Oregon · electrician licensing · verified July 2026

Oregon electrician license requirements

Do you need a license to work as an electrician in Oregon?

Oregon licenses electricians statewide, so one credential is valid across the whole state.

Reciprocity for General Journeyman covers 7 states (reciprocal applicants need 576 classroom hours + 8,000 OJT hours / 4-year apprenticeship; Washington applicants must have completed an Oregon or Washington apprenticeship and passed Washington's exam); General Supervising reciprocity exists with Arkansas and Utah only. Electrical contractor licenses are separate business licenses through BCD requiring a signing supervising electrician. A separate exam fee is not published, the application fee leads to a letter of authorization to schedule the state exam.

What licenses does Oregon issue?

The Oregon Building Codes Division, Department of Consumer and Business Services (Electrical and Elevator Board) issues the credentials below for this trade. Boards often list further classes for specialties and business licenses; these are the ones this page covers.

Hours are what each class asks for on its own terms. Where a senior class shows fewer than a journeyman, the board is counting time served after the earlier license rather than from the start; the prerequisite column says which.

Source: Oregon Building Codes Division, Department of Consumer and Business Services (Electrical and Elevator Board) (oregon.gov). Verified July 2026.

General Journeyman Electrician (J): Oregon apprenticeship completion, or 8,000 OJT hrs + 576 classroom hrs (or 16,000 OJT hrs without classroom) out-of-state

General Supervising Electrician (S): Oregon General Journeyman license (or equivalent qualification) + 8,000 additional journeyman hours

Limited Residential Electrician (LR): Apprenticeship completion, or 4,000 residential OJT hrs + 288 classroom hrs (or 8,000 OJT hrs)

Limited Journeyman Manufacturing Plant Electrician (PJ): Apprenticeship completion or equivalent out-of-state hours

How many hours do you need in Oregon?

Oregon requires 8,000 hours of on-the-job experience for a General Journeyman Electrician (J) license, plus 576 classroom hours. At a 40-hour week the on-the-job portion is roughly 4 years of full-time work.

What exam does Oregon require?

Oregon electrical licensing examination (per license type; General Journeyman exam is 52 questions, 3 hours, open book). Administered by Oregon Building Codes Division (state-administered at BCD test sites in 10 Oregon cities; BCD grades exams and issues results within ~2 weeks).

How much does an Oregon electrician license cost?

Getting a General Journeyman Electrician (J) license in Oregon costs $100 in board fees, before any training. That is the application fee charged once, with renewal charged separately below. No board publishes this total, so it is added up here from the schedule it does publish. An exam is required and its fee is not in that figure, because no amount for it appears in the board material this page is built from. Check the board's current fee schedule before budgeting.

• Application fee$100
• Initial license feeincluded
• Renewal fee (recurring)$100

How often do you renew, and what continuing education is required?

Renewal period: 3 years (General Journeyman renews every three years on October 1)

Continuing education: General Journeyman: 24 total hours per 3-year renewal cycle, which must include the correct number of code-change credits (per BCD CE rules). Limited Building Maintenance (BME), Limited Elevator Journeyman (E), Limited Stage (ST), and Limited Maintenance Manufactured Structures (LMM) licenses are exempt from CE.

How does the apprenticeship route work?

Completion of an Oregon-approved apprenticeship (registered through Oregon's apprenticeship system) is the primary in-state qualification for journeyman-level licenses, it substitutes entirely for the hour-verification requirements, which apply only to experience obtained outside Oregon. Out-of-state applicants without classroom training may substitute double the on-the-job hours (OAR 918-030-0030(2)), subject to the '300 percent rule' capping credit in any single work category at 3x the category minimum.

Which states does Oregon have license reciprocity with?

Oregon appears in 7 published reciprocal licensing agreements for this trade, covering Arkansas, Idaho, Maine, Montana, Utah, Washington, Wyoming. Boards write these as agreements between two states rather than as a one-way list, and some publish the list while their counterpart does not, so this counts every agreement naming Oregon from either side. Recognition is never automatic: the board you apply to decides, and most require the original license to have been earned by examination and to be in good standing.

Source: reciprocity agreement (oregon.gov). Verified July 2026.

How does Oregon compare to neighboring states?

Requirements stop at the state line, which matters if you live near one or expect to move. Here is what the neighboring states ask of the same trade.

Source: state licensing boards. Verified July 2026.

How does Oregon compare nationally?

24 states publish an explicit hour figure for this trade, and they range from 8,000 to 10,000 hours. Oregon's 8,000 hours is what 23 of them ask, making it the standard rather than an outlier; no state asks less and 1 asks more. The full comparison is on the hours by state table.

Sources and verification

Other states with published requirements for this trade: Rhode Island, South Dakota, Utah, Vermont.

Price the whole path with the license cost estimator, or weigh earning against paying for school with the apprenticeship comparison. Back to electricians overview.

Licensing requirements change between our verification sweeps. This page is informational only, so confirm current requirements with Oregon Building Codes Division, Department of Consumer and Business Services (Electrical and Elevator Board) before making decisions. Not legal advice.