PACCAR Internship 2027–2028: Programs, Deadlines & How to Apply

Last updated: August 2026

PACCAR publishes its intern pay rate right inside the job posting: $25.00 an hour for undergraduate students and $30.00 an hour for graduate students, stated identically in nine separate requisitions across four sites and three divisions. The $28.44 billion, Fortune 500 #158 truck maker behind Kenworth, Peterbilt and DAF has now earned its 87th consecutive year of net income. It hires interns into six distinct divisions, not one central program. For the 2027–2028 cycle, summer-2027 requisitions are expected to start appearing around early October 2026, projecting the 2026 cycle whose first three PACCAR Parts postings went live on 2 October 2025. So what does a student do between now and October?

And right now the board reads "There are currently no open positions matching this category".

Quick Facts

PACCAR posts intern requisitions division by division across a roughly 4.5-month spread, starting with PACCAR Parts around early October and ending with the Technical Center and the Sunnyvale MBA role around February. There is no single opening date and no visible deadline. And requisitions can be gone in days.

Externships are short, remote programs where you finish a real project with a real company. The Amazon Fulfillment Center Operational Strategy & People Analytics Externship builds the operations and continuous-improvement evidence PACCAR Parts and the plant roles reward, and the Beats by Dre Data Analytics Externship turns "I know data" into a finished analysis project in PACCAR's own Power BI and Tableau vocabulary. Explore all Externships.

What Is a PACCAR Internship?

A PACCAR internship is a paid, on-site placement running 10 to 12 weeks starting in May or June inside one of the six-plus divisions that make up the company behind Kenworth and Peterbilt trucks. PACCAR's own board says it best: "You'll get the opportunity to work on real projects and have fun along the way. We offer internships in all job categories, locations and product areas." And interns end the summer with a presentation of their accomplishments to fellow interns and senior management.

But PACCAR also runs a separate fall cohort at its Columbus, Mississippi engine plant.

When Do PACCAR Internship Applications Open for 2027–2028?

PACCAR doesn't announce a single opening date. Instead, its six divisions post intern requisitions on their own schedules across a roughly 4.5-month window, and the 2026 cycle was consistent enough to project the next one. PACCAR Parts opened first, posting three requisitions on 2 October 2025; the last summer-2026 requisition didn't appear until 13 February 2026. Right now the Internship Jobs category reads "There are currently no open positions matching this category or location."

So applications for summer 2027 are expected starting around early October 2026.

How to read this page: our dates come from tracking previous recruiting cycles and daily posting data. Treat them as informed estimates based on historical patterns, not confirmed dates. The company's official careers page is always the most current source. If a role is posted there, go by that, even if this page suggests the window hasn't opened yet.

Why You Must Apply the Week Applications Open

There is no "PACCAR internship deadline." There are two dozen site-and-function-specific windows opening on different dates across a 4.5-month spread, and PACCAR publishes a closing date only in machine-readable markup you'll never see. Lewisville's Financial Rotational internship for summer 2026 was already off the board by 15 December 2025, before the Bellevue Purchasing Accounting requisition for the same summer had been live four days and two months before Mount Vernon's engineering requisitions even posted. The Fall 2026 Quality Engineering Intern lasted at most eight days.

But missing the first window is survivable, since PACCAR re-posts requisitions that don't fill, roughly February to April. Assuming you'll get a second window isn't.

Which PACCAR Internship Programs Should You Target?

There is no single "PACCAR internship program." You apply to a division, and each one posts its own requisitions, on its own schedule, with its own requirements.

So here are six representative tracks from the 2026 cycle, spanning the engineering-to-business split.

Watch the Internship Jobs page and set the email alert. It's empty now and will stay empty until roughly October. PACCAR Engine Company in Columbus, Mississippi also runs a fall cohort with matched versions of its summer titles, posting anywhere from January to August.

What Are the Eligibility Requirements?

PACCAR has no single eligibility block. The bar differs sharply by division, and that's the useful thing to know:

• Class year: most Washington and corporate roles (PACCAR Parts, Kenworth Kirkland, Bellevue, Mount Vernon) prefer junior or senior standing. Kenworth Chillicothe is stricter: "Must be junior/senior level college student enrolled engineering." But PACCAR Engine Company in Columbus, Mississippi accepts students who've "completed their Sophomore year of College." Peterbilt Denton specifies no class year at all.

• GPA: only one division publishes a number. PACCAR Engine Company in Columbus asks for "a 3.0 GPA or higher is preferable." None of the Washington, Texas, Ohio or California requisitions mentions GPA.

• Degree level: undergraduate or graduate. Several requisitions read "Bachelor's or Master's Degree in Progress." The Sunnyvale role is explicitly M.B.A.

• Physical requirements: Louisville KY requires the ability to "move, lift or carry up to 70 lbs, withstand heights up to 30 feet" and notes this is "a safety-sensitive position, and the pre-employment drug testing includes cannabis testing." Columbus MS expects standing for prolonged periods and flexibility to work day and evening shifts.

• Relocation: PACCAR Parts and Peterbilt say relocation assistance may be offered. Peterbilt's 2026 wording changed from "relocation assistance" to "stipend assistance." No requisition mentions intern housing.

• Work authorization: not addressed in any of the 15 requisitions read. Only standard equal-opportunity and E-Verify boilerplate.

Is the 3.0 GPA a Hard Cutoff?

It isn't a cutoff at all outside Mississippi, and it's "preferable" even there. PACCAR publishes a GPA number in exactly one division's requisitions, PACCAR Engine Company in Columbus, MS, and words it "A 3.0 GPA or higher is preferable," not required. Nine of the fifteen requisitions we read name no GPA whatsoever. The gates that actually bite at PACCAR are class year (junior/senior for most Washington roles, sophomore-and-up in Mississippi) and being on the board the week your division's requisition appears.

What Skills Does PACCAR Look For, and How Do You Build Them?

Fifteen PACCAR intern and co-op job descriptions from the 2026 and 2025 cycles, read in full, paint a profile dominated by professional traits rather than named tools, and that's by construction. PACCAR re-uses one five-line requirement block ("Exceptional Microsoft Office, Excellent verbal and written communication, Multi-tasking, Self-starter and Resourceful, Strong Professionalism, Analytical") almost identically across several divisions, so Office and communication sit at the top of this chart by design. But the real differentiation happens lower. AutoCAD is a hard requirement at Kenworth Chillicothe ("Must be proficient using autocad"), FMEA, SPC, DOE and CAPA define the Columbus MS quality role, and Power BI, Tableau and SQL are the data family's currency.

What's genuinely absent from all 15 JDs? SolidWorks, CREO, CATIA, ANSYS, MATLAB, Python and GD&T, even though the wider mechanical-intern market's top two skills are SolidWorks and AutoCAD. PACCAR is an AutoCAD shop, not a SolidWorks one.

How Is Demand for Mechanical Engineering Interns Moving Right Now?

Build These Skills Before You Apply

And several bars in the chart map to a remote Externship that ends in a finished company project. Not AutoCAD itself, but the adjacent evidence PACCAR's requisitions reward. So what's the overlap?

These don't teach you AutoCAD, and they don't pretend to. But what they build is the adjacent evidence PACCAR's requisitions actually reward: documented project work, operational data analysis, structured problem solving and a presentable end-of-project deliverable.

What Is the PACCAR Application and Interview Process Like?

PACCAR's interview loop is short and human. No coding assessment, no HireVue, on the evidence available:

1. Watch jobs.paccar.com/go/Internship-Jobs/2706600/ and set the email alert. The page is empty right now and will stay empty until roughly October. Ignore the ten jobs shown underneath the "no open positions" message. PACCAR's own banner says they're the ten most recent postings of any kind, not internships.

2. Pick a division, not "PACCAR." Filter by facility on the board (?optionsFacetsDD_facility={Division}). Each division posts on its own date with its own requirements.

3. Apply through the requisition's "Apply now" flow on jobs.paccar.com or via the LinkedIn apply integration, which PACCAR enables on every requisition.

4. Phone screen, then a behavioural panel. Community reports describe a compact loop: one r/csMajors poster's 2024 summary reads "PACCAR: only one round, talked with both manager and team lead." A Glassdoor intern-interview review describes roughly 30 minutes of behavioural questions with about three interviewers. Glassdoor reports 61% positive experience and 2.7 out of 5 difficulty.

5. Offer. Paid hourly at PACCAR's published $25 (undergraduate) / $30 (graduate) rate on the requisitions that publish one, with 401k up to a 5% match, medical/dental/vision and sick leave.

PACCAR's own careers footer warns: "Always be on the lookout for job scams. PACCAR will never ask you for money as part of recruitment or a job offer."

So if anyone asks you to pay, it's not PACCAR.

What Students on Reddit Say

Three threads, from the outside.

How Do You Stand Out at a Company That Publishes No Deadline?

Three moves, starting with the calendar. Apply the week your division's requisition appears, and know that "your division" is the unit, not "PACCAR." Last cycle the requisitions appeared across a 4.5-month spread from 2 October 2025 to 13 February 2026, and Lewisville's Financial Rotational role was already gone by mid-December, before Mount Vernon's engineering requisitions even posted.

Second, what's the cheapest insider signal you can send? Speak PACCAR's vocabulary back to it and get the CAD package right. Kenworth Chillicothe says "Must be proficient using autocad" outright; the wider market's top skill is SolidWorks, but PACCAR doesn't ask for it anywhere. A portfolio built for PACCAR is an AutoCAD portfolio.

And third, build the closing presentation into your pitch. PACCAR tells interns up front that the summer ends with a presentation to fellow interns and senior management. A candidate who arrives with a worked example of exactly that's answering the question PACCAR is actually asking.

What Other Companies Should You Consider?

PACCAR's peers are the heavy-equipment and industrial manufacturers whose intern calendars overlap.

For more in engineering and manufacturing, see our Engineering Internships Summer 2027 Guide.

FAQ

Can I still apply for a summer 2026 PACCAR internship?

No. PACCAR's summer-2026 requisitions posted between October 2025 and February 2026 and are all off the board; that class started in May or June 2026. On 15 August 2026 PACCAR's own Internship page read "There are currently no open positions matching this category or location." The next open cycle is summer 2027, expected to start posting around October 2026.

When do PACCAR internship applications open for summer 2027?

Expected from around early October 2026, division by division, through about February 2027. That projects the documented 2026 cycle, whose first three requisitions posted 2 October 2025 and whose last posted 13 February 2026.

So PACCAR Parts opens first, then Kenworth, then Bellevue corporate and Peterbilt, then the engine plant and the Technical Center.

Are PACCAR internships rolling?

No. PACCAR never uses the word, publishes no visible deadline in any requisition body, and its postings aren't continuously open. Requisitions appear per division, live for anything from days to about eleven weeks, and disappear without notice. On 15 August 2026 no live PACCAR requisition of any kind was more than 28 days old.

What GPA does PACCAR require for an internship?

Only one division publishes a number: PACCAR Engine Company in Columbus, Mississippi asks for "a 3.0 GPA or higher is preferable." Nine of the fifteen requisitions we read name no GPA at all, and no PACCAR careers page mentions one either. The gate that actually bites is class year, with most Washington roles preferring juniors and seniors while Mississippi accepts completed sophomores.

How much do PACCAR interns get paid?

PACCAR publishes the rate in the posting: $25.00 an hour for undergraduate students and $30.00 an hour for graduate students, stated in nine separate 2026-cycle requisitions across Washington and Kentucky.

And interns also get 401k with up to a 5% match, medical, dental and vision, and sick leave. Texas, Ohio and Mississippi postings publish no rate.

How long is a PACCAR internship, and does it run in the fall?

The summer program runs 10 to 12 weeks, starting in May or June, on site.

But PACCAR also runs a genuine fall cohort at its Columbus, Mississippi engine plant. Ten of its summer intern titles have matching fall versions, posted anywhere from January to August. It publishes no week count for the fall term.

What is the PACCAR intern interview process like?

Short. Community reports describe a phone screen followed by a panel; one applicant's 2024 summary was a single round with both the hiring manager and the team lead. A Glassdoor intern review describes roughly 30 minutes of behavioural questions with about three interviewers, and the platform reports 61% positive interview experience at 2.7 out of 5 difficulty overall.

Where are PACCAR internships located?

Mostly in Washington State, across four separate PACCAR sites within about 60 miles of Seattle: Kirkland (Kenworth), Renton (PACCAR Parts), Bellevue (headquarters) and Mount Vernon (the PACCAR Technical Center). The main non-Washington hubs are Peterbilt in Denton, Texas and PACCAR Engine Company in Columbus, Mississippi, plus Chillicothe, Ohio and Louisville, Kentucky.

There's no single opening date to circle. PACCAR's six divisions post on their own schedules starting around early October 2026, and each window can close in days. Set the Internship Jobs email alert today and spend the runway on proof: a remote Externship turns "I know Excel and AutoCAD" into a finished project your week-one application can point at.