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Knoxville Police Department entry pay
What this agency pays a new officer to start, and how that compares with the rest of the country.
Entry pay onlyEvery salary here is what an officer is paid on day one, out of the academy — base pay on a 40-hour week, with no overtime, shift differential, specialty or education pay counted. Nobody stays on it.
Knoxville Police Department starts at $58,102 a year — about $27.93 an hour on a 2,080-hour year, before overtime. That is $8,583 below the median of the 2,288 agencies on this list, and $10,038 below the median for municipal agencies.
Cost of livingPrices in Tennessee run about 8% below the national average, so this goes about as far as $63,244 would somewhere at average prices — $5,142 more than the headline figure. Most of that is utilities, at 72 against a national average of 100, where goods are 96. Based on state-wide price levels, because this agency is not tied to a single metro area, from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, 2024. The salary above is what the employer publishes; this line is our arithmetic on it, and nothing on this site is ranked on it.
How big the department isKnoxville Police Department reported 369 sworn officers and 100 civilian staff to the FBI for 2025. That is 1.8 officers per 1,000 residents, over a population of 200,645.A rate is only meaningful for a city department, where the population served is the city’s own. Reporting to the FBI is voluntary, so a count can reflect a partial return as easily as a small agency, and the FBI asks that agencies not be compared on staffing. Source: FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, Full-time Law Enforcement Employees, 2025.
What Knoxville says about itself
At KPD, we see our work as a calling. We invest deeply in training, champion diversity at every level, and foster a culture where the desire to serve is the foundation of everything we do.
What Knoxville does
The Knoxville Police Department is the city force for Knoxville, the third largest city in Tennessee. Its academy made history in 2004 as the first municipal academy in the country to earn full CALEA accreditation, and it is a certified training facility under the Tennessee POST Commission; recruits complete close to twice the training hours the state requires. The academy campus has multiple pistol ranges, a 100-yard rifle range, a rappel tower, a 360-degree indoor live-fire facility with computerised simulation, and a driving complex with a skid pad and a full city response course laid out with street signs, traffic lights and road markings. Veterans can apply GI Bill benefits toward the academy, and graduates are offered up to 36 college credits by dozens of colleges and universities. Alongside patrol the department runs a mounted unit, and it operates a Police Cadet programme for 18 to 20 year olds in non-enforcement roles and a Police Explorer Post for 14 to 21 year olds. Officers are assigned take-home vehicles at the Chief's discretion, with insurance and fuel provided, and the pension vests after 25 years of service and age 56. The department is overseen in part by the Police Advisory and Review Committee, an independent review body.
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Where the figure comes from
Checked 20 September 2026. Knoxville Police Department recruitment: "Earn $58,102/year as a Starting Officer" — open the source document
Read 10 September 2026 from the department's own recruitment site, page last modified 6 April 2026. The department publishes three figures in one table: Annual Salary During Academy $52,700; Starting Annual Officer Salary $58,102; Police Officer Salary $58,102 to $87,075. THE ACADEMY FIGURE IS THE ONE PUBLISHED HERE because it is the rate from the start of employment - recruits are paid employees with full City benefits from day one of the roughly 22-week academy, which runs Monday to Friday in business hours and is not residential. $58,102 is what the same officer earns on graduating, and it is recorded in this note rather than as the figure. THE ENTRY TEST IS SETTLED FROM THE LATERAL SIDE: lateral transfers must be certified with at least two years of continuous law enforcement service - security, corrections and military police expressly do not qualify - and their starting salary is set by years of POST-certified experience, so the academy rate is the no-experience rate. Excluded: longevity pay after four years of service, the $650 annual uniform allowance, up to $5,250 a year of tuition reimbursement, time-and-a-half overtime, 11 paid holidays, and the take-home vehicle programme, which allows officers to keep the car within a 25-mile radius. The City reported in January 2026 that starting pay was 'about $58,000' after a budgeted increase, which matches the post-academy line rather than the academy line. *** CORRECTED 20 SEPTEMBER 2026, UP FROM $52,700 TO $58,102. *** The row deliberately published the ACADEMY figure and said so, on the reasoning that recruits are paid employees with full City benefits from day one of the roughly 22-week academy. Sound on its own terms, but the standing rule is ENTRY PAY ONLY, NEVER A CADET, RECRUIT OR TRAINEE RATE. RE-READ ON THE DEPARTMENT'S OWN RECRUITMENT SITE 20 September 2026, which prices the two side by side: 'Earn $52,700/year while in academy' and 'Earn $58,102/year as a Starting Officer'. The Starting Officer figure is the sworn rate on completing the academy and is the figure. Note that the recruitment site no longer shows the $58,102-$87,075 Police Officer range the row previously recorded; the two current figures are what it now carries.
Entry-level base salary only. Overtime, bonuses, education incentives, shift
differentials, locality pay and lateral rates are excluded, so most officers earn more
than this.
How this level compares
Where Knoxville sits is partly about the agency and partly about which level of policing it belongs to. The three levels do not pay the same.
| Level | Lowest | Median | Highest | Agencies |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Municipal | $33,280 | $68,140 | $163,619 | 1549 |
| County | $35,000 | $63,565 | $132,263 | 516 |
| Special jurisdiction | $31,200 | $60,204 | $107,954 | 71 |
| State | $33,994 | $65,166 | $110,916 | 145 |
| Federal | $70,477 | $73,502 | $86,530 | 5 |
| Territory | $16,640 | $28,236 | $43,354 | 9 |
Federal agencies pay the most to start
The middle federal agency starts at $73,502 — about $5,400 more than the middle municipal agency and about $9,900 more than the middle county agency and about $13,300 more than the middle special jurisdiction agency and about $8,300 more than the middle state agency and about $45,300 more than the middle territory agency. Knoxville starts at $58,102, so $10,038 below the municipal middle.
How it ranks
Common questions
How much does a Knoxville Police Department officer make?
Knoxville Police Department starts a new officer on $58,102 a year, about $27.93 an hour on a 2,080-hour year. That is base salary before overtime, bonuses, education incentives, shift differentials and locality pay, so most serving officers earn more. The figure comes from Knoxville Police Department recruitment: "Earn $58,102/year as a Starting Officer".
Is that good pay for a police officer in Tennessee?
It ranks #14 of 26 agencies we have verified in Tennessee — 12 pay less, 13 pay more in the state — and #1,672 of 2,288 nationally. Against the national median it is $8,583 below, and against other municipal agencies $10,038 below.
Compare with another department
Put Knoxville Police Department side by side with any other agency on the site — the two salaries, what each is worth once local prices are counted, and which comes out ahead.
The agencies either side of it
Other agencies in TN
| # | Agency | Level | Sworn # | Entry pay | Vs Knoxville | National |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Brentwood Police Department | Municipal | 67 | $75,804 | +$17,702 | #640 |
| 2 | Metropolitan Nashville Police Department | Municipal | 1,546 | $70,904 | +$12,802 | #888 |
| 3 | Murfreesboro Police Department | Municipal | 313 | $67,922 | +$9,820 | #1,063 |
| 4 | Tennessee Bureau of Investigation | State | 484 | $67,764 | +$9,662 | #1,070 |
| 5 | Germantown Police Department | Municipal | 113 | $66,773 | +$8,671 | #1,135 |
| 6 | Smyrna Police Department | Municipal | 106 | $66,305 | +$8,203 | #1,171 |
| 7 | Tennessee Highway Patrol | State | — | $65,804 | +$7,702 | #1,201 |
| 8 | Hendersonville Police Department | Municipal | 134 | $65,654 | +$7,552 | #1,211 |
| 9 | Franklin Police Department | Municipal | 138 | $65,000 | +$6,898 | #1,256 |
| 10 | Chattanooga Police Department | Municipal | 397 | $60,460 | +$2,358 | #1,538 |
| 11 | Pigeon Forge Police Department | Municipal | 71 | $60,014 | +$1,912 | #1,565 |
| 12 | Collierville Police Department | Municipal | 115 | $60,000 | +$1,898 | #1,584 |
Base pay is only part of the year
Whatever the figure above, the rotation is what decides your year — which weekends you lose, when the changeovers land, what you can plan around. Save yours once and BlueShifts shows it a year ahead, with the off-duty jobs you take and what each one paid.
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