Founder Salary Report 2023

Funding

Average funding amounts increased +48% to $12M (excluding one outlier of $1.1BN) up from $8.1M in 2022. It's a similar story to the trends we saw in overall salaries, while the average fundraising amount has increased YoY for those that have raised, the incidence of founders bootstrapping their startups has increased +180% from 4.5% of respondents in 2022 compared to 11.5% in 2023.

Bootstrapped vs. VC-Backed Salaries Breakdown

Founders who are VC-backed are more likely to have higher salaries compared to their bootstrapped counterparts. Of the founders who paid themselves between $100K and $200K annually, on average, 93% of them were VC-backed while only 4% were bootstrapped.

Nearly 70% of bootstrapped founders pay themselves between $1-$100K annually, while 54% of VC-backed founders pay themselves between $50K and $150K a year.

$0

29%

4%

$1-$49K

13%

6%

$50K-$99K

26%

25%

$100K-$149K

9%

29%

$150K-$199K

8%

21%

$200K-$249K

5%

9%

$250K-$299K

3%

4%

$300K+

8%

2%

Bootstrapped companies were defined as those with no funding, while VC-backed salaries are defined as those with some investor capital.