Nevada to Wyoming: journeyman electrician license reciprocity
Nevada does not issue a statewide journeyman electrician license, so there is nothing to transfer. Here is Wyoming's standard path for out-of-state applicants.
Your origin state does not issue a statewide license at this level, so there is no license to transfer. The destination's standard out-of-state path is shown; expect to meet it in full.
Reference only, not legal advice. Rules change; confirm with the licensing board before you apply. Full disclaimer.
Licensure by examination with out-of-state experience (states without a reciprocal agreement)
Your out-of-state credentials give no advantage. You meet the destination's requirements from scratch.
The licensing page states that Wyoming must have a reciprocal agreement with the state the applicant is reciprocating from, so a journeyman from any other state applies for the Wyoming journeyman exam. Out-of-state work experience is accepted toward the 8,000-hour requirement when documented by notarized employer letters or the Journeyman and Master Work Verification Form, notarized union letters, or official letters from other licensing boards; the department says a copy of a current license from another state board whose work-history requirement is equal to or more stringent than Wyoming's 8,000 hours may be accepted as proof of work history. The applicant must still show 576 hours of approved apprenticeship classroom instruction (or 10 years / 20,000 hours as a licensed journeyman or master approved by the Chief Electrical Inspector), pass the exam with 70%, and then pay the $100 license fee through the eLicense portal. W.S. 35-9-126(d) also lets the department issue a reciprocal license to anyone whose out-of-state license was obtained through an exam equal to or exceeding Wyoming's, but the department does not describe using that discretion outside its listed agreement states.
The licensing page does not name the exam vendor or the exam fee; it says testing fees are paid to the testing facility, and W.S. 35-9-129 caps the examination fee at $300. Each processing step can take up to five business days.
At a glance
- Trade exam
- Required
- Law / code exam
- Not required
- Out-of-state hours
- Count toward eligibility
- Typical processing
- About 15 days
What you must already have
- You must document at least 8,000 hours of qualifying work experience.Four years in the electrical wiring industry under a qualifying electrician for a licensed electrical contractor; no more than 75% in any one of residential, commercial or industrial; up to 4,000 hours of credit for electrical schooling beyond the required 576 hours
- 576 hours (144 per year over four years) of electrically related classroom instruction from a Department of Labor approved apprenticeship program, or 10 years / 20,000 hours as a licensed journeyman or master electrician approved by the Chief Electrical Inspector
What you'll do to get licensed in Wyoming
- 1Trade exam. Pass the destination's trade exam. Wyoming Journeyman Electrician examination, open book on the current NEC, 70% to pass.
- 2Exam fee. Pay the exam fee. Examination fee paid to the testing facility (amount not published on the licensing page; statutory cap $300).
- 3License fee. Pay the license or certificate fee ($100). Initial Journeyman Electrician license fee paid after uploading the exam pass letter (plus 2.5% card processing fee).
- 4Other. Government-issued ID verification in the eLicense portal, work verification documents and apprenticeship education transcripts.
Published fees on this path total $100, excluding exam-vendor fees, bonds, and insurance.
What you'll need to buy or arrange
Exam preparation
Most boards contract PSI, Prov, or ICC for exams. Check which code edition the exam is written to before buying a prep course.
- Trade exam
- Exam fee
How Wyoming licenses journeyman electricians
Wyoming journeyman electrician · “Journeyman Electrician”
Statewide license
Wyoming issues a statewide Journeyman Electrician license through the Department of Fire Prevention and Electrical Safety (the State Fire Marshal's Office); the governor-appointed Electrical Board adopts the licensing rules. To sit for the exam an applicant documents four years (8,000 hours) of work in the electrical wiring industry under a qualifying electrician for a licensed contractor, spread across residential, commercial and industrial work with no more than 75% in one category, plus 576 hours of approved apprenticeship classroom instruction (or 20,000 hours as a licensed electrician in lieu of schooling). The open-book exam is on the current NEC (2023, with the 2026 NEC effective July 1, 2026) and requires 70%. The initial license fee is $100; the license runs three years, expiring January 1, and renews for $50 with 16 hours of board-approved continuing education. Wyoming has journeyman reciprocity agreements with seventeen states and waives its exam for their licensees.
Why Nevada has nothing to transfer
Nevada journeyman electrician
Licensed by cities and counties
Nevada has no statewide journeyman electrician license. The Nevada State Contractors Board (NSCB) licenses electrical contractors under classification C-2 (NRS/NAC 624) and states that it does not issue licenses to individual journeymen, so an out-of-state journeyman license has nothing to transfer to at the state level and is not required for employment by a licensed C-2 contractor in most of the state. Journeyman cards are instead required by local building codes in the urban jurisdictions: Clark County, the City of Las Vegas, the City of Henderson and the City of Reno all require a master electrician, electrical qualified individual or journeyman electrician to be on site for permitted electrical work, and their journeyman credential is a Nevada Electrical Qualifications Card obtained by passing the ICC national G17 Journeyman Electrician (or G18 Residential Electrician) exam at 70% and applying to Electrical Safety Professionals (ESP), the third-party card administrator, with 2,000 documented hours of electrical work or apprenticeship (a requirement added January 1, 2024). No jurisdiction publishes a waiver of the ICC exam for an out-of-state license; Clark County recognizes only certificates from its accepted testing agency or from other Nevada political subdivisions within the county, and Reno lets holders of a reciprocal license from another city, county, state or country work for 12 months inside the city before obtaining the Reno certification. Cards are valid three years and renewed with ESP continuing education.
How local licensing works in Nevada
How local licensing works. NRS Chapter 624 licenses only contractors; a C-2 Electrical Contracting license is issued to a business and qualified by an individual with four years of journeyman-or-higher experience, and the NSCB's own FAQ says Nevada does not license individual journeymen. Whether a working electrician needs a personal credential is decided by each county's or city's building administrative code. The southern Nevada jurisdictions and Reno run a common program: exams are the ICC National Electrician exams (G17 Journeyman Electrician, G18 Residential Electrician, G16 Master Electrician) taken through Pearson VUE, and photo ID cards are issued by Electrical Safety Professionals (ESP), the Nevada non-profit that took over the Clark County ID card program on September 1, 2019.
Clark County (unincorporated Las Vegas valley, Laughlin, Mesquite area). Clark County Code §22.02.250 requires the contractor to have a master electrician or electrical qualified individual, or a journeyman electrician, present in a supervisory capacity whenever permitted electrical work is under way. §22.02.255 defines a journeyman as someone who has passed the journeyman examination accepted by the Building Official; §22.02.260 lists Journeyman Electrician (all electrical work), Journeyman Residential Electrician (one- and two-family dwellings), Journeyman Sign Electrician and Technician (low voltage) categories and requires certificates to be kept current with the county's accepted third-party testing agency. The only equivalency in the code is for a current certificate from an accepted independent testing agency or from a political subdivision of Nevada within Clark County; there is no provision for other states' licenses. Since 2019 the accepted exam is the ICC G17/G18 and the card comes from ESP.
City of Las Vegas. The City of Las Vegas Administrative Code (2019 edition) §306 carries the same on-site supervision rule (master electrician or electrical qualified individual, or a journeyman electrician). The city uses the same ESP card as Clark County.
City of Henderson. ESP's program notice lists Henderson among the municipalities that require at least a journeyman electrical card for installing electrical systems; Henderson's own building pages could not be opened for this record, so its ordinance text is unverified.
City of Reno (Washoe County). Reno Municipal Code Title 14 prohibits electrical installations, alterations or additions unless done by a person holding a valid journeyman certificate, with exceptions for homeowners, licensed contractors under direct supervision arrangements, and contractors with reciprocal licenses from another city, county, state or country, who must obtain the Reno certification after 12 months of work in the city. The ICC G17 or G18 exam needs no pre-approval; the applicant then sends the score report to ESP for a card valid three years.
ESP card requirements (all of the above). Pass the ICC exam (70% journeyman, 75% master); since January 1, 2024 a new card also needs 2,000 documented hours of electrical work or apprenticeship; renewal every three years with 15 CEU hours for journeymen (30 for masters) including an 8-hour NEC update class; a card expired more than one year requires re-examination. ESP's card and exam fees are not published on the official jurisdiction pages and were not verified.
Out-of-state holders. None of these jurisdictions publish a reciprocity or endorsement path for a journeyman license from another state. Reno's 12-month grace period for reciprocal licenses is the only accommodation found. In practice an arriving journeyman takes the ICC G17 exam once and obtains the ESP card, which is honored by Clark County, Las Vegas, Henderson and Reno. Rural counties and Carson City were not surveyed.
- Clark County (Department of Building and Fire Prevention)
- City of Las Vegas (Department of Building and Safety)
- City of Henderson (per ESP program notice; ordinance not verified)
- City of Reno (Development Services)
Common questions
- Do I have to take the Wyoming journeyman electrician exam if I'm licensed in Nevada?
- Yes. Wyoming requires the trade exam on this path.
- What does it cost to get a Wyoming journeyman electrician license from Nevada?
- Published fees on this path total $100, not counting exam vendor fees or bonds.
- Do my Nevada work hours count in Wyoming?
- Yes. Documented out-of-state experience counts toward Wyoming's eligibility requirements.
- How long does the application take?
- The board's published or typical processing time is about 15 days.
- Does it work the other way, from Wyoming to Nevada?
- Not necessarily. Reciprocity is directed. Going from Wyoming to Nevada, the mechanism is not applicable.
Sources
- Wyoming Statutes Title 35, Chapter 9, Article 1 - Department of Fire Prevention and Electrical Safety · W.S. 35-9-126(a), 35-9-126(d), 35-9-129 · Wyoming Legislature · Statute · verified September 15, 202635-9-126(a): applicants for master and journeyman licenses apply to the chief electrical inspector, pass the examination and pay the license fee; a master license expires July 1 and a journeyman license January 1 in the third year after issue; up to 4,000 hours of electrical school credit toward work experience. 35-9-126(d): the department may issue a reciprocal license to an applicant who obtained an out-of-state or foreign license through an examination equal to or exceeding Wyoming's. 35-9-129: fee caps - master $200, journeyman $100, temporary permit $50, examination $300.
- Wyoming State Fire Marshal's Office - Fire Council and Electrical Board · Wyoming Department of Fire Prevention and Electrical Safety · Agency Page · verified September 15, 2026The five-member Electrical Board appointed by the governor adopts the rules for licensing master and journeyman electricians, technicians, apprentices, temporary permits and reciprocal licenses.
- Wyoming State Fire Marshal's Office - Electrical Safety Home Page · Wyoming Department of Fire Prevention and Electrical Safety · Agency Page · verified September 15, 2026Effective April 1, 2025 a 2.5% processing fee (minimum $1) is added to card payments; Wyoming currently enforces the 2023 NEC with the 2026 NEC effective July 1, 2026; links the licensing portal and the statutes and rules.
- Wyoming Department of Fire Prevention and Electrical Safety - Licensing · W.S. 35-9-101 et seq. · Wyoming State Fire Marshal's Office, Electrical Safety Division · Agency Page · verified September 15, 2026The only statewide construction-trade licensing program in Wyoming; the page lists apprentice, low-voltage/limited technician, journeyman and master electrician licenses and electrical/low-voltage contractor licenses. It contains no HVAC, mechanical or refrigeration license. The one HVAC-related state credential is the LM-H Limited Technician license, which covers the electrical wiring of HVAC systems only.
Verified dates are when a person last opened each source and confirmed the facts above. Cite the board, not us.