Offer negotiation from first call to signature¶

For interns, new grads and engineers with 0 to 3 years of experience. Work through the 9 steps below, from the first recruiter call to a signed offer.

Recruiters plan for a counter. One recruiter told Levels.fyi that about 15% of candidates still don't negotiate (Levels.fyi, 2021). Hello Interview, written by former FAANG recruiters and hiring managers, says the first offer is meant to be countered.

Seven rules¶

#	Rule	Source
1	Never say a number first. Never say your walk-away number at all.	Patrick McKenzie, Aline Lerner
2	Never accept, decline or counter on the call where you hear the offer. Thank them, ask for it in writing, give a date.	Josh Doody, Levels.fyi negotiation guide
3	Get every number in writing, including sign-on repayment terms.	Haseeb Qureshi, rule 1
4	Get your offers to land in the same window. Negotiate after they land, not before.	Aline Lerner
5	Give a reason for every ask: a competing offer, market data, a bonus you forfeit, a relocation cost. Never rent or loans.	Haseeb Qureshi, rule 7, Levels.fyi negotiation guide
6	Negotiate with the recruiter, not the hiring manager.	Hello Interview
7	Never lie about a competing offer, your pay, or your work authorization.	Ethics below

Why asking is worth it: employers count your fully loaded cost at 150% to 200% of salary, so a few thousand dollars matters far more to you than to them (McKenzie). Negotiate only after they have decided they want you.

The process, step by step¶

Each step is a checklist. Tick items as you go. The site saves your progress in this browser.

Step 1: Research before the first recruiter call¶

Time: 30 minutes per company.

Find the role's level on the level mapping table. New grad is usually Google L3, Meta E3, Amazon L4 (SDE I), Microsoft 59 or 60, Apple ICT2. To see two ladders side by side, open the Levels.fyi level comparison and swap in your companies.
Open the company's Levels.fyi page (swap google in the URL for your company). Write down the median base, stock, bonus and the vesting schedule.
Check whether the stock column is first-year stock (Google, Uber, Nvidia) or a yearly average (Amazon, Meta, Microsoft). The two are not comparable. See Comp basics.
Read the pay range on the job post. Several US states require one, including the seven in the table below. It is usually base only.
Search the Blind Offer Evaluation forum for "[Company] new grad offer 2026" to see recent packages and deadlines.
Need a visa? Check the company's sponsorship history on the USCIS H-1B Employer Data Hub using Jugal's 4-step method, and its filed H-1B salaries for your title and city on h1bdata.info.
Write two private numbers: your walk-away (the lowest you would sign) and your target (the upper half of the band for your level, per Candor).
Paste scripts S1 to S7 into your call notes.

Step 2: Get through the recruiter screen without naming a number¶

Asked for expectations: deflect with S1. Pushed again: ask for their range with S2. The post shows a range: use S3.
A web form demands a number: enter researched total comp at the high end of Levels.fyi data for the level (S4). Never your walk-away.
Asked for current or past pay: decline politely (S5). All seven states in the pay transparency table restrict salary-history questions.
Asked where else you are interviewing: stay general and promise not to accept elsewhere without talking to them first (S6).
Ask your own questions: level, number of rounds, time from final round to decision, when team matching happens, visa support (S7).
Send a short thank-you the same day (S7b).
Log every answer in your tracker (Follow-up and tracking).

Step 3: Line up your timelines during the loops¶

List every active process with its next date.
Ask companies that are far ahead to hold the onsite 2 to 3 weeks out (S9).
Once you hold an offer or a final round, email the slower companies with your deadline and ask them to speed up (S8).
Hold off negotiating any offer until the ones you expect have landed. Details in Line up your offers.

Step 4: Take the offer call¶

Thank them and name one thing about the team or product you are excited about.
Do not accept, counter or name a number. Ask for the offer in writing and the deadline (S10).
Ask the offer questions in S12: level, base, bonus target, equity value and the share price used, vesting, sign-on terms, relocation, start date, team, benefits, visa.
The same day, email what you heard and ask for the written offer (S11).

Step 5: Evaluate every offer the same way¶

Put each offer into the 4-year table in Compare offers step by step.
Compare Year 1 and the 4-year average. Rerun the stock at 0.7x and 1.3x.
Add the 401(k) match in dollars, the ESPP, and state tax (Benefits, Taxes).
Score the non-money factors from Tech Interview Handbook: product and team, company prospects, career growth, culture, work-life balance, mobility. Add visa support.
Pick the offer you would sign today if nothing changed. That is the one you negotiate hardest.

Step 6: Make one clear ask¶

Decide one total number before you write anything. Split it into the parts that move: for new grads, sign-on and equity first, base last. Doody's counter calculator sets a counter from your walk-away number and how much each side needs the deal.
With a competing offer: send S13. Quote the numbers exactly. You are not required to show the letter, but be ready to (Hello Interview).
Without one: use market data and your strengths (S15). Expect a smaller move.
Base is fixed: pivot to sign-on, equity, relocation or start date (S16).
Intern offer: ask about housing, relocation or dates, not the hourly rate (S16b).
Offered a lower level than you interviewed for: raise it before you discuss numbers (S16c).
Leaving a job: ask the new company to cover the bonus or unvested stock you forfeit (S17).
Keep it to one ask plus at most one final ask (Haseeb, part 2).

Step 7: Close the deal¶

Ready to commit: "If you can get to [X], I will sign by [date]" (S20). Say it only if you will.
Told "this is our best offer": ask once about other levers (S19), then decide.
Get the revised offer in writing before you say yes.

Step 8: Read the contract before you sign¶

Sign-on and relocation repayment: prorated or full, for how long, gross or net. Prorated repayment is the common case (Doody).
Equity: dollar value, share count, share price used, schedule and cliff.
Contingencies: background check, work authorization, start date.
Non-compete and non-solicit clauses, and which state's law governs. The FTC non-compete rule is not in effect, so state law decides. In California, Business and Professions Code 16600.5 makes a void non-compete unenforceable wherever it was signed.
Team, start date and work location match what you agreed.

Step 9: Accept, then close every other door¶

Accept in writing (S25).
The same day, withdraw from other processes (S29) and decline other offers (S26).
Save every offer email, signed letter and benefits guide in one folder. International students, keep pay stubs there too. A salary in the top 10% for your role and region is one of the EB-1A criteria, and Jugal's post on missing the 2026 H-1B lottery says to keep your offer letter and pay stubs as evidence (post).
International students: send the immigration questions in S30 if you have not, and start the paperwork the week you sign.

What you can negotiate¶

The rule of thumb from Hello Interview, the Levels.fyi negotiation guide and Candor: the interview sets your level, and the level sets the band.

Within the band, base moves least, equity and sign-on move most, and the annual bonus % does not move at all.

Item	Intern or new grad	Experienced (1 to 3 years)
Level	Set by the loop. Amazon's level cannot change after the loop (Levels.fyi, 2022).	Same rule, but push back on a down-level before the offer is final, with a competing offer at the higher level (S16c). interviewing.io reports down-leveling for about 55% of the Meta candidates it covered, E4 to E7 (source).
Base	Fixed or a narrow band. Google bands are "rigidly set" per level (Levels.fyi, 2020). Meta's E3 base range is narrow (Levels.fyi, 2022).	Moves within the band. Exception offers above the band exist for strong candidates and hard-to-fill roles (Hello Interview).
Equity (RSUs)	Sometimes, mostly with a competing offer.	The biggest lever. A former Google recruiter says equity is where the biggest increase happens (Levels.fyi, 2020).
Sign-on bonus	The most common move. For Google L3, the same ex-recruiter names a higher sign-on as about the only lever. A former Amazon recruiter calls sign-on "the most flexible component" (Levels.fyi, 2022).	Yes. It is also how companies cover a bonus or stock you forfeit (S17).
Annual bonus %	No. Fixed by level.	No. Fixed by level.
Relocation	Sometimes: the amount, or cash instead of a managed move.	Yes.
Start date	Yes.	Yes.
Team	Ask. Meta placed E3 and E4 hires through a 6 to 8 week Bootcamp after joining (Levels.fyi, 2022).	At Meta, team matching for E4 and up happens after the onsite and before the offer (interviewing.io).
Intern hourly rate	Rarely. Ask about housing, relocation and dates instead (S16b). Recruiters say "even interns" negotiate (Levels.fyi, 2021).	n/a
Location or remote	Rarely.	Sometimes. Pay follows the location's cost of labor, not your cost of living (Levels.fyi guide).
Deadline	Yes. See Exploding offers.	Yes.

What a realistic move looks like:

New grads: a larger sign-on or a bigger equity grant, rarely base. Some packages are fixed. One polite ask still costs nothing.
Experienced: Aline Lerner's suggested asks are 1.5x to 2x the equity, 10% to 15% more salary, and a sign-on of at least 20% of base (interviewing.io). Treat these as aggressive for a new grad.
Meta, E4 to E7: interviewing.io saw competing offers raise first-year total comp by $50K to $150K. Without one, it says Meta "will not meaningfully budge" (source).

Line up your offers¶

A competing offer is the strongest reason a company has to move. Meta approves increases "primarily on market data or competing offers" (Levels.fyi, 2022). Two offers that land in the same week are worth more than two offers a month apart.

Several offers at once is realistic. I went from no offers to 3 startup offers in under 3 weeks, with no referrals (post). My 4-week log was 65 applications, 22 responses, 8 interviews and 4 offers (post).

Situation	What to do	Script
One company is weeks ahead of the others	Ask it to schedule the onsite 2 to 3 weeks out so you can prepare	S9
You get an offer while other loops are mid-way	Email the others the same day with your deadline and ask them to speed up	S8
A company says it cannot speed up	Ask the company holding the offer for more time instead	S21
A Microsoft internship is in your pipeline	Microsoft's intern FAQ says to allow up to 90 days for a decision and that it cannot expedite for competing offer deadlines (Microsoft). Apply early.	none
A return offer from your internship	Ask for a deadline after fall recruiting, then use it as your competing offer	S24
Startups mixed with big tech	Startups can go from first call to offer in under 3 weeks. Start them after your big tech loops are scheduled.	S9

Order of operations:

Apply to slow processes first: big tech with team matching, Microsoft internships, anything with a long OA window.
Schedule onsites so your final rounds fall within the same 2 to 3 weeks.
When the first offer arrives, get its deadline, then send S8 to every other company that day.
Evaluate all offers with the 4-year table.
Negotiate with your top choice last, using the final numbers from the others.

Exploding offers and deadlines¶

You can ask for more time on any deadline. Cite these norms when you do.

NACE, the US association for campus recruiting, says a one to two week offer deadline is common, and that bonuses for accepting early create problematic pressure (NACE).
Haseeb Qureshi treats a 24 to 72 hour deadline as unacceptable and says most companies relent when you say so (freeCodeCamp).
Your school may set stricter rules for employers who recruit there. Find your career center's "offer guidelines" page. Example from UIUC Grainger Engineering (guidelines):

Interview season	Offer made	Offer should stay open until
Fall (June 1 to Dec 31)	Before Oct 15	Nov 1 or later
Fall	After Oct 15	At least 2 weeks after the offer
Spring (Jan 1 to May 31)	Before Mar 15	Apr 1 or later
Spring	After Mar 15	At least 2 weeks after the offer
Summer internship or co-op	Return offer (internship or full-time)	3 weeks after the next term starts, or 3 weeks after the offer, whichever is later

The fall and spring rows cover full-time, internship and co-op offers.

What to do with a short deadline:

Ask for the deadline on the offer call and write it down.
If it is under 2 weeks, falls before your school's guideline date, or lands before your other final rounds, ask for a specific later date with a reason (S21, plus S22 for campus offers).
The same day, ask your other companies to speed up (S8).
If they refuse, ask what changes if you take a few more days (S23).
If the offer would disappear, decide with what you have. Never accept with a plan to back out.
Treat an early-acceptance bonus as a deadline in disguise. Ask whether it still applies with the extended date.

Ethics: lines you do not cross¶

Do	Do not
Quote competing offers exactly, and share the letter if asked	Invent, inflate or round up a competing offer
Give a response date and keep it	Accept while planning to keep interviewing
Withdraw from other processes the day you accept	Renege. UIUC blocks students who renege from Handshake for at least one semester (UIUC); NACE says schools respond case by case, up to freezing accounts (NACE)
Say "If you can do X, I will sign" only when you will	Issue ultimatums you will not carry out
Answer work authorization questions truthfully	Answer "No" to future sponsorship when you will need an H-1B (International students)
Go through your recruiter	Go around the recruiter to the hiring manager
Decline quickly once you decide, so the slot goes to someone else	Sit on an offer you know you will not take
Talk to your career center first if something serious changes after you accept	Go silent on an employer

International students (US offers)¶

Watch out: General information as of Oct 2026, not legal or tax advice. Immigration rules changed many times in 2025 and 2026 and several are in court, so confirm with your school's DSO and, for H-1B questions, the company's immigration counsel. Background: International students.

Your base salary now changes your H-1B odds¶

Since Feb 27, 2026, the H-1B lottery is weighted by wage level (USCIS, final rule). Each registration gets one entry per wage level that the offered wage meets for its job code and work location.

Wage level your base meets	Lottery entries	DHS projected selection odds
Level I	1	15.29%
Level II	2	30.58%
Level III	3	45.87%
Level IV	4	61.16%
Old random lottery, for comparison	1	29.59%

These are DHS projections, not measured results. In the FY2027 lottery, level I made up about 17.8% of selections (Proclamation 11069).

Ask the recruiter for the job code (SOC) and the office county. Software engineers are usually SOC 15-1252, Software Developers.
Look up the wages on the DOL FLAG wage search: enter SOC 15-1252 and the county, then note the Level I to IV annual wages.
Compare your base salary, not total comp. The rule's preamble says employers can only use base wages here; cash bonuses count only in limited cases and stock does not (final rule).
If your base sits just below the next level, ask to move money from the sign-on into base (S31). Base is the only component that changes your entries.
Ask for one work location. With several locations, the lowest level applies, so a "remote, anywhere in the US" role can register you lower than a single-office role.
Get the sponsorship commitments in writing before you sign (S30): registration, who pays, SOC code, location, wage level, the plan if you are not selected, and green card timing.

Fees, start dates and take-home pay (as of Oct 2026)¶

The $100,000 H-1B payment from the Sept 2025 proclamation is not being collected. Courts blocked it on June 8 and Sept 30, 2026, and it never applied to an approved change of status from F-1 inside the US (USCIS, Ogletree).
A proposed $103,265 fee on all cap-subject petitions would cover F-1 to H-1B change of status if it becomes final (proposed rule, Aug 25, 2026). Ask your recruiter who pays if it does.
You cannot start work before your EAD start date. Under current rules, post-completion OPT can start up to 60 days after your program end date (USCIS OPT). Ask for a start date with 2 to 4 weeks of buffer (S32).
Premium processing for the OPT I-765 costs $1,780 (USCIS fee schedule) and takes 30 business days (USCIS). Ask whether the company reimburses it if your start date is tight.
STEM OPT needs an employer enrolled in E-Verify that signs Form I-983 (USCIS STEM OPT). Confirm with the E-Verify employer search before you accept.
F-1 students who are nonresident aliens are exempt from Social Security and Medicare tax on CPT and OPT wages (IRS). That is 7.65% more take-home than a citizen on the same salary. Check your first paystub and ask payroll to fix it if FICA was withheld.

India offers¶

Ask for the full CTC breakdown in writing (S33).
Convert CTC to monthly in-hand pay with the ClearTax salary calculator. CTC is total employer cost, not take-home: ClearTax's example turns ₹21 lakh CTC into about ₹1,40,458 a month in hand (ClearTax).
Remove one-time items before you compare: joining bonus, relocation, and the first-year stock in a front-loaded grant.
Check the structure against the Labour Codes in force since Nov 21, 2025. Basic plus DA must be at least 50% of total pay, which can raise PF and gratuity and lower in-hand (ClearTax). Ask whether your offer already follows it.
Compare the old and new tax regimes with the Income Tax Department calculator.
Ask when the joining bonus is paid and what you repay if you leave early.
Employed now? Ask for a joining date that fits your notice period, a notice buyout, or a joining bonus that covers the bonus you forfeit (S33).
Startup ESOPs: ask the strike price, current fair market value, vesting, and how long you have to exercise after leaving. The gain at exercise is taxed as a perquisite at your slab rate; eligible startups can defer that tax (ClearTax ESOP).
Know the market tier. Gergely Orosz found that India-HQ companies rarely pay standout compensation and US-HQ firms set the top tier (Pragmatic Engineer). Levels.fyi medians (Oct 2026): Google L3 India ₹35.5 lakh, Amazon L4 India ₹27.5 lakh, Flipkart SDE 1 ₹22.4 lakh total.
Find 3 recent offers for the same company and level. Search the Compensation tab on LeetCode Discuss and the salary discussions on AmbitionBox. Note base, joining bonus, stock and year.
Placing through campus? Read your placement cell's rules on holding, negotiating and declining offers before you do any of the three.

UK and Europe offers¶

UK pension: the auto-enrolment minimum is 8% in total with at least 3% from the employer, on earnings between £6,240 and £50,270 (GOV.UK). Ask for the employer % and whether it applies to your full salary.
UK notice periods are set by your contract (GOV.UK). Check yours before you resign from a current job.
UK visa floor: the Skilled Worker visa usually needs at least £41,700 or the going rate, whichever is higher (GOV.UK). New entrants, such as applicants under 26 or switching from a Student visa, can be paid 70% of the going rate with a £33,400 floor (GOV.UK). Confirm the offer clears it first.
UK Graduate visa: 2 years if you apply on or before Dec 31, 2026, and 18 months from Jan 1, 2027 (GOV.UK).
EU: the Pay Transparency Directive gives applicants the right to the starting pay or its range before the interview and bans pay-history questions (Article 5). Member states had to pass national laws by June 7, 2026 (EUR-Lex). Check whether your country has.
Europe pays in tiers. Orosz's Netherlands entry-level ranges: EUR 25,000 to 40,000 at local companies, EUR 40,000 to 65,000 at ambitious local companies, EUR 65,000 to 100,000 at big tech and top scaleups (Pragmatic Engineer).
For local data, search TechPays by country (UK, Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg, Estonia, Hungary as of Oct 2026) and compare with the Levels.fyi page for the same company.

US pay transparency laws¶

Use the posted range as your anchor. Big tech posts usually show base only, so ask about equity and sign-on separately. Employers in these states can still ask your salary expectations. Answer with S1.

State	The posting must show	Employers covered	Salary history	Source
California	Pay scale	15+ employees	Employer may not seek it	Labor Code 432.3, FAQ
New York	Minimum and maximum salary or hourly range	4+ employees	Employer may not ask (since Jan 6, 2020)	NY DOL, NY salary history ban
Washington	Wage scale or salary range, plus a description of benefits and other pay	15+ employees	Employer may not ask	WA L&I
Colorado	Compensation and benefits	Employers in Colorado	Employer may not ask	CDLE
Illinois	Pay scale and benefits (a link counts)	15+ employees	Employer may not require it	820 ILCS 112/10
Minnesota	Starting salary range plus benefits	30+ employees	Employer may not ask or consider it	Stat. 181.173, Stat. 363A.08 subd. 8
Massachusetts	Pay range (from Oct 29, 2025)	25+ employees	Employer may not seek it before an offer is made	c.149 s.105F, c.149 s.105A

Watch out: New York, Massachusetts and Minnesota still let an employer use pay history you volunteer. Do not offer it.

Weak vs strong moves¶

Weak	Strong
"I'm looking for about $150K" on the first call	"I'd like to learn more about the role before I put a number on it" (S1)
"Yes, I accept" on the offer call	"Thank you. Could you send it in writing? I'll come back to you by Friday." (S10)
"Can you do any better?"	"If you can bring the sign-on to $X, I'll sign by Friday." (S20)
"My rent in San Francisco is high"	"Levels.fyi data for [level] in [city] puts the median at [$X]. This offer is [$Y] below it." (S15)
"Another company offered me more"	Exact base, equity, vesting and sign-on of the other offer (S13)
Negotiating the first offer while 3 loops are mid-way	Waiting until the offers land, then negotiating once
Asking for 6 changes at once	One total number, split into 2 components

Next: Compensation basics