What compact privilege is
A multistate license from your primary state of residence carries compact privilege — the authority to practice in other compact states without licensing separately in each. It only exists between states that are live in the Nurse Licensure Compact.
Practicing in Pennsylvania on privilege
Because Pennsylvania participates, an active multistate license lets you work in Pennsylvania — common for travel nurses and telehealth. Privilege follows the patient’s location and your home-state license staying active and multistate.
The law that governs this in Pennsylvania
Working in Pennsylvania on another state’s license is practice in Pennsylvania, so it is Pennsylvania’s own nurse practice act that defines what you may do and the Pennsylvania State Board of Nursing that applies it. That act is Professional Nursing Law, 63 P.S. § 211 et seq..
The compact itself is separate law. Pennsylvania adopted it at Act 68 of 2021 (Senate Bill 115), which is what allows a multistate license issued elsewhere to reach Pennsylvania at all — the practice act still decides what you may do once it does.
Signed 1 July 2021 and effective immediately, but the compact did not become usable in Pennsylvania until implementation completed on 7 July 2025 — four years later.
Confirm before you rely on it
License status changes and the compact evolves. Confirm your own license type on Nursys and check Pennsylvania’s current rules with the Pennsylvania State Board of Nursing. CompactStates.com is an independent guide, not a licensing authority.
Since when has a compact license worked in Pennsylvania?
Nurses holding another state’s multistate license have been able to practice in Pennsylvania since July 7, 2025. That is recent enough that employer handbooks, agency briefings, and articles written before then still describe Pennsylvania as non-compact — so if you are told you need a Pennsylvania license, check the date on the guidance.
Where a Pennsylvania multistate license reaches
If your Pennsylvania license is multistate — not every Pennsylvania license is — it carries privilege into these 39 jurisdictions, because each one currently issues and honours multistate licenses. It reaches nowhere else, and a non-compact state needs its own license by endorsement.
Two conditions sit underneath this list and neither is visible on it. Your primary state of residence must actually be Pennsylvania — privilege follows residence, not where the license was issued. And the license itself must be multistate rather than single-state, which is a fact about your record that only verification can settle.
Alabama · Arizona · Arkansas · Colorado · Connecticut · Delaware · Florida · Georgia · Idaho · Indiana · Iowa · Kansas · Kentucky · Louisiana · Maine · Maryland · Mississippi · Missouri · Montana · Nebraska · New Hampshire · New Jersey · New Mexico · North Carolina · North Dakota · Ohio · Oklahoma · Rhode Island · South Carolina · South Dakota · Tennessee · Texas · Utah · Vermont · Virginia · Washington · West Virginia · Wisconsin · Wyoming