How much equity should a software engineer get, by stage

A reasonable equity grant for a software engineer ranges from about 0.5 percent to 2.0 percent at seed, dropping to roughly 0.05 percent to 0.3 percent by Series B, and lower again at Series C. The number falls as the company de-risks, because the share you receive is buying a smaller slice of a more certain outcome. Everything past that single rule is detail: your seniority, whether you are a true founding engineer, the strike price, and how the grant was sized in the first place. This post puts real ranges next to each stage, walks one grant through the actual math, and tells you which factors move your offer up or down.

Most of the roles on the roles.cc board sit between seed and Series B, sorted by how recently the company raised. That window is exactly where equity is largest and least standardized, so it is worth knowing what good looks like before you read an offer letter.

What is a normal equity grant by stage?

Equity is usually quoted to you in one of two ways: a percentage of the company (common at the earliest stages) or a number of options at a strike price (standard once there is a real 409A valuation). Both describe the same thing. The percentage is the honest unit for comparing offers across companies, so convert everything back to it.

Here are working ranges for an individual-contributor software engineer, not a founder. They are benchmarks, not guarantees, and they assume a four-year vest. Treat the senior column as staff or staff-adjacent ICs.

Two patterns to notice. First, the bands compress fast: a founding engineer at seed can hold 10x to 40x what the same person would get joining at Series C. Second, "founding engineer" is a real multiplier, not a vanity title. It means employee 1 through 5, broad ownership, and meaningful technical risk, and it is the only IC slot where 1 percent or more is common. If a Series B company offers you a "founding engineer" title with a 0.05 percent grant, the title is decoration. For what the role actually involves, see what a founding engineer actually does.

How do you sanity-check an equity grant?

A percentage means nothing until you turn it into dollars across a few outcomes. You need four inputs, and you should ask for all of them in writing before you sign:

• Number of options in your grant.
• Strike price per share (what you pay to exercise).
• Total shares outstanding, fully diluted, so you can compute your real percentage.
• The most recent preferred price or post-money valuation, so you can estimate today's paper value.

If a company will not share fully-diluted share count, treat that as a yellow flag and ask again. You cannot evaluate a grant without the denominator. These four numbers, plus the questions in startup equity at seed, Series A, and B: what to ask, are the whole due-diligence list.

A worked example: multiplying out a grant

Say you join a Series A company as a senior engineer. The offer is 40,000 options at a $1.50 strike. The company has 20,000,000 fully-diluted shares, and the last round priced preferred stock at $5.00 per share.

• Your ownership: 40,000 / 20,000,000 = 0.2 percent. That sits at the top of the Series A senior band above, which is a good sign.
• Cost to exercise the whole grant: 40,000 x $1.50 = $60,000. Real money you would have to put in to own the shares outright.
• Paper value at today's price: 40,000 x $5.00 = $200,000, or about $140,000 net of the strike. This is a marker, not cash, and it assumes the last round's price holds.
• Per year, vested: roughly $35,000 of net paper value per year over a four-year vest (illustrative, not advice).

Now stress-test it. If the company exits at 3x the last round, your stake is worth roughly $600,000 gross, or about $540,000 after the strike, before tax and before any dilution from future rounds. If the company raises twice more before exit, expect your 0.2 percent to dilute to something closer to 0.13 percent. If the company shuts down, the options are worth zero and you are glad you did not pay $60,000 to exercise early. Run the same three cases (down, flat, up) on any offer. One number in isolation tells you nothing.

What moves a grant up or down?

Two engineers at the same company, same title, same start month, can hold very different grants. The drivers are predictable:

• Seniority and scope. Staff and founding roles carry the broadest bands. A staff engineer owning a whole system gets multiples of a mid-level grant.
• Join order. Employee number 3 and employee number 30 face very different risk, so they get very different equity. The earlier you join post-raise, the larger the slice. You can watch which companies just closed on the recent raises page.
• Cash versus equity tradeoff. Some companies let you trade base salary for more options, or the reverse. A higher cash offer often comes with a thinner grant.
• The strike price. A low strike on an early grant is worth far more than a high strike later, because more of the upside is yours. Two grants with the same option count are not equal if the strikes differ.
• Negotiation. Equity is more negotiable than base, especially at seed and Series A where there is no rigid band yet. See how to negotiate a startup offer.
• Refreshers and vesting terms. A one-year cliff, a four-year vest, and whether the company grants refreshers all change the real value. A grant with no refresher plan shrinks in relative terms every year you stay.

The percentage tells you the size of the bet. The strike price, the cliff, and the next two rounds of dilution tell you what you actually keep.

How does equity compare to cash at each stage?

The earlier the stage, the more of your total compensation is equity rather than salary, and the wider the range of outcomes. A seed engineer might take a below-market base in exchange for 1 percent of the company. A Series C engineer is closer to market cash with a small, more liquid-feeling grant. Neither is strictly better. It depends on your runway, your risk tolerance, and your read on the company.

For how this maps to actual base numbers in the two largest US markets, see senior software engineer salary in SF and NYC for 2026. For the deeper mechanics of options, strike prices, and vesting, read how stock options and vesting work.

What is a good rule of thumb for evaluating any grant?

1. 01Convert to a percentage. Share counts are noise. Get to fully-diluted percent.
2. 02Compare against the stage band. Use the table above. Above the band is good, far below it deserves a question.
3. 03Price three outcomes. Down round, flat, and a 3x to 5x exit, net of strike and expected dilution.
4. 04Weigh it against cash. A larger grant rarely makes up for a base you cannot live on while it vests.
5. 05Check the terms. Strike, cliff, vest length, post-termination exercise window, and refresher policy.