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Okaloosa County Sheriff's Office 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.
Okaloosa County Sheriff's Office starts at $63,554 a year — about $30.55 an hour on a 2,080-hour year, before overtime. That is $3,130 below the median of the 2,288 agencies on this list, and $5 below the median for county agencies.
Cost of livingPrices in Crestview-Fort Walton Beach-Destin, FL run about 3% below the national average, so this goes about as far as $65,499 would somewhere at average prices — $1,945 more than the headline figure. That average hides a wide spread: utilities at 89, where goods are 96. Based on price levels for this metropolitan 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 isOkaloosa County Sheriff's Office reported 319 sworn officers and 149 civilian staff to the FBI for 2025.No rate is shown: this agency does not police a single population the FBI publishes a figure for. 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 Okaloosa County says about itself
We are committed to upholding the Constitution of the United States and the laws of Florida with excellence and integrity. We strive to reduce crime while providing fair and equal treatment for all.
What Okaloosa County does
Okaloosa County Sheriff's Office covers a north-west Florida county running from the Gulf of Mexico to the Alabama line, protecting more than 180,000 year-round residents and many thousands of tourists. It works from an administrative building at Shalimar with full-service offices there and at Crestview, and substations at Destin, Bluewater Bay, Okaloosa Island, Sylvania Heights, Baker, Laurel Hill and Hetherington. Patrol is divided into three districts — North from Duke Field to the Alabama line, Central through the unincorporated areas around Fort Walton Beach, and East taking in Destin, Okaloosa Island and Niceville — each under a captain. The office also polices the City of Destin under annual contract, and its traffic unit works closely with the county's substantial military population, providing safety briefings to personnel arriving from other states.
Where the figure comes from
Checked 15 August 2026. Okaloosa County Sheriff's Office Deputy Sheriff employment page — open the source document
The Okaloosa County Sheriff's Office advertises a patrol deputy starting salary of $63,554.40, and states that this amount INCLUDES SCHEDULED PATROL OVERTIME. That makes it different in kind from most figures on this site, which are base salary before overtime: at Okaloosa the scheduled overtime is a built-in feature of the patrol roster rather than occasional extra work, and the agency does not publish the base component separately. Read the figure as what a new patrol deputy is told to expect, not as an hourly base rate.
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.
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How this level compares
Where Okaloosa County 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. Okaloosa County starts at $63,554, so $11 below the county middle.
How it ranks
Common questions
How much does a Okaloosa County Sheriff's Office officer make?
Okaloosa County Sheriff's Office starts a new officer on $63,554 a year, about $30.55 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 Okaloosa County Sheriff's Office Deputy Sheriff employment page.
Is that good pay for a police officer in Florida?
It ranks #115 of 303 agencies we have verified in Florida — 188 pay less, 114 pay more in the state — and #1,343 of 2,288 nationally. Against the national median it is $3,130 below, and against other county agencies $5 below.
Compare with another department
Put Okaloosa County Sheriff's Office 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 FL
| # | Agency | Level | Sworn # | Entry pay | Vs Okaloosa | National |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Boca Raton Police Services Department | Municipal | 195 | $91,007 | +$27,453 | #244 |
| 2 | Fort Lauderdale Police Department | Municipal | 565 | $81,723 | +$18,169 | #433 |
| 3 | Plantation Police Department | Municipal | 164 | $81,000 | +$17,446 | #459 |
| 4 | Hillsboro Beach Police Department | Municipal | 15 | $80,954 | +$17,400 | #461 |
| 5 | Pinecrest Police Department | Municipal | 47 | $80,912 | +$17,357 | #464 |
| 6 | Sunny Isles Beach Police Department | Municipal | 65 | $80,000 | +$16,446 | #496 |
| 7 | Indian Creek Village Public Safety Department | Municipal | 10 | $79,850 | +$16,296 | #500 |
| 8 | Sunrise Police Department | Municipal | 190 | $79,071 | +$15,517 | #520 |
| 9 | Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office | County | 1,720 | $78,828 | +$15,274 | #526 |
| 10 | Aventura Police Department | Municipal | 91 | $78,556 | +$15,001 | #536 |
| 11 | Longboat Key Police Department | Municipal | 19 | $78,430 | +$14,876 | #543 |
| 12 | Manalapan Police Department | Municipal | 13 | $78,280 | +$14,726 | #549 |
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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