Explore by Career/Production
Sewing Machine Operators
Operate or tend sewing machines to join, reinforce, decorate, or perform related sewing operations in the manufacture of garment or nongarment products.
- Median pay
- $36,000
- per year
- 10-year outlook
- -10.8%
- Declining
- Typical entry
- No formal educational credential
Key skills
- Monitoring
- Active Listening
- Critical Thinking
- Complex Problem Solving
- Operations Monitoring
- Quality Control Analysis
- Judgment and Decision Making
- Time Management
What they do
- Monitor machine operation to detect problems such as defective stitching, breaks in thread, or machine malfunctions.
- Place spools of thread, cord, or other materials on spindles, insert bobbins, and thread ends through machine guides and components.
- Position items under needles, using marks on machines, clamps, templates, or cloth as guides.
- Guide garments or garment parts under machine needles and presser feet to sew parts together.
- Remove holding devices and finished items from machines.
- Match cloth pieces in correct sequences prior to sewing them, and verify that dye lots and patterns match.
- Fold or stretch edges or lengths of items while sewing to facilitate forming specified sections.
- Cut excess material or thread from finished products.
- Select supplies such as fasteners and thread, according to job requirements.
- Examine and measure finished articles to verify conformance to standards, using rulers.
Majors that lead here
No mapped majors yet.
Sources: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (OEWS, Employment Projections) and O*NET, used under CC BY 4.0.