Bonuses, bonuses, and more bonuses! Yet another Biglaw firm has stepped into the 2025 bonus arena, rolling out its year-end awards. While the market continues to wait for a leader — cough, Milbank, cough — to break from the pack with something splashier, this latest announcement shows that firms are still jockeying for position by offering bigger and better bonuses to their highest billers.
Ropes & Gray — a firm that brought in $3,416,636,000 gross revenue in 2024, putting it at No. 7 on the most recent Am Law 100 — has announced a Cravath match for year-end bonuses for those who have met 1900 creditable hours, and a Milbank match for special bonuses.
This is what the firm’s bonus scales look like (note that for the Class of 2017 and beyond, Ropes is offering associates $15,000 in additional bonus money):
- Class of 2025 – $15,000 / $6,000 (prorated)
- Class of 2024 – $20,000 / $6,000
- Class of 2023 – $30,000 / $10,000
- Class of 2022 – $57,500 / $15,000
- Class of 2021 – $75,000 / $20,000
- Class of 2020 – $90,000 / $25,000
- Class of 2019 – $105,000 / $25,000
- Class of 2018 – $115,000 / $25,000
- Class of 2017+ – $130,000 / $25,000
In addition to matching both the year-end and the special bonus scales, the firm is offering bonuses that “may be increased up to 150% of the year-end bonus amounts” for those who have billed “materially more” than their 1900-hour billable expectation.
Congratulations to everyone at Ropes & Gray!
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Staci Zaretsky is the managing editor of Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Bluesky, X/Twitter, and Threads, or connect with her on Lin
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