Google - Competitive Intelligence BETA

Get insider information on how Google structures their compensation.

⏰ Recent Updates

October 2025 - Google Boomerang policy has become more strict. No negotiations on comp if returning within 3-4 years of leaving. Most other companies have a policy of 1-2 years. They’ll look at previous comp and current leverage to determine new offer, but will not negotiate from there.
June 2025 - Deepmind becoming big focus within Google, with different comp philosophies around their recruiting/negotiating.
April 2025 - Google updates yearly performance review to better reward top performers and decreases rewards for mid-high performers.
March 2024 - Google Cloud Sales org in North America are not doing promotions in 2024, top performers getting raises up to .9%.
June 2023 - Google is more widely using a compensation expectation form, asking candidates to fill out detailed information on base salary, equity, and bonus expectations.

📄 Offer Overview

🧐 Compensation Philosophy

What does a typical offer look like? What forms of compensation? Anything particularly unique to this company? How does this company pay relative to rest of market? How is compensation determined and set? Does compensation differ by location?

Google provides a fairly standard tech compensation package that consists of base + GSUs + Sign-on + Performance bonus. They also pay by geography, so depending on where an employee lives, their compensation band may differ.

Google allows renegotiating sign-on into equity. From L4 offer: $30k sign-on + $275k equity → $322k equity

Senior Staff SWE FB/Google
Base: $240k - $280k (both companies)
Bonus 25% (both companies)
Equity: $1.2M - $2.5M over 4 years (FB)
Equity: $950k - $2M (Google vesting 33/33/22/12)
Sign on: $50k - $150k (if they max equity, rare that they will get to $150k. Even D2 at FB didnt get to $150k sign on
TC: $650K - $1M (Mid $825K)

Performance Review/Yearly Raises

Google’s performance review is in March and raises are granted based on performance, generally ranging from 3-5%. You would be awarded full bonus consideration if your joining date is prior to Sept 1, then a pro-rated amount after that. Target bonus % is based on level and can sometimes go higher. Equity refreshers are also granted during this review.

Deepmind:

Very similar to Google overall, but Deepmind more similar to a Meta FAIR. You may see something that could be anywhere from 15 to 20% better than what you would get for the same level if it was just a general role within the organization.
Deepmind is going to pay a little bit more for those that have specialized skill sets; make sure that they're getting the best talent out there, so they're willing to open up compensation bands and have higher compensation ranges than Google proper. They’re also more open to negotiating with the right leverage like current comp, upcoming equity vests, etc.
Google is more strict, wanting screenshots of competing offers and rarely considers upcoming liquidity as a valid negotiation tactic.
Example offer we had: L6 Researcher with Deepmind who we helped negotiate up to a 2.6M Y1 TC, which the CTO confirmed was in the 99th percentile

💵 Cash Compensation (Salary & Sign-on Bonus)

Do they give a sign-on bonus? If so, how much?

They do provide sign on bonuses, capped at $50k for most lower level roles, but can move up above for the right candidate.

📈 Equity Compensation (Valuation & Vesting Schedule)

How is value per share determined? What is the vesting schedule? Are signing bonuses offered and what is the range?

Vesting type: 'GSU' (Google form of RSU). Vesting schedule: primary for now: 38/32/20/10

Notably they don't seem to use this schedule for the new graduates.

Used to have: 33,33,22,12 & 25,25,25,25 (GSUs vesting monthly, without a cliff). Other less common schedules we saw: 36,28,20,16, 40,20,20,20, and 40,28,20,12.

The number of GSUs is determined by dividing $xxx by the average closing price of Alphabet’s Class C stock for the calendar month prior to the date of grant, rounded up to the nearest full GSU.

💳 Benefits & Non-monetary Compensation

What notable benefits does this company provide? Note: Also check Levels.fyi's public benefits page for this company.

https://www.levels.fyi/company/Google/benefits/

Benefits at a glance (US):

Full medical, vision, dental plans (effective on day 1; no waiting period)
20 vacation days when you join (increases with tenure)
13 paid holidays per year
401(k) Matching: Google matches half of whatever you contribute to your pre-tax and Roth 401(k). At the end of the year, if you have received less than $3,000 in company matching contributions and are still employed as of December 31, Google will contribute an additional $0.50 for every $1 you contributed to your account. With the governmental limit increasing to $22,500 in 2023, that means that by leveraging Google’s match, you could receive up to $11,250 in additional tax-free funds. Every dollar of the match is fully vested. There are lots of resources that you can access once you've started that will help you calculate the best way to maximize the match.
Free coffee bars, breakfast, lunch and dinner (and lots of snacks, too!)
Perks: on-site massages, being able to bring your dog to work, fitness benefits, celebrity guest chefs and presenters, etc.
20 hours of volunteer time to give back to the communities/non-profits you are passionate about
Annual education reimbursement to keep growing professionally (Google will pay 2/3 of the cost up to $12,000 for job-related learning and 1/3 of the cost up to $1,200 for personal learning). Google will match 100% of your student loan contributions up to $2,500 annually, with those contributions going toward the principal of your student loan.
Parental benefits:
- Maternity Leave: no tenure limit; 24 weeks of fully-paid leave + 2 weeks of ramp-back time
- Parental Leave: no tenure limit; 18 weeks of baby bonding leave that can be used all at once or throughout the course of the child's first year
- Fertility benefits: up to four cycles of IVF fully covered by Google
- Adoption benefits: reimbursement up to $25,000 for up to three adoptions; 12 weeks baby bonding leave
- Surrogacy benefits: reimbursement up to two attempts up to $40,000 per attempt; 12 weeks baby bonding leave
- 20 days total of back-up care for when your regular caretaking method falls through

⏳ Timeline

How much time does someone have to think about an offer before accepting? Are they strict about dates?

Google is pretty generous with their timing since candidates will go through a team-matching phase.

🛳 Visas & Immigration

What are the companies policies for hiring non-US citizens? How does immigration process work?

Aligns with other top tech companies.

🚨 Gotcha's

Anything to watch out for?

Equity refresher policy: lower new-hire RSU (GSU) will lead to lower refreshers in the future.

🤑 Negotiations

🔍 Process Overview

How are offers generated? How soon can someone hear back from the recruiter after negotiating? How many rounds of negotiations can be done? What happens after signing an offer?

Most Google's negotiations can take up to 2 months, sometimes even longer (see links to our blog articles with details on Google interviews and negotiations).

You need competing offers to push compensation significantly higher (15%+). They ask for proof: either screenshots or a written offer/email from a recruiter. The documentation needs to reflect:

Date
Name
Company name/logo (if Offer Letter) OR recruiter's work email address (if email confirmation)
Compensation breakdown

It has to be another public company. They stopped taking competing offers from start-ups. Companies tend not to give written offers to prevent counteroffers. A way around it - ask a recruiter for a recap email with comp breakdown.

Google doesn't typically take private company/start-up equity into account when clients talk about stock/equity they'll be leaving behind.

⚖️ Levers

What components can be negotiated? What levers can be adjusted (ex. salary can be increased)?

Most components of the compensation package can be negotiated, however equity and bonus will be the easiest levers to pull.

👥 Stakeholders

Who's involved in the process (ex. hiring manager, recruiter, etc.)? Who has the authority to make compensation decisions?

Recruiter works closely with compensation team to draft and approve the offer, once a recruiter provides a written offer to a candidate, there is not much room for subsequent negotiations.

📎 Other Negotiables

Can PTO be negotiated? Can relocation be negotiated? Can any other benefits be negotiated?

Most other components cannot be negotiated, however for the right candidate, they may be able to flex incentives/performance bonuses for higher level roles.

💼 Negotiation for Employees

If I start and I get promoted, do I get to re-negotiate my package? Can I negotiate a raise? How hard is it to negotiate an increase after I join?

It's 50/50, depends on the employee and how much the team doesn't want to lose them. When they transition from Alphabet companies to Google, that's the only opportunity where they get to renegotiate their package. Google will treat these transfers as external candidates.

👩‍💻 Employee Compensation Policies

♻️ Refreshers

What happens after 4 years when my stocks are fully vested?

Google offers refreshers. They use new-hire GSUs as an anchor for refreshers, so by getting candidates to accept lower GSUs, they get to pay less in refreshers later.

Annual GSU refreshers vest over 4 years evenly (25,25,25,25), they are granted in the beginning of January.

💲 Performance Bonuses

Are they given? How do they work? When are yearly bonuses paid out? When is the cut-off for someone to be eligible for a performance review?

Based on offers we received:

L3 - L5 - 15%

L6 - 20%

L7 - 25%

L8 - 30%

L9 - 40%

Bonus is paid in January of the following year.

Yearly Performance Reviews have an internal grading system, from best to worst:

Transformative Impact
Outstanding Impact
Significant Impact
Moderate Impact
Not Enough Impact

As of April 2025, Google announced they will increase manager allocations for Outstanding Impact and rewarding those employees more. They will also reduce rewards for Significant Impact and below, to incentivize more outstanding impact employees.