By Jim Knott, Founder

Most published associate pay data describes the largest firms. A headline starting salary of $225,000 says nothing about a firm of 40 attorneys in Tampa or a 120-attorney firm in Charlotte. This article sets out what the main annual survey does show for smaller firms, and what it leaves out.

What the data shows

NALP, the association for legal career professionals, publishes an annual Associate Salary Survey. The 2025 survey reports salaries as of January 1, 2025, and NALP summarized it in its Bulletin in June 2025. For first-year associates, it reports these medians (NALP, 2025 (opens in a new tab)):

  • Across all firms in the survey: $200,000.
  • Firms with 250 or fewer lawyers: $150,000.
  • Firms with 701 or more lawyers: $215,000.

The gap between the smallest size band and the largest is $65,000 at the median. A firm of 5 to 200 attorneys that benchmarks against the headline number is comparing itself to a different market.

What the data does not tell you

The figures above are a useful starting point, but they leave out a lot that matters to a hiring partner:

  • Size bands are wide. The smallest NALP band covers every firm with 250 or fewer lawyers. A firm of 10 attorneys and a firm of 200 are in the same group.
  • It is a first-year median. It does not give pay for second-year, mid-level, or senior associates.
  • It is not local. Pay for the same associate in Miami, Hartford, and Dallas can differ, and a national median hides that.
  • It is not by practice area. Firms often pay differently for corporate, litigation, and trusts and estates work.
  • It is dated. It reflects January 2025, and pay moves.

Why smaller firms set pay differently

Larger firms with a published scale tend to follow one another. Firms of 5 to 200 attorneys usually set pay against their own local market and their own economics. The things that typically drive the number are the firm's billing rates, the clients it serves, how profitable the practice is, and how competitive hiring is in that practice area and city.

Base salary is also only part of an offer. The billable requirement, how bonuses are decided, benefits, hours, and the path to partnership change what an offer is worth. A higher base with a higher billable requirement is not necessarily a better offer.

How to benchmark your own firm

  • Start with your own last three hires in the practice area: what did each accept, and what did the ones who declined want?
  • Ask candidates who turned you down what the other offer was, and what made it better.
  • Ask any recruiter you work with what offers they have seen for that practice area in your state, and how recently.
  • Check regional bar association and local legal market surveys where they exist.
  • Compare billable requirements and bonus terms, not only base salary.

Bound goes through current compensation for your practice area and state on the intake call. Bound does not yet publish its own compensation figures for firms of 5 to 200 attorneys. When it does, the report will say where the data came from.

Source

NALP, 2025 Associate Salary Survey, as reported in the NALP Bulletin, June 2025 (opens in a new tab). Figures are as of January 1, 2025.