A physiotherapist two years out of college is weighing a staff grade post in a regional hospital against a job in a private clinic in the same town, and a third option that did not exist a few years ago: seeing patients by video from home. The three come with three different pay structures, and only one of them publishes its numbers.
This page sets out what each one actually pays, as of October 2026, with sources for every figure. Where a number cannot be sourced, we say so rather than inventing one.
One profession, two pay systems
Public pay in Ireland is set by national scales and published to the euro. Private pay is whatever you and an employer, or you and your patients, agree. That single difference explains most of what follows: the HSE section of this page is precise, and the private section is honest about being a range.
The HSE scales, from 1 June 2026
The HSE publishes consolidated salary scales for every grade. The figures below are the scales effective 1 June 2026. Pay moves up the scale by annual increments, so where you land depends on your point, not just your grade.
- Physiotherapist (staff grade): €45,514 to €63,831 across 13 points, with a long service increment that brings the top to €65,068.
- Physiotherapist, Senior: €65,197 to €76,767.
- Clinical Specialist Physiotherapist: €72,119 to €83,689.
- Physiotherapist Manager: €78,592 to €94,350, with Manager-in-Charge III scales running to €100,131.
Three things sit on top of the scale and change the real value of a public post. Premium payments apply to weekend and unsocial-hours work in some services. Public service pension membership is automatic, and its value is easy to underestimate when comparing against a private offer that carries no pension at all. And the increments are contractual: a staff grade physiotherapist who simply stays in post moves from €45,514 toward €63,831 without a promotion.
The grade structure is also the career ladder. Progression to Senior and Clinical Specialist posts is by competition, not time served, and those posts concentrate in the acute hospitals and larger services.
What private practice pays
There is no scale. Private pay in Ireland is unregulated and unpublished, so anyone quoting a precise figure for "the private sector" is averaging a small sample. The most useful honest number: Indeed's aggregate across 402 reported Irish physiotherapist salaries puts the average at €59,395, with a typical range of roughly €44,800 to €78,800. Treat that as a rough map. It mixes public and private, junior and senior, and it is built from job postings and self-reports.
What can be described precisely is the structure. Private clinic work is usually paid in one of four ways:
- A salary, as in any job. Advertised clinic salaries for less experienced physiotherapists often start below the HSE staff grade scale, and the package rarely includes a pension.
- An hourly or sessional rate, paid for clinical hours delivered.
- A percentage split, where the clinic takes a share of each session fee and you keep the rest. The percentage varies clinic to clinic and is set in your contract, so read it rather than assuming an industry standard, because there is not one.
- Room rent, where you are fully self-employed, pay the clinic for the room, and keep everything else.
Under the last three, your income is a multiple of two numbers: the session fee a local market will bear, and how full your diary is. The second number is the one that decides whether a split beats a salary.
Employed or self-employed: the comparison that matters
A €55,000 salary and €55,000 of self-employed income are not the same money. An employee gets paid annual leave, sick pay, an employer PRSI contribution and often a pension contribution. A self-employed physiotherapist pays their own professional indemnity insurance, CORU registration fee, equipment and software, funds their own pension, and earns nothing in the weeks they do not work. Self-employed income is also taxed through self-assessment rather than PAYE.
None of that makes self-employment the worse deal. It makes gross figures incomparable until you price those differences in. Revenue's guidance on registering for tax as a sole trader is the starting point on the tax side, and this page is not tax advice.
What online work pays
Video work removes the costs that sit between a private session fee and the physiotherapist's pocket: the room, the clinic's share of overheads, and the commute. What is left is the split between the physiotherapist and whatever brings the patients.
We can only publish our own numbers. At Book a Physio, the physiotherapist receives 80% of the fee for every session, and the platform keeps 20%. We state the share as a percentage rather than a euro figure because the session fee can change. The share is transferred to the physiotherapist's Stripe account seven days after the session ends. We are building the roster now and booking is not yet open to patients, so treat these as the published terms rather than a diary you can fill today.
Two honest caveats belong beside any per-session rate, ours included. An hourly clinical rate is not an annual salary: nobody delivers back to back sessions for 40 hours a week, and admin, notes and gaps between bookings are unpaid. And online work is normally self-employed work, so everything in the previous section applies to it.
For what has to be in place before you take a caseload online, working remotely as a physiotherapist in Ireland covers the Code, the ISCP e-health guidelines and insurance. How working with us is set up has its own page.
Comparing the three honestly
Put side by side, as of late 2026:
- A public post pays €45,514 to €65,068 at staff grade on a published scale, with a pension, increments and premium payments, and caps out near €100,000 at the most senior management grades.
- A private clinic post pays whatever the contract says, frequently starting below the public scale for juniors, with the upside living in splits and a full diary rather than in increments.
- Online sessional work pays per session delivered. At Book a Physio that is 80% of the session fee, with no room costs, and an income that scales with bookings rather than with hours contracted.
Most physiotherapists in Ireland mix these rather than choosing one: a public or clinic post for the floor, and private or online sessions on top. The right mix depends on how much certainty your situation needs, which is a personal question no pay table answers.