55+ Police Officer Jobs in Los Angeles, CA (Hiring Now in Aug 2026)

The Los Angeles police job market is wider than one famous department. The LAPD anchors it, but a ring of independent city departments, from Burbank to Inglewood to Manhattan Beach, runs its own academies, its own hiring calendars, and its own eligibility lists, and the region adds airport police, school police, and other area agencies on top. As of Aug 2026, this page tracks 55+ verified police officer jobs in Los Angeles, every one pulled directly from agency career pages and checked continuously, so nothing here is an expired posting dressed up as a live one.

Police pay data is also the easiest data in local government to misread, because the same department pays its academy recruits and its working officers under different ranks with wildly different numbers. This page walks through the real payroll figures rank by rank, then covers who is hiring, what types of openings exist, and what the academy and state certification pipeline actually demand before anyone pins on a badge.

Start with the rank that describes the actual career. Police Officer II is the working rank at the LAPD, the grade an officer holds after completing the academy and probation, and it covers 3,888 officers in city payroll data. The median total compensation for a Police Officer II is $174,609 per year, built on a median base salary of $125,376, with the middle half of earners landing between $153,718 and $196,655. The single highest total recorded reached $439,623, a reminder that overtime, court time, and specialty assignments can push real earnings far past the published schedule. The full distribution is in Bandana's LAPD Police Officer II salary data for Los Angeles, drawn from actual payroll records rather than estimates.

Now the number that confuses people. City payroll also shows a Police Officer I classification with a median of just $22,257, and taken at face value it looks like an alarmingly low salary. It is not a salary at all in the annual sense. Police Officer I is the academy and probationary rank, a group of 532 members at any given time, and its median reflects part-year academy pay: recruits who joined partway through the payroll year and spent months in training rather than working a full year at a full rate. Nobody polices Los Angeles for that figure. Read $22,257 as a snapshot of people passing through the pipeline, and read $174,609 as what the job actually pays once an officer reaches the working rank.

Use these numbers to set expectations rather than to negotiate, since sworn pay follows published schedules with step increases on a known timetable. The practical takeaway is the trajectory: a defined climb from academy pay through probation to a working rank where the median clears $174,609 with overtime available beyond it.

The City of Los Angeles is the biggest recruiter on the page, but it is far from the only one. The surrounding departments hire on their own cycles, and recent listings include Police Officer Trainee postings from the City of Inglewood and the City of Beverly Hills, along with openings from the City of Burbank, the City of Glendale, the City of Downey, the City of Manhattan Beach, the City of South Gate, and the City of San Marino. Smaller departments often move candidates through testing faster than the biggest agencies can, which is one reason serious candidates apply to several at once.

One more employer type appears here: Allied Universal posts Off Duty Police Officer assignments, secondary work for officers who already hold sworn status and want additional paid details. That listing type is a useful signal of how the profession works in this region, where an active certification opens doors beyond a single department's schedule. Each agency manages its own recruiting calendar and standards, which is exactly why a page aggregating verified openings across all of them surfaces opportunities that watching any single careers site would miss.

Entry-level candidates should look for Police Officer Trainee and Police Officer Recruit postings. These require no prior law enforcement experience; the hiring agency puts successful candidates through a state-certified academy as the first assignment of the job. Experienced officers have their own lane: Police Officer - Lateral and Police Officer (Lateral) postings recruit currently certified officers from other agencies, typically with abbreviated training, faster placement into patrol, and pay steps that credit prior service. Standard Police Officer postings round out the sworn list, and Off Duty Police Officer assignments add paid secondary work for those already certified.

Beyond the municipal departments, the feed reaches the region's specialized agencies, including airport police and school police, which offer the same sworn career with a different beat. Whichever lane fits, expect shift work early in a sworn career, since policing runs around the clock, with nights, weekends, and holidays typically offset by premium pay and predictable rotations under a civil service structure with union representation.

Every sworn hiring pipeline in California runs through POST, the state commission that sets minimum selection and training standards for peace officers. The arc is consistent from agency to agency: application, written and physical ability testing, then the stage that eliminates the most candidates, a thorough background investigation covering personal history, finances, driving record, and past employment, followed by medical and psychological evaluations. Each posting lists its own minimum age, education, and eligibility standards, so read the announcement itself rather than relying on secondhand rules.

Clear all of that and you enter the academy. At the LAPD, recruits train for roughly six months at a POST-certified academy, then spend their probationary period as a Police Officer I working under field training officers before advancing to Police Officer II, the working rank reflected in the payroll data above. Lateral candidates shortcut the process with a current California POST certificate, which is why lateral postings appear across nearly every department on this page. Two pieces of advice carry more weight than any test prep: start physical conditioning early, and be relentlessly honest in the background phase, because discrepancies end more candidacies than weak scores do.

Financially, the working rank makes a strong case. A median total compensation of $174,609 puts a rank-and-file LAPD officer ahead of most careers that require a four-year degree, in a job that does not require one. Add a defined benefit pension, health coverage, union protections, and step increases that arrive on schedule, and the long-term economics compare favorably with almost anything else open to a high school graduate in this county. The lateral market adds mobility: certified officers can move between the departments on this page without starting over.

The counterweight is real. The hiring pipeline takes months and filters hard, academy pay during the Police Officer I phase is modest while it lasts, and the job itself brings shift work, physical risk, emotional weight, and constant public scrutiny. Candidates who weigh those demands with open eyes, and still want durable pay with a pension, will find 2026 a strong market across every agency listed here.

Start with the live listings below. Every card links straight to the hiring agency's own application, so you apply at the source rather than through a middleman. Applying to more than one department at a time is normal and smart, since testing stages overlap and eligibility lists move at different speeds from agency to agency. Before you submit, gather the identification, education, and employment records the background packet will demand, and set aside real time for the personal history questionnaire, because rushed answers create the inconsistencies investigators are trained to find. Every listing on this page is verified and sourced directly from employer career pages, so each one is current and actively hiring.

Jobs Hiring in Los Angeles, CA, Jobs Hiring in Long Beach, CA, Jobs Hiring in Glendale, CA, Jobs Hiring in Pasadena, CA, Jobs Hiring in Torrance, CA, Jobs Hiring in Burbank, CA, Police Officer Jobs Near Me.

LAPD Police Officer II Salaries (real payroll data), Police Officer Jobs in San Diego, Police Officer Jobs in San Francisco, Firefighter Jobs in Los Angeles, Government Jobs in Los Angeles County.