W-3 without dependents, nearest stations0 – $5,301 / month
San Francisco$5,301
Whiteman AFB$1,782
Camp Lejeune$1,776
Champaign$1,776
Yuma$1,773
Akron$1,764
Fort Rucker$1,764
Malmstrom SFB$1,764
Topeka$1,755
Wright-Patterson AFB$1,755
Youngstown$1,341
Akron is #263 of 338. The spread between
the dearest and cheapest station at this grade is $3,960 a month —
$47,520 a year, untaxed.
Every pay grade at Akron0 – $2,064 / month
E-1$1,197
E-2$1,197
E-3$1,197
E-4$1,197
E-5$1,383
E-6$1,494
E-7$1,539
E-8$1,653
E-9$1,752
W-1$1,536
W-2$1,650
W-3$1,764
W-4$1,923
W-5$1,947
O-1E$1,578
O-2E$1,728
O-3E$1,920
O-1$1,491
O-2$1,569
O-3$1,797
O-4$1,935
O-5$2,037
O-6$2,052
O-7$2,064
Promoting to W-4 here adds $159 a
month. The pay chart moves this allowance far less than the map does.
01
Where you are stationed outweighs what you are paid. Moving from Akron to San Francisco at W-3 is worth $3,537 a month — about 22 promotions worth of housing allowance, at $159 per grade here.
02
Dependency status is worth 12% here. That is a status your finance office determines, not a box you tick — and it is the single largest lever on this page that is not a change of address.
03
None of it is taxed. $1,764 a month of BAH takes more than $1,764 of basic pay to match, which is why comparing a civilian salary against military base pay alone understates the gap.
Ad slot — in-content, after the answerPlaced below the number, never above it. VA-loan and PCS-move advertisers bid here.
Things the rate table doesn't tell you
01
“With dependents” is a dependency status, not a marital status. A single member paying child support can be authorized BAH-Diff; a married dual-military couple with no children is not automatically the with-dependents rate for both. If your situation is unusual, your finance office decides — not this table.
02
O-8, O-9 and O-10 draw the same BAH as O-7. The table stops there for a reason, not because it is missing rows.
03
This is CONUS BAH only. Overseas is OHA, which works differently — it reimburses actual rent up to a cap, with separate utility and move-in allowances. Alaska and Hawaii are BAH; Germany, Japan and Korea are OHA.