Pave, the complete compensation intelligence platform, today released The New Age of Equity: 2026 Equity Program Trends, a comprehensive report produced in partnership with Infinite Equity, analyzing over 4 million equity grants across 4,500+ companies. The report uncovers how equity program design, participation, and management are evolving across public and private organizations — and where the two are diverging in meaningful ways.

These findings emerge at a critical juncture for compensation leaders. As AI transforms the talent landscape and competition for technical expertise accelerates, organizations are reevaluating key equity decisions—including vesting durations, cliff structures, recipient criteria, and acceptable levels of dilution.

Key findings include:

• Public companies broke from the four-year vesting standard in 2024. Seventy percent of new hire grants at public companies now vest in less than four years, while private companies have doubled down on the traditional four-year schedule — with 85% of new hire grants using it in 2025.
• Vesting cliffs tell two different stories. At private companies, 80% of new hire grants include a cliff, compared with just 32% at public companies. Both types of organizations are reducing cliffs for ongoing grants, but for different reasons.
• AI-native companies are spending more equity to compete for talent. Private AI-native companies operate at a median net burn rate of 3.9% — nearly 40% higher than the 2.8% median at non-AI tech companies — reflecting the intensity of competition for AI and ML talent.
• Promotions are the strongest driver of ongoing equity grants. A median 95% of promoted employees receive ongoing equity, compared with just 44% of high performers who are not promoted — suggesting companies use equity to reinforce career progression rather than reward in-role performance.

• R&D gets preferential equity treatment, but the gap narrows at the top. Among early-career new hires (P1–P2), 84% of R&D employees receive equity compared with just 49% in G&A. At the director level, the gap nearly disappears.

Leadership Perspectives

"Equity programs aren't one-size-fits-all, and the data makes that clearer than ever," said Matt Schulman, Founder and CEO of Pave. "Public and private companies are now running fundamentally different playbooks. The companies getting this right are the ones treating equity as an integrated system, not a set of isolated decisions. This report gives compensation leaders the benchmarks they need to make those decisions with confidence."

“What’s changing isn’t just vesting schedules—it’s how companies are managing tradeoffs across the entire equity program,” said Jon Burg of Infinite Equity. “Shorter vesting, higher burn rates, and more targeted allocation are all interconnected decisions. The companies getting this right aren’t reacting to trends, they’re deliberately designing equity systems that balance cost, retention, and performance, with a clear understanding of the downstream impact of each choice.”

"What stands out to me is how much the talent market for AI is reshaping equity economics across the board," said Alex Cwirko-Godycki, GM of Market Data at Pave. "AI-native companies are running burn rates that would have been considered aggressive just two years ago, and it's not reckless — it's a deliberate response to a market where demand for technical talent far outpaces supply. The question for every company now is how the rise of AI affects their own equity and compensation strategy, regardless of whether they're an AI company or not."

AI in Total Rewards

The report’s insights into AI-driven equity dynamics align with Pave’s ongoing investment in its AI in Total Rewards initiative—a comprehensive suite of resources, research, and tools that empowers compensation and total rewards leaders to address the impact of AI on workforce and compensation strategy. 

Live Webinar: Redesigning Equity in 2026

Pave and Infinite Equity will host a live webinar on Wednesday, April 9 at 10:00 a.m. PT / 1:00 p.m. ET to walk through the report's key findings and discuss what they mean for compensation leaders designing and managing equity programs today. The session, titled Redesigning Equity in 2026: Trends & Benchmarks from Over 4 Million Grants, will cover how vesting practices are diverging between public and private companies, where AI is driving elevated equity spend, and how leading organizations are rethinking participation and burn rate strategy. Registration is available at https://explore.pave.com/Redesigning-Equity-2026-Trends.html 

Methodology

The report is based on an analysis of over 4 million equity grants from 4,500+ companies participating in Pave's real-time compensation dataset, covering grants from 2020 to present. All data is anonymized and aggregated to protect the confidentiality of companies and employees.

The full report is available for download at [pave.com/resources]. To register for the April 9 live webinar, visit https://explore.pave.com/Redesigning-Equity-2026-Trends.html.