New grad RN jobs and nurse residency programs in Arkansas

A quarter of Arkansas RNs earn less than $32.04 an hour ($66,640 a year) and half earn more than $37.95. First-year offers tend to sit near the lower figure, since hospital pay scales usually rise with experience.

Arkansas ranks 47th of the 50 states and DC for median RN pay. When you compare offers, weigh them against local rent as well as against other states.

$5.91 an hour separates the 25th percentile from the median here, close to the typical gap across the states.

The largest RN job market touching Arkansas is the Memphis area, with 13,760 RNs; that count includes nurses in Tennessee and Mississippi.

The Arkansas State Board of Nursing licenses RNs in Arkansas.

Arkansas is in the Nurse Licensure Compact. If Arkansas is your primary state of residence, the license you earn after the NCLEX can be multistate, valid in every compact state. Nurses who live in another compact state can work in Arkansas on their home state's multistate license.

Every one of its neighboring states is in the compact too, so one license covers the whole region.

Yes, with conditions. A temporary permit costs an extra fee and is issued only within 90 days of finishing your program, once you are registered with Pearson VUE and your background checks are clear. It lasts 90 days or until the result of your first exam, whichever comes first.

Source: Arkansas State Board of Nursing, RN initial by exam, read October 2026. The permit makes it legal; whether you can use it depends on the employer, since not every hospital starts graduate nurses before they are licensed. Ask the recruiter.

29 of the 50 states and DC allow something like this, each with its own limits. See every state's rule.

2,094 of the 2,402 first-time, U.S.-educated candidates who took the NCLEX-RN for Arkansas in 2025 passed: 87.2%, 0.5 points above the national rate of 86.7%.

Against the 8 new-grad programs we track here, that is about 300 new test takers per program, well above the national figure of about 114. Part of that is how few programs we track here, so look at new-grad RN jobs outside residencies as well.

The exam is the same everywhere; the rate tells you about the graduates who tested here, not about your own chances. See pass rates in every state.

Among its neighboring states, Texas both pays RNs the most (a median of $95,970) and has the most new-grad programs on our list (163).