Career · Medicine and health
Massage therapist
Helps people relax their muscles with massage.
Career overview
What a day looks like
A massage therapist greets the client, asks how they feel and chooses suitable techniques. They work with their hands, watch the person's reactions closely and keep the workplace clean.
Try it yourself this week
20 minutes
Measure your pulse before and after exercise and explain the difference
- Sit quietly for 3 minutes, find your pulse on your wrist or neck and count the beats for 15 seconds. Multiply by four and write it down.
- Do 20 squats at an easy pace. If you have any health limits or feel dizzy, stop — that's a result too.
- Measure your pulse right away, after 1 minute and after 3 minutes. Write down all the numbers.
- Draw a simple graph and look up in your biology textbook why the heart beats faster during exercise and how quickly it calms down.
What you'll learn about yourself: Whether you're curious about what happens inside the body — and enjoy turning how you feel into exact numbers.
30 minutes
Put together a 10-minute warm-up and do it yourself
- Build a warm-up in three parts: joints (from top to bottom), light cardio, stretching. No weights.
- Do it yourself with a timer and pay attention to how you feel. If anything hurts, stop.
- Write down what was easy and where you fell behind on time.
- Rework the plan the way you'd explain it to a group of ten-year-olds: what words, what pace, what to demonstrate. You can run it for a brother, sister or friend — if you want to.
What you'll learn about yourself: What suits you more: moving yourself, or coming up with exercises and explaining them to others — and whether you have the patience for repetition.
What you can do next
Next 3 months
Learn what muscles there are
Find a muscle diagram in a textbook and label the main groups.
In six months
Find out how massage differs from medical treatment
Read in a reliable source what a massage therapist does and what is left to a doctor.
In a year
Ask a specialist
Together with your parents, ask a massage therapist how they prepare for work and when a client should see a doctor first.
What it pays
No verified information is available in this section yet.
Where to study
No verified information is available in this section yet.
How to get into college
College gets you a profession faster than university. You can apply after grade 9 or after grade 11.
- Colleges accept students both after grade 9 and after grade 11. After grade 9 you study longer — about 3 years 10 months; after grade 11, about 2 years 10 months. The exact length depends on the college and the specialty.
Source: kchk.edu.kz (opens in a new tab) - About 80% of students admitted to colleges in the 2024/25 school year study on a state order, which means in state-funded places (in 2023/24 it was about 70%). But each college and each specialty has its own number of state-funded places.
Source: inbusiness.kz (opens in a new tab) - There are also paid colleges. For example, training as a nurse at ADILMED costs 450,000 ₸ per year. Check the price and conditions on the college's website.
Source: adilmed.kz (opens in a new tab)
UNT: which subjects to take for university
The UNT (Unified National Testing) is Kazakhstan's national university entrance test. You need it to get into university after grade 11.
- The UNT 2026 has three compulsory subjects: History of Kazakhstan, Reading Literacy and Mathematical Literacy. On top of these, you take two profile subjects, chosen to match your specialty.
Source: testcenter.kz (opens in a new tab) - In total, the test has 120 questions (maximum 140 points) and you get 4 hours. The format is the same as in 2025.
Source: testcenter.kz (opens in a new tab) - Profile subjects depend on the group of specialties. For example: information technology — Mathematics and Computer Science; nursing and veterinary medicine — Biology and Chemistry; electrical engineering — Mathematics and Physics; law — World History and Fundamentals of Law. The full list is published by the National Testing Center.
Source: testcenter.kz (opens in a new tab) - For creative specialties (for example, media and design), you take History of Kazakhstan and Reading Literacy through the UNT, and two creative exams at the university itself.
Source: testcenter.kz (opens in a new tab) - Some universities have their own admission rules. Nazarbayev University, for example, requires a UNT score of at least 85, a GPA of 4.0 and English at IELTS 6.0 level.
Source: nu.edu.kz (opens in a new tab)
Courses and opportunities
No verified information is available in this section yet.
History of the career
No verified information is available in this section yet.
Well-known people in this field
No verified information is available in this section yet.