Well Pump Replacement Cost Calculator
Well pump replacement cost runs about $2,600 at 80 feet and $8,400 at 450. Depth is not a detail here, it is most of the answer, and it works through three separate lines at once: the drop pipe and cable are priced by the foot, the pump has to be more powerful, and past 250 feet the column is too heavy to pull by hand and a hoist truck comes out.
Estimate the cost for your home
Estimated cost to replace a well pump
$3,453
typical · range $2,144 to $4,763 · Submersible, 0.75 HP
Labour priced at national wages. Enter a ZIP code to price it for your area. 80% of this figure comes from modelled material prices — each line shows its own uncertainty.
Priced from bls.gov Aug 2026how every line is sourced
The one input that changes the answer for you.
The number that decides half this bill. It is on your well drilling report; if you do not have it, your state well database usually does.
At 150 ft you need a submersible of about 0.75 HP. Sits at the bottom of the well and pushes water up. Needed on anything but a shallow well.
Still shallow enough to pull by hand. Past 250 ft a hoist truck is needed and the price steps up.
1 / 4
The figure above is already calculated. Each step just makes it more yours, and you can stop at any of them.
| Line item | Qty | Cost | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Submersible well pumphorsepower, sized from depth | 0.75horsepower | $420–$1,125 | estimated±46% |
| Drop pipefull well depth, when the pipe is replaced | 150linear ft | $330–$825 | estimated±43% |
| Submersible drop cablefull well depth, on submersible pumps | 150linear ft | $270–$690 | estimated±44% |
| Pressure tank1 when the pressure tank is replaced too | 1each | $320–$950 | estimated±50% |
| Pressure switch, gauge and fittings1 per replacement | 1lot | $60–$190 | estimated±52% |
| Pull the old pump, set the new one, prime and test6 hours + 1 hour per 50 ft of depth (modelled) | 9hour | $536–$576 | sourced |
| Electrician: control box and connections2 electrician-hours (modelled) | 2hour | $118–$127 | sourced |
| Shock chlorination and water test1 per replacement | 1lot | $90–$280 | estimated±51% |
| Total | $2,144–$4,763 | ±38% |
Where these numbers come from
- Labour rates by area
- BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025, for plumbers and electricians in your metropolitan area. Retrieved 2026-08-20. Benefit load from BLS Employer Costs for Employee Compensation.
- Why the well is disinfected afterwards
- Opening a well introduces surface bacteria, so it is shock chlorinated and the water tested before it goes back into use. Private wells are not covered by the Safe Drinking Water Act, which is exactly why testing is on you rather than on a utility — see the EPA on drinking water reporting, which applies to community systems and not to your well.
- Why depth is the question we ask
- A well has a static water level, a drawdown level while pumping, and a pump set below both — three different depths that people often conflate. USGS Water Science School, Groundwater Wells explains the distinction. The figure this calculator wants is how deep the pump itself sits, which is on your drilling report. Retrieved 2026-08-22.
- How the pump is sized
- Horsepower is stepped from depth: half a horsepower to 100 feet, three quarters to 200, one to 300, one and a half to 400, two beyond. Those are the usual industry steps and they are our estimate, not a published standard. The real figure comes from a total dynamic head calculation that includes the lift to your tank and the friction in your pipe, which a calculator cannot see.
- Material prices
- Modelled estimates, not sourced prices. No public, machine-readable source of US residential material prices exists, and we would rather say so than pretend otherwise. Each line carries its own uncertainty band. How we estimate them.
Contractor overhead and profit applied at 33–43% over direct cost. Data last reviewed 2026-08-22.
What this figure does not include
- Drilling a new well
- This models replacing the pump in an existing well. Drilling is a different project priced per foot of hole, and an order of magnitude more expensive.
- A collapsed or silted casing
- If the well itself has failed rather than the pump, no pump will fix it. That is found when the old one comes out, and it changes the job entirely.
- Permit fees and well reports
- Many states require a well report to be filed on pump replacement. Fees vary and are excluded rather than averaged.
- Water treatment
- Iron, sulphur, hardness or bacterial problems need their own equipment and are not part of a pump replacement.
- Emergency call-out premiums
- A well pump usually fails without warning, and out-of-hours work is charged accordingly. These figures assume scheduled work.
Questions people actually ask
How do I tell if my well pump is bad?
The usual signs are no water at all, water that sputters and spits air, pressure that drops away while a tap runs, a pump that runs constantly without building pressure, or one that clicks on and off every few seconds. That last one — short cycling — is often the pressure tank rather than the pump, and replacing the pump will not fix it. A tripping breaker points at the motor or the cable. Before anyone pulls the pump, it is worth checking the tank pressure and the switch, because both are far cheaper.
What is the life expectancy of a well pump?
Eight to fifteen years for a submersible, and often less for a surface jet pump because it works harder for the same water. Sand or silt in the water shortens it considerably, as does short cycling from a failed pressure tank. Depth matters too, not for the pump but for you: replacing one at 400 feet costs several times what the same pump costs at 80, which is why a deep well justifies buying at the better end of the range rather than the cheapest unit that fits.
Can a plumber replace a well pump?
Many plumbers do, and on a shallow well it is straightforward work. Deep wells are usually the domain of a well contractor with a hoist truck, because past roughly 250 feet the column of pipe, cable and pump is too heavy to pull by hand. Several states also license well work separately from plumbing and require a report to be filed on replacement. Asking whether the contractor has pulled a pump at your depth before is a fair question, and the answer changes the price.
Is a well pump covered by homeowners insurance?
Standard policies generally do not cover a pump that fails from age or wear, which is how most of them fail. Cover is more likely where the failure follows something sudden the policy names, such as a lightning strike, and some insurers sell equipment breakdown endorsements that go further. What yours covers, and what it excludes, is a question only your policy documents can answer. It is worth reading before the pump fails rather than after, because these endorsements cannot be added retrospectively.
Taken from Google’s “people also ask” results for this search on 22 August 2026, not invented.
Other cost calculators
The first of these are the jobs closest to this one — the ones that turn up in the same quote, or instead of it.
- Toilet installation cost
Separates the fixture from the fitting fee and prices the labour at your local wage, which is the number to hold a quote against.
- Sewer line replacement cost
Prices a replacement by the foot, and shows what trenchless methods save once you count restoring the driveway you would have dug up.
- HVAC replacement cost
Prices a whole system replaced in one visit and measures, against our own furnace and air conditioner models, what doing both halves together really saves.
- The full well pump replacement cost dataset
Every unit price, every quantity rule and the reasoning behind each estimate, as a plain table.
- How we calculate
The formula, the sources, and an honest account of which parts of the model are weak.