Carta Release Notes - Product Updates - CARTA TOTAL COMP

3 weeks ago6/29/2026

Quarterly benchmark refresh - Q2 2026

What's new?

We have updated salary, total cash compensation, and equity benchmarks for all job areas and specializations across all peer groups.

Across all countries in this release, approximately 91% meet the medium / high confidence threshold for equity and 80% for salary, reflecting the strength and breadth of Carta's underlying compensation dataset.

Benchmark Trends

In aggregate, salary and total cash compensation benchmarks are higher than our last release, increasing by approximately 3% at the median. This represents a stronger quarter-over-quarter move than recent releases, where increases have typically been less than 1–2%. Increases are fairly consistent across company stages and levels. Similar to previous updates, specialization-level data continues to change more than the broader job-area sample, as sample sizes for specialized roles are smaller.

Equity benchmarks are also higher than last quarter, with a median increase of approximately 3% across most job areas - slightly stronger than recent quarters. AI/ML Engineering saw the largest median equity increase. Equity YoY growth across many job areas is substantial, reflecting continued market recalibration over the past year.

What were the largest areas of movement from these benchmarks?

Salary - Salary benchmarks for most job areas and specializations are within 3% of last quarter's data. Engineering (particularly AI/ML), Sales, Finance, Design (Art & Graphic Design, General), Operations, and Product saw the strongest increases.

Equity - Equity benchmarks are generally up 3–8% versus last quarter. The largest median increases were in Engineering (AI/ML), Sales, Marketing, Product, and Finance with 6-8% increases.

How do I update my benchmark version?

You can preview the new benchmarks on your Scorecard by navigating to the Benchmarks page and clicking on the "Preview benchmarks" bubble in the top left.

Here you will have the opportunity to preview the new plan with the updated benchmarks version and assess their impact on your Scorecard before accepting the new plan.

Questions?

If you have any questions about these new benchmarks, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

Ashley Zhou

4 months ago3/19/2026

Add target bonus and commission data to Carta Total Compensation via HRIS

What’s new?

Starting today Carta Total Compensation customers can add their target bonus and commission data for employees via their HRIS integration (or CSV/SFTP upload)

How do I add my target bonus and commission data?

If you’re using a Rippling integration, your bonus and commission data will sync automatically. Just delete any existing plans under Compensation Plan, and after your next sync, the correct values will appear in Carta.

For other HRIS platforms, contact our support team, and an agent will help set up the integration.

Questions?

If you have any questions about adding your target bonus/commissions data to Carta Total Compensation, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

5 months ago2/17/2026

Quarterly benchmark refresh - Q1 2026

What’s new?

We have updated salary, total cash compensation, and equity benchmarks for all job areas and specializations across all peer groups. In addition we have included new benchmarks in this release:

Benchmark Trends

In aggregate, salary and total cash compensation benchmarks are slightly higher than our last release, increasing slightly less than 1%. Increases are consistent across stages of company and fairly consistent across levels. Similar to previous updates, specialization level data continues to change more than the broader sample, as sample sizes for these roles are smaller than job area level data.

Equity benchmarks are also slightly higher than last quarter. Increases were a bit more concentrated in earlier stage companies.

What were the largest areas of movement from these benchmarks?

Salary - Salary benchmarks for nearly all job areas and specializations are within 2% of last quarter’s data. Project management is the only role that increased by more than 2% quarter-over-quarter (by about 3%)

Equity - Equity benchmarks are generally within 2-3% of last quarter’s benchmarks.

How do I update my benchmark version?

You can also preview the new benchmarks on your Scorecard by navigating to the Benchmarks page and clicking on the "Preview benchmarks" bubble in the top left.

Questions?

If you have any questions about these new benchmarks, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

6 months ago1/5/2026

Quarterly benchmark refresh - Q4 2025

What’s new?

Benchmark Trends

In aggregate, salary and total cash compensation benchmarks are slightly higher than our last release, increasing by about 1%. Increases are consistent across stages of company and fairly consistent across levels. Similar to previous updates, specialization level data continues to change more than the broader sample, as sample sizes for these roles are smaller than job area level data.

Equity benchmarks are increasing in aggregate, showing about a 2% increase versus last quarter. Later stage peer groups generally saw the largest increases

What were the largest areas of movement from these benchmarks?

Salary - Salary benchmarks for all job areas and specializations are within 2% of last quarter’s data. Recruiting is the only role that decreased quarter-over-quarter (by about 1%)

Equity - Equity benchmarks are generally within 5% of last quarter’s benchmarks. Product Management is the only role that increased by more, showing a 7% increase.

How do I update my benchmark version?

Questions?

If you have any questions about these new benchmarks, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

9 months ago9/30/2025

Quarterly benchmark refresh - Q3 2025

What’s new?

We have updated salary, total cash compensation, and equity benchmarks for all job areas and specializations across all peer groups.

Benchmark Trends

In aggregate, salary and total cash compensation benchmarks are slightly higher than our last release, increasing by slightly less than 1%. Overall, increases are larger among companies with higher valuations, while increases by level are fairly consistent. Similar to previous updates, specialization level data continues to change more than the broader sample, as sample sizes for these roles are smaller than job area level data.

Equity - Equity benchmarks are generally within 5% of last quarter’s benchmarks. Logistics and Supply Chain Management and Partnerships increased by more than 5%. Manufacturing benchmarks decreased by about 5%.

What were the largest areas of movement from these benchmarks?

Salary - Salary benchmarks for most job areas and specializations are within 2% of last quarter’s data. Research, Human Resources, and Manufacturing saw the largest increases versus last quarter

How do I update my benchmark version?

Questions?

If you have any questions about these new benchmarks, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

11 months ago7/31/2025

Paybands improvements

What’s new?

We have made two improvements to paybands to make setting and updating bands easier:

  1. Reset bands - you can now reset paybands based on your current Compensation Plan or, after updating your Plan, reset them based on your updated compensation philosophy
  2. Automatic calculations for minimums and maximums - when updating payband targets, the minimum and maximum of the band that you are editing will automatically update based on your paybands settings

How do I reset paybands?

  1. Navigate to the Paybands page
  2. In the upper right corner, click the “Reset paybands” button

After clicking Reset paybands you will be asked to confirm your choice. Once you confirm, all of your paybands will be reset based on your current Compensation Plan.

Note that this cannot be undone once you confirm.

Questions?

If you have any questions or feedback about Custom Paybands, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

a year ago6/30/2025

Equity benchmarks for board members and advisors

What’s new?

We are launching a new set of benchmarks to help companies make data-driven decisions for board member and advisor equity grants.

These new benchmarks are based on initial equity grants to board members and advisors that have been issued since January 2024, and are shown based on post-money valuation.

How can I access the new Benchmarks?

  1. Navigate to the Benchmarks page in Carta Total Compensation
  2. Navigate to the “Board members and Advisors" tab on the Benchmarks page

The appropriate benchmarks, based on your company’s valuation, will be highlighted on the page.

Questions?

If you have any questions about these new benchmarks, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

a year ago6/26/2025

Quarterly benchmark refresh - Q2 2025

What’s new?

We have updated salary, total cash compensation, and equity benchmarks for all job areas and specializations across both valuation and headcount based peer groups. We have also added benchmarks for 5 new specializations:

These new benchmarks are available for post-money valuation and capital raised peer groups. Benchmarks based on headcount for these roles, as well as notional equity value benchmarks, will be included in a future release

Benchmark Trends

In aggregate, salary and total cash compensation benchmarks are slightly higher than our last release, increasing by about 1%. These increases were consistent across all valuation peer groups and levels. Similar to previous updates, specialization level data continues to change more than the broader sample, as sample sizes for these roles are smaller than job area level data.

Equity benchmarks are increasing in aggregate, showing about a 1.5% increase versus last quarter. Similar to last quarter, increases are fairly tightly correlated with company valuation, with higher valuation benchmarks seeing the largest increases.

What were the largest areas of movement from these benchmarks?

Salary - Salary benchmarks for most job areas and specializations are within 2% of last quarter’s data. Legal and Office Management saw the largest increases versus last quarter

Equity - Equity benchmarks are generally within 5% of last quarter’s benchmarks. UX/Frontend Engineering and Manufacturing increased by more than 5%

How do I update my benchmark version?

Questions?

If you have any questions about these new benchmarks, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

a year ago5/29/2025

Hiring plan improvements

What’s new?

We've made general UI/UX improvements to the hiring plan tool that is part of the Manage Employees experience. We've also added the ability to save and delete individual hiring plans that can then be incorporated into the Equity Pool Forecast for your company.

How do I create and save a hiring plan?

  1. Navigate to Manage Employees
  2. Click on "Launch Hiring Planner"
  3. Click "New Hiring Plan", type in a name for your plan, and click "Create New Plan"

Once you've created a hiring plan you can add/delete potential hires, rename the plan, or delete the plan.

How do I incorporate a hiring plan into my equity pool forecast?

When you have added all potential hires to your hiring plan, click on "View Detailed Forecast" in the banner below the hiring plan

On the equity pool forecast page, select the hiring plan that you'd like to include in the forecast

Questions?

If you have any questions or feedback about the hiring planner or equity pool forecast, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

a year ago5/20/2025

Geographic adjustments for Canadian cities

What’s new?

We have added new geographic adjustment factors for three cities in Canada: Vancouver, Toronto, and Montreal. The rest of Canada will now have its own geo-adjustments for salary and equity

How do I view new benchmarks?

In order to see city-specific geo-adjustments for Canada you will need to update your benchmark version. You can update your benchmark version by navigating to the Benchmarks page and clicking on the "Preview benchmarks" bubble in the top left.

Once your benchmark version has been updated you will be able to see the new adjustments on the Benchmarks page, within your Compensation Plan, and both the Company and Employee Scorecards

Questions?

If you have any questions or feedback about these new benchmarks, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

a year ago4/10/2025

View benchmarks based on capital raised

What’s new?

We have added a new peer group category to view salary, total cash compensation, and equity benchmarks – based on capital raised.

How do I view new benchmarks?

You can view the new capital raised-based benchmarks by visiting the Benchmarks page and selecting the peer group filter. The new peer groups will be in the dropdown alongside the current peer groups based on post-money valuation and headcount.

How do I use these new benchmarks in my Compensation Plan and Scorecards?

We are working on a future update that will allow companies to use any of our peer groups in their Compensation Plans and Scorecard.

Questions?

If you have any questions or feedback about these new benchmarks, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

a year ago3/31/2025

Quarterly benchmark refresh - Q1 2025

What’s new?

We have updated salary, total cash compensation, and equity benchmarks for all job areas and specializations across both valuation and headcount based peer groups.

Benchmark Trends

In aggregate, salary and total cash compensation benchmarks are slightly higher than our last release, increasing by a bit more than 1%. These increases were consistent across all valuation peer groups and levels. Similar to previous updates, specialization level data continues to change more than the broader sample, as sample sizes for these roles are smaller than job area level data.

Equity benchmarks are increasing in aggregate, showing about a 3% increase versus last quarter. Similar to last quarter, increases are fairly tightly correlated with company valuation, with higher valuation benchmarks seeing the largest increases.

What were the largest areas of movement from these benchmarks?

Salary - Salary benchmarks for most job areas and specializations are within 2% of last quarter’s data. Social Media Marketing and Logistics & Supply Chain saw the largest increases versus last quarter

Equity - Equity benchmarks are generally within 5% of last quarter’s benchmarks. There is more variation by role in this quarter’s release, with Recruiting, Strategy, and Partnerships showing the largest increases. Mobile, Logistics & Supply Chain, and Art & Graphic Design are showing the largest decreases

How do I update my benchmark version?

Questions?

If you have any questions about these new benchmarks, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

a year ago2/13/2025

Custom Paybands

What’s new?

Carta Total Compensation is excited to introduce Custom Paybands, a new feature that allows customers to define, manage, and evaluate compensation using their own salary and equity ranges. Previously, users relied on benchmark-based market bands; however, with Custom Pay Bands, customers can now set their own pay ranges for specific job areas and levels, ensuring alignment with their internal compensation strategy.

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How can I access paybands?

  1. Navigate to the Paybands page in Carta Total Compensation

  2. Review the details of your Compensation Plan

  3. Click “Create Paybands”

  4. You’ll be shown a list of paybands that have been automatically created for you

How do I edit paybands?

  1. From the Paybands screen, click on the payband that you’d like to edit
  2. Click edit on the individual payband page
  3. You can now enter new minimum, target, and maximum salaries/equity grants for each level. You may also enter notes to document any decisions. You can also rename the band.
  4. Click “Save” to return to the individual payband view

How do I create paybands for multiple locations?

  1. Under Compensation Plan, navigate to Payband settings
  2. Select a location where you would like to create paybands
  3. Set an adjustment factor off of top-of-market benchmarks for the new location
  4. Click + add location adjustment to add  more locations
  5. After editing this section, click on Preview & Save so the system can re-calculate the scorecard

Note: You will need to enter all relevant locations here in order for employee comparisons on the Scorecard to be accurate.

Questions?

If you have any questions or feedback about Custom Paybands, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

a year ago12/18/2024

Quarterly benchmark refresh - Q4 2024

What’s new?

We have updated salary, total cash compensation, and equity benchmarks for all job areas and specializations across both valuation and headcount based peer groups, as well as for Life Sciences-specific roles

Benchmark Trends

In aggregate, salary and total cash compensation benchmarks are slightly higher than our last release, increasing by 1%. These increases were consistent across all valuation peer groups and levels. Similar to previous updates, specialization level data continues to change more than the broader sample, as sample sizes for these roles are smaller than job area level data.

Equity benchmarks are increasing in aggregate, showing about a 2% increase versus last quarter. Similar to last quarter, increases are fairly tightly correlated with company valuation, with higher valuation benchmarks seeing the largest increases.

Updated headcount based benchmarks continue to show larger than typical increases or decreases compared to our initial release for a number of roles. This is a result of additional data, improvements to our underlying models, and feedback from customers.  Going forward we expect these benchmarks to be less volatile over time (similar to our valuation-based benchmarks).

The same is true for Life Sciences benchmarks. This quarter marks the first update of these benchmarks since their initial release. Since their initial release the sample size underlying these benchmarks has increased significantly (a roughly 50% increase in employee records), which caused larger than typical increases or decreases for a number of roles.

What were the largest areas of movement from these benchmarks?

Salary - Salary benchmarks for most job areas and specializations are within 2% of last quarter’s data.

Equity - Equity benchmarks are generally within 5% of last quarter’s benchmarks. Roles that are increasing by more than 5% are Partnerships and Strategy.

How do I update my benchmark version?

Questions?

If you have any questions about these new benchmarks, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

a year ago11/6/2024

Notional equity value benchmarks

What’s new?

Up until now, all equity benchmarks in Carta Total Compensation have been based on fully diluted ownership percentage. While it’s common practice for most early to mid-stage startups to base their equity grants on percentage ownership, later stage companies tend to denote their equity grants in dollar values.

To better serve those companies, equity benchmarks based on notional value are now available on the Benchmarks page. These new benchmarks are available for the $500 million - $1 billion and Greater than $1 billion post-money valuation peer groups. These benchmarks reflect 4-year new hire grants calculated based on number of shares multiplied by preferred price on the date of grant.

How can I access the new notional value benchmarks?

  1. Navigate to the Benchmarks page in Carta Total Compensation
  2. After selecting either the $500 million - $1 billion or Above $1 billion peer group, in the Equity Unit dropdown menu, select “Notional Value”

For this initial release, these benchmarks are only available on the Benchmarks page. We will be integrating notional value benchmarks into other parts of Carta Total Compensation in the coming months.

Questions?

If you have any questions about these new benchmarks, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

a year ago9/30/2024

Quarterly benchmark refresh - Q3 2024

What’s new?

Benchmark Trends

Equity benchmarks are increasing in aggregate, showing about a 2% increase versus last quarter. This quarter’s increases are fairly tightly correlated with company valuation, with higher valuation benchmarks seeing the largest increases.

Updated headcount based benchmarks show larger than typical increases or decreases compared to our initial release for a number of roles. This is a result of additional data, improvements to our underlying models, and feedback from customers.  Going forward we expect these benchmarks to be less volatile over time (similar to our valuation-based benchmarks)

What were the largest areas of movement from these benchmarks?

Salary - Salary benchmarks for most job areas and specializations are within 2% of last quarter’s data.

Equity - Equity benchmarks are generally within 5% of last quarter’s benchmarks. Roles that are increasing by more than 5% are Product Marketing, Admin, Project Management, Support, and UX Design

How do I update my benchmark version?

Questions?

If you have any questions about these new benchmarks, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

a year ago9/12/2024

Equity Plan Benchmarks

What’s new?

Board members, investors, and company executives need to to ensure, from a governance perspective, that equity is being used responsibly by the company. To support this need we are launching a new set of benchmarks to help companies evaluate their equity usage versus peers:

  1. Option pool size - the percentage of fully diluted shares reserved to grant to people in the future
  2. Equity burn rate -  the percentage of fully diluted shares granted over the last 365 days

How can I access the new Equity Plan Benchmarks?

  1. Navigate to the Benchmarks page in Carta Total Compensation
  2. Navigate to the “Option pool & Burn rate” tab on the Benchmarks page

The appropriate benchmarks, based on your company’s valuation, will be highlighted on the page.

Questions?

If you have any questions about these new benchmarks, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

a year ago7/29/2024

Advanced Equity Refresh Planner

What’s new?

We are launching an updated version of our Equity Refresh Planner to better help with:

  1. Identifying which employees receive a grant
  2. Deciding the size of each refresh grant based on market benchmarks

This updated tool includes:

  1. The ability to add/remove employees to your company’s Refresh Plan
  2. Quick filters to quickly identify eligible and/or High Retention risk employees based on tenure, your compensation plan, and market targets.
  3. Settings to help manage the refresh grant recommendation and tenure eligibility criteria

How can I access the new Equity Refresh planner?

  1. Navigate to the Reports page in Carta Total Compensation
  2. Navigate to the “Equity Refresh” tile and click “View report”
  3. The interactive planner will open

How do I use the Advanced Equity Refresh planner?

This planner helps companies identify employees who should be considered for additional equity grants as a way to retain talent at the company. It also provides market based refresh grant recommendations that can be adjusted as needed.

Questions?

If you have any questions about this new planner, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

Stefan Rosenberg

2 years ago6/13/2024

New suite of Employee management tools

Starting today, Carta is enabling you to easily determine how much equity to grant employees and when to grant it via new tools such as the Hiring Planner, Refresh Grant Planner, and Equity Pool Forecast.

Only Carta can help you:

What’s new?

With our new suite of Employee management tools, administrators have access to four new features:

  1. Manage Employees hub: See the tools, required steps, and resources to help you hire, manage and retain your team.
  2. Hiring Planner: Add potential new hires to see recommended equity and cash compensation based on market data, and export plans to share with your team and investors.
  3. Refresh Grant Planner: See which employees are completing vesting soon, and plan out refresh grants to tenured employees to help retain top performers
  4. Equity Pool Forecast: Visualize your equity grants, hiring, and retention initiatives and their impact on your equity pool over time.

Who is this available for?

All Corporation founders and administrators who can view their company’s cap table.

How do I use it?

You can access these flows by going to your Carta account, and going to Manage Employees in the side navigation. From there, you can easily access all of the additional tools.

View a demo walkthrough of this feature.

Anything else I need to know?

If there is anything you wish to see here, use the feedback form that will show up when you first visit the Manage employees page. If you have already responded and have additional feedback, or cannot find the form, you can reach out to your CSM or provide feedback via Carta Community.

Will WD

2 years ago5/23/2024

View benchmarks based on employee headcount

What’s new?

We have added a new peer group category to view salary, total cash compensation, and equity benchmarks – based on employee headcount.

How do I view new benchmarks?

You can view the new employee headcount-based benchmarks by visiting the Benchmarks page and selecting the peer group filter. The new peer groups will be in the dropdown alongside the current peer groups based on post-money valuation.

How do I use these new benchmarks in my Compensation Plan and Scorecards?

We are working on an additional update that will allow companies to use employee headcount-based benchmarks in their Compensation Plans and Scorecards next quarter.

Questions?

If you have any questions or feedback about these new benchmarks, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

2 years ago5/2/2024

Quarterly Benchmark Refresh and Updated US and International Geographic Adjustments - Q2 2024

What’s new?

We have updated salary, total cash compensation, and equity benchmarks for all job areas and specializations. Additionally, we have updated US geographic adjustments for all metro areas as well as international market adjustments and currency conversions.

Benchmark Trends

In aggregate, salary and total cash compensation benchmarks are slightly higher than our last release, increasing by 1%. Salaries increased slightly more for companies with valuations up to $100M. Across all roles, levels 7 and above tended to increase more than levels 6 and below. Similar to previous updates, specialization level data continues to change more than the broader sample, as sample sizes for these roles are smaller than job area level data.

Equity benchmarks are increasing in aggregate, showing about a 4% increase versus last quarter. Looking at equity trends by valuation, equity benchmarks increased the most for companies with valuations greater than $500 million.

Looking across updated geographic differential data, we observed our top market compensation increasing faster than most other metro areas, resulting in some slightly larger discounts between our top markets and other cities. Most of the larger metro areas within our dataset, however,  have remained relatively stable. For international locations, salary and/or equity adjustments have changed by 10% or more in the following countries: Brazil, Germany, Singapore, Japan, United Arab Emirates, and Switzerland.

What were the largest areas of movement from these benchmarks?

Salary - Salary benchmarks for most job areas and specializations are within 2% of last quarter’s data.

Equity - We saw a wider range of equity changes this quarter compared to previous quarters. Some of the larger increases are in Recruiting, Strategy, Project Management, and Sales/Solutions Engineering which are all increasing 10-15% versus last quarter. Mobile Engineering and Product Management saw the largest decreases vs. last quarter (6-8%)

How do I update my benchmark version?

Questions?

If you have any questions about these new benchmarks, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

2 years ago4/29/2024

Categorize CEOs as a Founder or Non-Founder

What’s new?

Companies can now classify their CEOs as being either a Founder CEO or Non-Founder CEO. This will allow companies to compare CEO compensation to market targets on both the company and employee Scorecards accurately.

How do I categorize the CEO as a Founder or Non-Founder?

Navigate to the employee list and navigate to “Edit employee” for the CEO.

Select “Job area and level” from the menu on the left, and set “Job area” to “CEO”. From there you will be able to select “Founder” or “Non-Founder” for the CEO role

Finally, click “Save” in the upper right corner of the screen to save these changes. You will now be able to compare CEO compensation to market targets on the company and employee Scorecards.

Questions?

If you have any questions about how to categorize a CEO as a Founder or Non-Founder, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

2 years ago4/15/2024

Founder and Non-Founder CEO benchmarks

What’s new?

We are adding additional granularity to our CEO benchmarks by:

How do I see benchmarks for the new roles?

You can view the new CEO benchmarks by visiting the Benchmarks page and selecting “CEO” under Area. Within “CEO” you can select “Founder” or “Non-Founder” from the Founder Status dropdown.

How do benchmarks for the additional benchmarks affect the Employee Scorecard?

Learn more about how to classify a CEO as a Founder or Non-Founder here.

Questions?

If you have any questions about these new benchmarks, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

2 years ago4/2/2024

Equity Refresh report

What’s new?

We are introducing a new interactive report – the Equity Refresh report.  The report will let users view:

How can I access the Equity Refresh report?

  1. Navigate to the Reports page in Carta Total Compensation
  2. Navigate to the “Equity Refresh report” tile and click “View report”
  3. The interactive report will open

How do I use the Equity Refresh report?

This report helps companies identify employees who should be considered for additional equity grants as a way to retain talent at the company.

Questions?

If you have any questions about this new report, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

Stefan Rosenberg

2 years ago2/13/2024

Compensation Summary report

What’s new?

We are introducing a new interactive report – the Compensation Summary report. Users can now see a complete view of employee salary and equity spend by by Job Area, Track, or Location and evaluate headcount costs to market targets for these groups.

How can I access the Compensation Summary report?

  1. Navigate to the Reports page in Carta Total Compensation
  2. Navigate to the “Compensation Summary report” tile and click “View report”
  3. The interactive report will open

How do I use the Compensation Summary report?

With the Compensation Summary report, you can view employee salary and equity spend grouped by Job Area, Track, or Location in a table view. Any datapoint that is +/- 10% of the market benchmark will display in red. The Compensation Summary report provides several summary insights including:

Summary insights take into account only employees with complete information and eligible benchmark targets. Users can export their Compensation Summary report to share and use in reporting.

Questions?

If you have any questions about this new report, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

2 years ago1/30/2024

Quarterly benchmark refresh - Q1 2024

What’s new?

We have updated salary, total cash compensation, and equity benchmarks for all job areas and specializations.

Benchmark Trends

Since our last quarterly refresh, we’ve seen an increase in the number of companies and employee records in our data set, with the largest influx among higher valuation companies. As a result, some benchmarks saw slightly larger changes compared to previous releases.

In aggregate, salary and total cash compensation benchmarks are flat to slightly higher than our last release. Salaries increased more for higher valuation companies. Similar to previous updates, specialization level data continues to change more than the broader sample, as sample sizes for these roles are smaller than job area level data.

Equity benchmarks are flat in aggregate, showing a slight downward trend from last quarter’s 1% increase. Looking at equity trends by valuation, equity benchmarks are flat overall for most peer groups but have declined by about 3% for companies with valuations greater than $1 billion.

What were the largest areas of movement from these benchmarks?

Salary - Salary benchmarks for most job areas and specializations are within 2% of last quarter’s data. The Administrative job area has increased by 4%, while CEO salary benchmarks have decreased by 4%.

Equity - Human Resources equity benchmarks have increased 7% overall following a 3% decrease in last quarter’s benchmarks. Three specializations saw the largest decrease in equity benchmarks (5-6%): Web Engineer, AI/ML Engineer, and Account Executive. All other roles saw increases/decreases within 3-4% of last quarter.

How do I update my benchmark version?

Questions?

If you have any questions about these new benchmarks, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

2 years ago11/1/2023

U.S. national average geo-adjustments

What’s new?

You can now use benchmarks that are adjusted to reflect US national average pay levels. This new feature allows you to use an accurate, standard, and uniform approach when setting a compensation framework for your company. You can view and use the US national average by:

  1. Viewing Benchmarks at the US national average pay level
  2. Setting your Compensation Plan at the US national average pay level

How can I review US national average geo-adjustments?

US national average benchmarks are available to review on the Benchmarks page by following these steps:

1. Navigate to the “Benchmarks” page

2. In the Location selection drop-down, users can select “All US locations (national average)”

How can I use the US national average in my compensation plan?

If your location-based compensation strategy targets compensation for all employees at the US national average, you can follow these steps to build that into your Compensation Plan

  1. Navigate to “Compensation plan” on the top nav.
  2. Navigate to “Location-based pay”
  3. Under “USA Adjustments” select “Pay everyone the same regardless of location”
  4. Check the box labeled “Use national average”

Questions?

If you have any questions about US national average geo-adjustments, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

2 years ago10/31/2023

New compensation benchmarks for HR, Marketing, and Manufacturing roles

What’s new?

Our benchmarks now support one new job area and two new specializations:

Note: The sample size for new benchmarks are generally smaller than existing benchmarks, which could result in data volatility as we continue to update the data and grow our overall sample size.

How do I see benchmarks for the new roles?

You can view benchmarks for the new roles by:

Visiting the Benchmarks page and selecting “Manufacturing, “Human Resources, or “Marketing” under Area. Within “Human Resources” and “Marketing”, you can select any of the new specializations by selecting the Specialization dropdown.

This will allow you to view compensation benchmarks for levels 1 - 8 for these new roles

The above process can be followed for each of the new benchmarks.

How do benchmarks for the additional benchmarks affect the Employee Scorecard?

The compa-ratio is a quick way to compare an employee's compensation to your plan's target rate for a given job area, level, and location. The compa-ratios for an employee assigned to the new benchmarks will now be calculated using the target compensation for the new benchmarks.

How do I update my benchmark version to use new data?

Questions?

If you have any questions about the new data, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

2 years ago10/30/2023

Compensation data in Cap Table Stakeholders modal

What’s new?

Carta Total Compensation customers will have access to a complete view of employee details with their salary information, equity information, and market targets now also visible in the Cap Table Stakeholder modal.

How do I access it?

1. Users can navigate to ‘Manage Stakeholders’ under Essentials on the left-hand navigation menu.

2. Stakeholders who are employees will have a new menu item “View employee Compensation” under the three-dot menu

3. This will open the “Compensation” tab for the employee, which will display:

a. A summary of salary and equity compensation

b. Market targets for the individual as set by the Compensation Plan in Carta Total Compensation

Questions?

If you have any questions, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

2 years ago10/10/2023

Introducing the New Hire Equity Forecasting calculator to help you proactively allocate equity

What’s new?

Carta Total Compensation users can now use the New Hire Equity Forecast calculator to proactively allocate equity for anticipated headcount in the upcoming months.

How do I access it?

You can access the New Hire Equity Forecast calculator, along with any other Carta Total Comp report, from either:

See a quick video on accessing compensation reports here.

Questions?

If you have any questions about the new report, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

2 years ago9/14/2023

Quarterly benchmark refresh and new Life Sciences industry benchmarks

What’s new?

We have three new updates included as a part of this benchmark version:

Quarterly benchmark refresh

We have updated salary, total cash compensation, and equity benchmarks for all job areas and specializations.

Market Trends

Salary and total cash compensation benchmarks are generally flat since our last update. These trends are fairly consistent across company valuation and level. As in previous updates, specialization level data continues to be more volatile than the broader sample, as sample sizes for these roles are smaller than job area-level data.

Equity benchmarks have decreased approximately 1%, less than last quarter’s 9%. Equity benchmarks have been decreasing steadily since the beginning of the year, and it’s possible that the market is starting to stabilize close to a “new normal”. We did observe larger decreases, however, among later stage companies indicating that these companies (similar to public companies earlier in 2023) are focused on managing dilution in the face of falling valuations

What were the largest areas of movement from these benchmarks?

Salary - Project Management roles saw the largest increase this quarter (+5%), balancing out the larger decrease that this job area saw last quarter. Notably our AI/ML engineering benchmarks increased by approximately 3%. IT and Legal salary benchmarks decreased by 3% versus last quarter. All other job areas saw salary changes that were within 2% of last quarter’s benchmarks.

Equity - Human Resources and Finance roles saw the largest decreases. Some job areas and specializations did see overall increases to equity benchmarks this quarter, such as Sales Development, Sales/Solutions Engineering, and Art and Graphic Design. Most other job areas changed by 3% or less versus last quarter though there can be variance by level and valuation peer group.

Life Sciences industry benchmarks

We have released initial benchmarks for three new specializations specific to the Life Sciences industry:

Benchmarks for these roles were developed based on employee data taken exclusively from the Life Sciences companies in our database, making these benchmarks our first industry specific benchmarks. These benchmarks are reflective of the geographic distribution of Life Sciences talent, with markets like Boston, San Diego, Seattle, and Los Angeles joining San Francisco and New York as the top labor markets for these roles.

Peer group updates

Finally, in an effort to increase the overall quality of our benchmarks, we will no longer provide data for the Below $1M valuation peer group. Variability of pay within that group tended to be high, and many of our benchmarks were less relevant for companies at such an early stage. Any customers with Plans set to use the Below $1M will automatically default to the $1M - $10M peer group after updating to the latest benchmark version.

How do I update my benchmark version?

How do I see benchmarks for the new Life Sciences industry specializations?

You can view benchmarks for the new specializations by:

1. Visiting the Benchmarks page and selecting “Research” under Area. Once the job area is selected, you can select “Life Sciences” from the Industry dropdown and any of the new specializations by selecting the Specialization dropdown.

2. This will allow you to view salary/equity benchmarks for levels 1-3 for Research Associate, levels 4-6 for Scientist, and levels 1-5 for Lab Operations

Questions?

If you have any questions about these new benchmarks or if you have suggestions for additional Life Sciences specific data, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

2 years ago9/1/2023

See how upcoming refresh / tenure, promotion, and true-up grants will affect your option pool

What’s new?

You can now use the Equity Forecasting and Burn Calculator to automatically calculate the impact on your option pool from three different types of equity grants:

With these grants incorporated into your calculations, you can more accurately model your equity pool’s burn over the coming year to make informed decisions around strategies for your compensation program.

How do I access the Equity Forecasting and Burn Calculator?

You can access the Equity Forecasting and Burn Calculator, along with any other Carta Total Comp reports, from either:

If you want to have access or want to schedule a demo to understand what you can unlock with the calculator and Carta Total Comp, reach out to your CSM.

What’s next?

We are planning a few additional enhancements to improve ease of use of the Equity Forecasting and Burn Calculator:

This calculator is also a living and growing tool – and so any feedback you have will be appreciated. You can either provide it via reports-feedback@carta.com, through your CSM, or directly within Carta Total Compensation after downloading the calculator. Your feedback will help us improve this and other reports to fit your needs.

Will WD

2 years ago7/27/2023

New specializations for Sales and updated international data

What’s new?

Carta Total Comp has two new data updates: New specializations and updates to our international data.

Our benchmarks now support three new specializations in the Sales job area:

Note: Our sample size for new specializations can be smaller than job area benchmarks, which could result in data volatility as we continue to update the data and grow our overall sample size.

Additionally, we have updated international market adjustments and the six-month rolling exchange rates that are used to convert USD to international currencies. These new adjustments and exchange rates are live for all Carta Total Compensation customers. Note that in the following countries, salary and/or equity adjustments have changed by 10% or more: India, Brazil, Ukraine, Hungary, Mexico, Armenia, Estonia, and United Arab Emirates.

How do I see benchmarks for the new specializations?

You can view benchmarks for the new specializations by:

1. Visiting the Benchmarks page and selecting “Sales” under Area. Once the job area is selected, you can select any of the new specializations by selecting the Specialization dropdown.

2. This will allow you to view salary/equity benchmarks for levels 1 - 8 for Sales/Solutions Engineering. For Account Executive and Sales Development Representative, data are available for levels 1-6.

3. The above process can be followed for each of the new specializations.

How do benchmarks for the additional specializations affect the Employee Scorecard?

The compa-ratio is a quick way to compare an employee's compensation to your plan's target rate for a given job area, level, and location. The compa-ratios for an employee assigned to the new Sales specializations will now be calculated using the target compensation for the specialization, not the job area.

How do I update my benchmark version to use new specializations?

You can update your compensation plan to use the latest benchmark versions either by visiting the Plan page and clicking on the "Update available" link in the Active Plan window.

How do I see new international market adjustments?

1. To see new international market adjustments, navigate to the Plan tab and scroll down to International Market Adjustment.

2. Market adjustments will automatically be updated. You can customize any adjustments by using the Edit button on the right.

What’s next?

The Carta Total Compensation team is working on our Q3 benchmark refresh for all job areas and specializations

3 years ago7/17/2023

Export benchmarks from Carta Total Compensation

What’s new?

Starting today, customers can export data from the Benchmarks page as a CSV file to use in their compensation analyses outside of Carta Total Compensation. The feature is active for all Carta Total Compensation customers and can be accessed from the Benchmarks page.

How do I access it?

1. Navigate to the Benchmarks page in Carta Total Compensation.

2. Choose the specific filters for the data you’d like to export, including the Location, Area, Specialization, Track, and compensation type.

3. Click the “Export” button that appears under the filters.

4. Open the downloaded file to see your data.

What’s next?

Carta Total Compensation is developing benchmarks for new specializations.

Questions?

If you have any questions about how to export Benchmarks data or if you have suggestions for additional export functionality, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

3 years ago7/10/2023

Simplify employee leveling in Carta Total Compensation

What’s new?

In Carta Total Compensation, you can now use a simple guide to:

  1. Assign Job Titles easily to any employee who is missing one, and
  2. Level multiple employees at once by assigning a Level to a Job Title

With fully leveled employees, you can leverage the power and insights of all Total Comp features, including Reports and Employee Scorecard. This feature eases that process by simplifying what employees need attention.

What do I need to do?

If you already have Total Compensation set up, you will see a banner at the top of your Total Comp page that will take you directly to a new flow.

As you’re assigning Levels to Job Titles, check out our leveling guide for guidance.

If you’re setting up Carta Total Compensation for the first time, use the new onboarding flow to level the employees pulled in from your HRIS (Human Resource Information System).

Questions?

If you have any questions about leveling your employees, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

3 years ago7/5/2023

New Bands page experience

What’s new?

We’ve redesigned the Bands page to make it easier to search for and view the compensation benchmarks you need. The new user experience is active for all Carta Total Compensation customers and can be accessed here.

There are 3 main changes:

1. Role and location filters can now be found at the top of the page, rather than along the left-side of the page.

2. You can view benchmarks for different compensation categories using the new buttons on the top of the page.

The new “All data” view allows you to see salary, total cash, and equity benchmarks all at the same time. Once selected, you can choose the exact benchmarks that you’d like to see side-by-side.

3. Our visualization is now hidden by default to help you get to the data you need quickly. However, you can always view it by clicking the “Show visualization” button above the benchmarks table.

What’s next?

We’ll be adding export functionality to the Bands page to allow customers to download Carta Total Compensation data as a spreadsheet.

Questions?

If you have any questions about the new look of the Bands page please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

3 years ago6/5/2023

Carta Total Compensation downloadable reports

What’s new?

Customers can now download reports directly from the company Scorecard page to gain additional insights into their compensation programs. There are 3 reports available to download:

What do I need to do?

You can download your Reports from the top of the Scorecard page.

What’s next?

These reports are currently in beta, so we’d love to hear your feedback as we continue to test and improve them.

After you download a report you can provide feedback directly in Carta Total Compensation. Your feedback will help us improve future versions of these and other reports on our roadmap.

We’ll be releasing other reports over the next couple of months. If there are specific reports that you’d like to see in Carta Total Compensation or have any questions, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

3 years ago5/25/2023

Quarterly benchmark refresh, total cash compensation for all roles, updated US geographic differentials, and 90th percentile data

May 25, 2023 Benchmarks

What’s new?

Market Trends

Salary and total cash compensation benchmarks have fallen slightly (approximately 1% overall) since last quarter, reflecting a continued down market for startup talent. We’re observing that new hire salaries across many roles are closer to or below our previous benchmarks, causing many salary benchmarks to decrease. On a role-by-role basis, we’re seeing a bit more volatility in this quarter’s data as compared to the last six months. As in previous updates, specialization-level data continues to be more volatile than the broader sample, as sample sizes for these roles are smaller than job area level data.

Equity benchmarks have decreased approximately 9%, less than last quarter’s 15%. Lower benchmarks cut across most roles and levels, though executive equity grants dropped slightly less, and even increased in some cases.

Looking across updated geographic differential data, most metro areas that moved closer to San Francisco pay levels have maintained their differentials compared to last year. This year, we see more cities outside of traditional tech hubs also moving closer to San Francisco pay levels (in particular metro areas across North Carolina and Florida)

What were the largest areas of movement from these benchmarks?

Salary - Sales, Research, and Strategy roles saw the largest increases, approximately 1-5% versus last quarter. Marketing, Administration, and Project Management roles saw the largest decreases ranging from 5-6%. The decreases for Marketing and Administration are driven by corrections that we have made for how certain roles are being categorized within these job areas. Information Technology also saw a larger decrease, largely due to the small sample size for this job area.

Equity - Support, Human Resources, and Strategy roles saw the largest decreases. Decreases in Product, Finance, and Operations were less pronounced than the overall sample

How do I update my plan to use the new benchmarks version?

You can update your compensation plan to use the latest benchmark versions either by:

Visiting the Plan page and clicking on the "Update available" link in the Active Plan window.

Navigating to the Bands page and clicking on the "Update" bubble in the top left.

You will have the opportunity to preview the new plan with the updated benchmarks version and assess their impact on your Scorecard before accepting the new plan.

What’s next?

Carta Total Compensation is developing benchmarks for new specializations.

3 years ago4/27/2023

New specializations for Design, Product, and Marketing

What’s new?

We’re excited to announce the release of three new specializations:

No other benchmarks have changed in this update.

How do I see benchmarks for the additional specializations?

You can view benchmarks for the new specializations by:

  1. Visiting the Bands page and selecting “Design”, “Product”, or “Marketing” under Area. Once the job area is selected, you can select either the Art & Graphic Design, Product Management, or the Social Media specialization by selecting the Specialization dropdown.

  1. This will allow you to view salary/equity bands for levels 1 - 8 for Art & Graphic Design or Product Management. For Social Media, data are available for levels 1-6.

  2. The above process can be followed for each of the new specializations.

How do benchmarks for the additional specializations affect the Employee Scorecard?

The compa-ratio is a quick way to compare an employee's compensation to your plan's target rate for a given job area, level, and location. The compa-ratios for an employee assigned to the Art & Graphic Design, Product Management, and Social Media specializations will now be calculated using the target compensation for the specialization, not the job area.

How do I update my benchmark version to use new specializations?

You can update your compensation plan to use the latest benchmark versions either by:

  1. Visiting the Plan page and clicking on the "Update available" link in the Active Plan window.

  2. Navigating to the Bands page and clicking on the "Update" bubble in the top left.

What’s next?

The Carta Total Compensation team is working on our Q2 benchmark refresh for all job areas and specializations

3 years ago4/24/2023

International Scorecards

What’s new?

International salary and equity targets are now on both the company and employee Scorecards. This now enables users to easily compare non-US employee compensation to the market, similar to how comparisons are currently shown for US employees. International bands data continues to be available on the Bands page.

On the Company Scorecard, users can see a complete view of all employees. Users can toggle between local currency and USD by clicking the checkbox at the top.

View an Employee-level Scorecard by clicking into any employee for additional information on their salary and equity. By default, employee cash compensation and market targets will be shown in the employee’s local currency. Users can toggle between local currency and USD using the checkboxes at the top of the employee scorecards.

As Carta Total Compensation only supports equity granted in USD, net equity values on all scorecards will only be shown in USD.

How do I update my scorecards to show international salary and equity targets?

No action is needed. The scorecards will update automatically with the appropriate data.

What’s next?

Carta Total Compensation is developing benchmarks for new specializations.