figure sits within a few points of that. Eighteen percent intend to leave their job by the end of the school year, the lowest reading since RAND began asking in 2021. Teachers are less burned out than they were at the pandemic peak and more burned out than almost any comparison group.

The pages that rank for this question lean on a 2022 Gallup poll, repeat the claim that half of teachers quit within five years, and treat intent to leave as if it were attrition. This page uses RAND's 2024, 2025 and 2026 surveys, Gallup's 2022 and 2026 data, the federal Teacher Follow-up Survey and BLS pay data, states the sample and date next to every figure, and keeps intentions separate from the people who actually left.

How many teachers are burned out?

RAND's State of the American Teacher survey is the only annual, nationally representative measure of teacher wellbeing that asks the same questions each year. The 2026 edition, fielded in January and February 2026 with 829 K-12 public school teachers from RAND's American Teacher Panel, found 55% reporting frequent job-related stress, down from 62% in 2025 and 58% in 2024. Burnout was 53% in 2025 and 60% in 2024; the 2026 figure is within four points of 2025.

Two other measures bracket those figures. Gallup's February 2022 poll of 12,319 US workers found 44% of K-12 workers "always" or "very often" burned out at work, the highest of any industry, with teachers specifically at 52%. And a Walton Family Foundation and Gallup survey of 2,069 teachers in May 2026 found burnout at 77% among teachers who said their workload expectations were unrealistic and 21% among those who said they were realistic. The burnout rate depends on the question, so this page states the instrument each time.

Teachers against other workers

RAND surveys a matched sample of working adults alongside teachers, which is what makes the gap measurable. In 2026, 55% of teachers reported frequent job-related stress against 34% of working adults with similar demographics. In 2024 the gap was 58% to 33%. Teachers were also about twice as likely to report difficulty coping with stress, and the share who said their job had a negative effect on their mental health ran around 15 points above the comparison group every year RAND has asked.

The comparison with other high-stress professions is closer than the headlines suggest. Our nurse burnout statistics page puts RN burnout at 45% to 58% depending on the instrument, and our physician burnout statistics page puts physician burnout at 42% in the latest AMA data. Teachers sit in the same band, with the distinction that their stress gap against the general workforce is measured directly.

Hours worked and the second job

Teachers' contracted hours understate their week. RAND's 2024 survey found teachers worked an average of 53 hours a week during the school year, against 46 for comparable working adults, with about a quarter of those hours outside the contracted day. The 2025 survey put the figure at 49 hours, and the 2026 survey, which added hours spent on second jobs, at about 54. Teachers are contracted for roughly 38 to 40 hours in most districts, which means ten or more unpaid hours a week is typical.

Thirty percent of teachers held a second job during the 2025-26 school year in RAND's data, most for income rather than interest. Teachers also spent an average of $665 of their own money on classroom supplies, a figure that has not been reimbursed by the $300 federal educator expense deduction since the deduction's last adjustment. Our working hours statistics page puts the 53-hour figure against other occupations.

Pay and the gap

RAND asked teachers what they earned and what they thought would be adequate. In 2026 the average base salary was $75,599 and the average "adequate" salary about $105,000, a gap of roughly $29,000 that has widened each year since the question was first asked. Thirty-nine percent of teachers said they received a raise that kept pace with inflation. The BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook puts median pay at $72,040 for high school teachers and $63,820 for kindergarten and elementary teachers as of May 2025, with wide variation by state.

Pay is not the top stressor in the RAND data, but it is the top reason teachers give for considering leaving, named by about two thirds of those who intend to go. The two findings fit together: pay does not cause the day-to-day stress, but it decides whether the stress is worth it.

What teachers say causes it

RAND asks teachers to pick their top sources of job-related stress. The 2026 ranking:

• Managing student behavior: 52%, the top stressor for the third year running.
• Low salary: about 45%.
• Administrative work outside teaching: about 40%.
• Long hours: about 35%.
• Supporting students' mental health and academic needs: about 30%.
• Lack of administrator support: about 25%.

Student behavior displaced pay and hours at the top after the pandemic, and RAND's 2024 report attributed about a quarter of the teacher stress gap against other workers to it. The Walton Family Foundation and Gallup data from May 2026 add the workload dimension: teachers who said their workload expectations were unrealistic were nearly four times as likely to report burnout. Our page on workplace stress statistics covers the same stressors across the workforce.

Intent to leave against actual attrition

Eighteen percent of teachers in RAND's 2026 survey intended to leave their job by the end of the school year, down from 23% in 2021 and 2023 and 22% in 2024. Intent is not attrition. The federal measure is the National Center for Education Statistics Teacher Follow-up Survey, which tracked teachers from 2020-21 into 2021-22 and found 8% had left teaching and 8% had moved to a different school. The 16% combined turnover was about the same as the previous survey a decade earlier. Intent to leave has run two to three times higher than actual leaving in every year both were measured.

State data since 2022 show attrition rose to around 10% in several states in 2022-23 and then eased. The pattern matches the RAND trend: the pandemic peak in stress and intent produced a measurable but modest rise in exits, not the exodus that was predicted.

Shortages and vacancies

NCES's School Pulse Panel for October 2024 found 3% of teaching positions vacant nationally, 35% of public schools with at least one vacancy, and 50% of school leaders saying their school was understaffed. Vacancies concentrate in special education, mathematics, science and bilingual education, and in high-poverty and rural schools. Shortages are a distribution problem more than a headcount problem: the national vacancy rate is low, but the schools and subjects with openings struggle to fill them.

One indicator points the other way. Education Week's teacher morale index, which combines responses on wellbeing, respect and intent, rose to +13 in 2026 from negative readings in 2024, the first time it has been clearly positive. Morale has recovered even as the stress gap against other workers has persisted.

What helps

The evidence on what reduces teacher burnout is thinner than the evidence on its prevalence, but three findings recur in the RAND and Gallup data. Teachers who said their principal supported them on student behavior reported stress rates roughly 15 points lower. Teachers with realistic workload expectations reported burnout at a quarter of the rate of those without, in the Walton Family Foundation and Gallup data. And teachers who had access to mental health support through their employer were more likely to say they could cope, though only about a third said such support was available. Our guide to spotting burnout in the data covers the early signals.

Reading these figures carefully

The claim that half of teachers leave within five years comes from Richard Ingersoll's 2003 analysis of 1990s data and has never been true nationally since; the federal Beginning Teacher Longitudinal Study put five-year attrition at 17%. Burnout rates of 70% or 80% that circulate online come from questions about ever having felt burned out, not frequent burnout. RAND's sample of 829 in 2026 carries a margin of error of about four points, so year-to-year moves of two or three points are noise. When a teacher burnout figure appears without its instrument, sample and year, it is not telling you much.

Key takeaways

• 55% of US teachers reported frequent job-related stress in early 2026, against 34% of similar working adults. Burnout was 53% in 2025 and about 50% in 2026, down from 60% in 2024.
• Teachers work about 49 to 53 hours a week during the school year, roughly 10 hours more than contracted, and 30% hold a second job.
• The average base salary is $75,599 against an average 'adequate' salary of about $105,000. 39% received a raise that kept pace with inflation.
• Managing student behavior is the top stressor at 52%, ahead of pay, administrative work and hours.
• 18% intended to leave by the end of the 2025-26 school year, the lowest since 2021. Actual attrition in the federal Teacher Follow-up Survey was 8% leaving and 8% moving schools.
• 3% of teaching positions were vacant in October 2024 and 35% of schools had at least one vacancy, concentrated in special education, STEM and high-poverty schools.
• Teachers with unrealistic workload expectations reported burnout at 77% against 21% for those with realistic expectations.
• 'Half of teachers quit within five years' is a 2003 claim about 1990s data. Federal five-year attrition is about 17%.