How Autodesk Pays

Technical ladder — Grade 8 through Grade 17

Management ladder — M1 through M6

Interface-only executive categories — E1 and E2

Disclosed executive layer

IC and management divergence

Hierarchy qualifications and legacy structures

• Autodesk does not publish a global internal architecture document. The ladder consolidates the Levels.fyi title map and reported compensation pages; direct observations are strongest for US Grade 8–15, US M1–M5 and India Grade 8–13, while Grade 16–17, M6 and most non-US city cells require modeling.
• No public evidence supports a company-wide legacy grade harmonization from a major predecessor merger. Acquired teams can retain role titles or local practices during integration, but a universal predecessor band map was not publicly disclosed, so acquisition-specific titles are not presented as global grades.
• The peer-level mapping is an approximate functional guide, not an official cross-company leveling table.

Peer-level mapping

Office and market catalogue — calibration factors versus San Francisco

Autodesk reported roughly 85 offices and about 1.2 million square feet, but publishes no headcount by city or a classification of sites as delivery, offshore or client-facing. Office profiles are functional inferences from office, careers and job-pattern material. Bangalore, the Bay Area, Portland, Boston, Montreal/Toronto/Vancouver, London/Dublin, Singapore, Shanghai and Tel Aviv show recurring product, engineering, regional or corporate activity; Sydney and Melbourne are visibly important regional customer and sales markets. Auckland and Dubai are regional-coverage schema completions rather than directory offices.

Cross-market median total compensation (USD)

Median points converted at the 25 August 2026 FX snapshot. Modeled equivalent total compensation is roughly 0.22–0.23× San Francisco in India, 0.64–0.68× in Australia, 0.70–0.80× in Canada and 0.56–0.70× across selected UK/EU locations — nominal, before tax and purchasing-power adjustments.

United States — directly reported IC medians (Levels.fyi)

United States — directly reported management medians (Levels.fyi)

India — directly reported software-engineering medians (Levels.fyi, national)

• US Grade 8–15 and M1–M5 medians are Levels.fyi national observations; the Grade 11 base median is below Grade 10 and Grade 10's bonus is unusually small — crowd-sourced medians, not band boundaries.
• M5 components are a rounded planning anchor around the reported US total; the San Francisco Bay Area page separately reported about $359,001 total, $229,667 base, $82,667 stock and $46,667 bonus. M6 has a public title but insufficient direct observations.
• Levels.fyi reported an India software-engineer median of about ₹43.9L and a Grade 8–13 range of roughly ₹19.6L to ₹78.3L; the Bangalore/Pune split is not disclosed, so Pune cells are modeled at 95% of the India anchor.

Australia — role evidence, not a verified grade map (Glassdoor)

Glassdoor Australia evidence is sales-heavy and too sparse to assign roles cleanly to Grade 8–17 or M1–M6, so Sydney and Melbourne cells are modeled and calibrated so common engineering and customer roles fall within the observed role ranges where possible.

Official job-posting base ranges — validation layer

Official Autodesk postings state that compensation may also include annual cash bonuses, commissions, stock grants and benefits, so a posted base range is not total compensation and often spans several US geographic pay zones. Poland is not in the location selector.

FY2026 executive incentive targets — percent of salary

FY2026 named-executive outcomes

The compensation committee retained negative discretion. Attainment ratios are disclosed salary × target percentage versus disclosed non-equity incentive compensation; they do not reveal the employee-wide AIP payout. FY2025 PSU achievement for disclosed performance tranches ranged about 95%–108%, an equity-performance outcome rather than a cash-bonus payout.

• The amended 2022 plan states a maximum 43,750,000-share reserve subject to adjustments and counting rules; full-value awards generally reduce the reserve at 2.08 shares per share issued.
• The FY2026 10-K describes roughly 44 million shares reserved, about 22 million shares subject to awards granted and approximately 24 million shares available at 31 January 2026. Forfeitures, prior-plan roll-ins and the 2.08 counting ratio make a simple granted ÷ reserve utilization percentage misleading.
• The 10-K references a March 2032 plan expiration in one section while the amended legal plan states April 2035. The page flags the inconsistency rather than silently reconciling it.

FY2026 aggregate grant activity — 31 January 2026

Vesting — common reported employee schedule

The 10-K says RSUs generally vest over one to four years. Employee-reported Levels.fyi pages most commonly show a three-year schedule, usually one-third per year, with some records showing annual year-one vesting followed by quarterly vesting; a fourth year is permitted by the filing but is not universal. Executive FY2026 PSUs use a three-year performance period.

Eligibility by hierarchy level

• The FY2026 filing says employees are eligible to participate in long-term plans, but eligibility is not the same as receiving a grant: RSU, PSU, option and other awards remain discretionary under the 2022 Equity Incentive Plan.
• Grade 8–15 and M1–M5 annual values are annualized planning values from reported packages; Grade 16–17, M6, E1 and E2 are modeled. Plan-eligible under the 2022 Equity Incentive Plan; actual grant, value and refresh cadence are discretionary and controlled by the grant notice.
• E3–E4 values are proxy-disclosed grant-date stock awards, shown as a planning range. New-hire awards can cover multiple years, refresh grants can overlap, share counts change with the grant-date price, and executive values are accounting figures rather than realized proceeds.
• Reported India Grade 8–13 packages contain annualized stock, unlike employers that reserve equity for senior bands only; the values remain sample-based.

Indicative annual grant value by band — Bangalore

Annualized planning value (±25%), not the face value of every new-hire grant. Share equivalents use the $250.36 reference price at 25 August 2026 close and ignore plan valuation rules and PSU performance. Highlighted rows are proxy-disclosed grant-date stock awards.

Named executive FY2026 target equity

The Summary Compensation Table is an accounting disclosure: stock-award values are grant-date fair value, not cash realized, current vested value or sale proceeds. Rebecca Pearce (EVP, Chief People Officer) appears in the FY2026 target-equity and Form 4 disclosures with a $4.25M target equity award.

Board compensation framework — FY2026

Directors could elect to receive certain cash retainers in RSUs at $1.20 of stock value for each $1.00 of foregone cash, subject to the proxy terms. Individual director totals varied with service period, committee roles and election choices.

Not publicly disclosed

Modeled promotion planning timeline

Intervals are labor-market planning assumptions, not Autodesk policy. Advancement at senior IC and executive levels depends on role availability, enterprise scope and sustained impact; tenure alone does not create promotion eligibility. Do not hard-code a 1–5 rating scale.

Dataset summary

City-level H-1B wage history

All-years aggregates. P25/P75 are rounded reconstruction values marked modeled; medians and record counts are the stronger fields.

Selected 2025 title / worksite records

Evidence classification

Explicit “Not publicly disclosed” index

Known gaps and diligence before relying on a cell

1. 1Obtain an Autodesk offer letter or recruiter confirmation for every grade/location cell shown as modeled.
2. 2Confirm whether local salary quotations include statutory employer costs such as Australian superannuation or Indian PF/gratuity.
3. 3Confirm country-specific RSU eligibility, grant currency, vesting cadence, tax withholding and retirement treatment.
4. 4Confirm the actual annual review calendar, performance labels, calibration method and promotion-increase guidance.
5. 5Refresh FX and the Autodesk share price on the page's update date.
6. 6Reconcile the plan-expiration wording between the 10-K and the amended equity-plan exhibit with counsel or investor relations.
7. 7Validate H-1B city percentiles from raw LCA records before using them for compliance or offer-setting.

FX rates used — 1 USD equals, snapshot 2026-08-25

Single-date conversion layer for comparability; it ignores payroll-date FX, tax, purchasing power, benefits valuation and hedging. Compensation intelligence, not legal, tax, investment, immigration or employment advice.

Source register — 31 sources

No verified company-wide salary-hike percentage, pay-freeze announcement, campus-offer revision, delayed-joining policy or employee attrition figure was found for the report period. Two large workforce actions in 2025 and 2026 can alter role mix, headcount, hiring ranges and internal mobility without a publicly announced salary freeze.

Q1 FY2027 revenue by geography — $1.934B total, up 18%

Revenue geographies, not employee-headcount disclosures.