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Occupational Therapy Assistants vs Physical Therapist Aides

Side-by-side · O*NET · BLS · AI-exposure research · Anthropic Economic Index

A factual, source-backed comparison of Occupational Therapy Assistants and Physical Therapist Aides on the dimensions both occupations carry. Every figure is a position within an independent published dataset — not a verdict on which job is better, safer, or more “future-proof.”

Occupational Therapy Assistants Physical Therapist Aides
Median pay · BLS OEWS
$68,340
$34,520
Employment · BLS OEWS
47,910
44,010
AI exposure (percentile) · task overlap, not automation
25th pct
7th pct

At a glance

Dimension Occupational Therapy Assistants Physical Therapist Aides
Median pay $68,340 $34,520
Employment 47,910 44,010
Employment outlook (2024–34) · BLS projection Growing fast (+19.2%) About average (+2.8%)
Annual openings · BLS projection 7,200 6,600
Typical education · O*NET Most occupations in this zone require training in vocational schools, related on-the-job experience, or an associate's degree. Usually requires a high school diploma or GED, though some occupations may not.
AI exposure · published exposure studies Low · 25th pct Low · 7th pct
Global GenAI gradient · ILO ISCO-08 · via crosswalk 57th pct · 30% of tasks 18th pct · 15% of tasks
Observed AI use · Anthropic Economic Index Augmentation-leaning (70.8%) —
Mostly remote-capable · Dingel–Neiman No No

Pay and employment are BLS OEWS estimates; outlook and openings are BLS 2024–2034 projections; AI exposure and observed-use figures come from separate research and reflect exposure and usage, not predictions that either job will disappear. Compare like with like.

Skills

Shared: Customer and Personal Service, Psychology, Oral Comprehension, Oral Expression, Active Listening, Speaking, Social Perceptiveness, Service Orientation, Written Expression, Problem Sensitivity, English Language, Therapy and Counseling, Reading Comprehension, Written Comprehension, Time Management, Near Vision, Public Safety and Security, Critical Thinking, Monitoring, Deductive Reasoning, Information Ordering, Speech Clarity, Writing, Active Learning, Instructing, Inductive Reasoning, Speech Recognition, Administrative, Coordination, Judgment and Decision Making, Static Strength, Computers and Electronics, Complex Problem Solving, Category Flexibility.

Specific to Occupational Therapy Assistants

  • Education and Training
  • Learning Strategies
  • Sociology and Anthropology
  • Fluency of Ideas
  • Medicine and Dentistry
  • Systems Analysis

Specific to Physical Therapist Aides

  • Selective Attention
  • Trunk Strength
  • Persuasion
  • Arm-Hand Steadiness
  • Finger Dexterity
  • Multilimb Coordination

Knowledge, skills & abilities O*NET rates as important for each occupation. “Shared” are common to both; the columns list what is distinctive to each (top by the order O*NET surfaces).

Tools & technology

Shared: Medical software , Spreadsheet software , Office suite software , Electronic mail software , Word processing software , Calendar and scheduling software .

Specific to Occupational Therapy Assistants

Specific to Physical Therapist Aides

    Full profiles

    This page is a summary. See the complete source-backed profile for Occupational Therapy Assistants or Physical Therapist Aides — tasks, the full skill graph, tools, work context, preparation, wages by percentile, industries, AI exposure and the AI work map.

    More comparisons

    Related occupations you can place side by side on the same sourced scale.

    Sources for this page

    Every figure above traces to a named public dataset and the exact release below — not hand-written opinion. See the full methodology for what each measure does and does not mean.

    Data compiled June 2, 2026. Figures are estimates, not advice.

    Cite this page
    Plain

    Singulariki. "Occupational Therapy Assistants vs Physical Therapist Aides." Singulariki: a source-backed encyclopedia of work. Built from O*NET 30.3; BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) May 2024; BLS Employment Projections 2024–2034; Anthropic Economic Index v4 (2026-01-15) + v2 (2025-03-27); Microsoft “Working with AI” working-with-ai; “GPTs are GPTs” (Eloundou et al.) arXiv 2303.10130; AI Occupational Exposure (AIOE) Felten, Raj & Seamans; ILO / Gmyrek et al. GenAI exposure gradient 2025; IBS O*NET-SOC ↔ ISCO-08 occupation crosswalk 2022; Frey & Osborne (2013) frey-osborne-automation; Dingel & Neiman (2020) dingel-neiman-workathome. Accessed June 7, 2026. https://singulariki.com/compare/occupational-therapy-assistants-vs-physical-therapist-aides

    APA

    Singulariki. (2026). Occupational Therapy Assistants vs Physical Therapist Aides. Singulariki: a source-backed encyclopedia of work. Retrieved June 7, 2026, from https://singulariki.com/compare/occupational-therapy-assistants-vs-physical-therapist-aides

    BibTeX 
    @misc{singulariki-occupational-therapy-assistants-vs-physical-therapist-aides,
  title  = {Occupational Therapy Assistants vs Physical Therapist Aides},
  author = {{Singulariki}},
  year   = {2026},
  note   = {O*NET 30.3; BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) May 2024; BLS Employment Projections 2024–2034; Anthropic Economic Index v4 (2026-01-15) + v2 (2025-03-27); Microsoft “Working with AI” working-with-ai; “GPTs are GPTs” (Eloundou et al.) arXiv 2303.10130; AI Occupational Exposure (AIOE) Felten, Raj & Seamans; ILO / Gmyrek et al. GenAI exposure gradient 2025; IBS O*NET-SOC ↔ ISCO-08 occupation crosswalk 2022; Frey & Osborne (2013) frey-osborne-automation; Dingel & Neiman (2020) dingel-neiman-workathome. Accessed June 7, 2026},
  url    = {https://singulariki.com/compare/occupational-therapy-assistants-vs-physical-therapist-aides}
}

    Citations name the underlying public dataset releases — they reflect what this page is built from, not just the URL.