For what it's worth, I have heard the same thing about Stripe -- that the work/life balance is rough, even compared with similar companies. It depends how important that is to you, and also whether Facebook would be any better, which I kind of doubt. As for the equity question, it's true that equity at the vast majority of startups ends up being worthless. But for a pre-IPO company, Stripe is pretty late-stage. There's a good chance that the equity will be worth what they say it is. And even in the unlikely event that your Stripe equity ends up being totally worthless, their offer would still end up being only $17k less than Facebook's, so you won't be doing too bad if you guess wrong there. As for the classic "you'll definitely be promoted soon" pitch from Facebook, the recruiters have no idea whether that is true; they're just saying it to get you in the door. The most foolproof way to get a promotion is to find a job at a different company at a higher level. Since you already have that in the form of the Stripe offer, I'd go with Stripe if you are ok with the work/life balance.