How Much Does A Volleyball Coach Make?

Coaching volleyball requires a great amount of attention to detail, knowledge about the game, and strategic thinking skills. How much do these coaches get paid to make such a valuable impact on the sport? Below, we will find out.

Youth Coach

Probably the most well-known volleyball coaches on a local level. Youth and high school volleyball coaches lead teams of young children in learning and playing the sport. These coaches may be affiliated with a town, a county or state league, or a school, and they are often parents or regular workers with day jobs who volunteer their time to coach volleyball.

However, any person is entitled to be paid for their services as a coach, so with that in mind, how much does a youth volleyball coach make? Although it depends on where the volleyball team is located and how prominent the program is, on average, youth volleyball coaches are compensated around $2,500-$3,000 per season. A typical youth volleyball season lasts from 10-12 weeks, evening this salary out to roughly $20 an hour.

On teams that are not affiliated with schools, youth volleyball coaches often volunteer their time and are not compensated at all for their coaching. Regardless of whether or not they are paid, youth volleyball coaches play a critical role in the advancement of the sport by teaching kids the fundamentals of the game, identifying young talent, and developing good volleyball habits in players early on in their careers.

College Coach

The next level after youth and high school volleyball coaches are college coaches, and this level of coaching represents both a rise in prestige and pay. While volleyball is not as prominent a sport at the college level as basketball or football, college volleyball coaches nevertheless receive greater scrutiny when they are hired, and with that increased scrutiny necessarily comes a higher quality of coach and better pay.

Volleyball coach salaries jump dramatically higher once a coach makes it to the full-time, collegiate level. For Division II and III schools, coach compensation is usually between $55,000 and $65,000 annually. For Division I coaches, salaries often hit three figures.

Within the NCAA, differing pay is found between the various conferences. As of the most recently available data, from 2018, the Big 10 and Big 12 featured the highest-paid volleyball coaches, with head coach salaries averaging $240,379 and $240,561, respectively.

In 2017, John Cook of Nebraska (Big 10) was the highest-paid NCAA volleyball coach, at $600,000. Of the other “Power Five” teams, ACC coaches averaged $116,670 in 2017, SEC coaches $156,071, and PAC 12 coaches $165,357.

Professional Coach

There are multiple different professional organizations where successful volleyball players can continue their athletic careers, and thus, there are multiple leagues a professional volleyball coach might spend their careers in. The National Volleyball Association, Pro Volleyball Federation, and the United States Olympic team (USA Volleyball) are a few of these leagues.

Each of these professional leagues compensates their coaches differently, in the range of approximately $39,000-$61,000 a year. The average salary of a professional volleyball coach lands at about $48,609 a year. This salary is noticeably lower than major Division I collegiate coaching salaries, indicating that viewership of college volleyball is significantly higher than that of professional volleyball.

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