CEO pay rose in 2025 as the worker pay gap widened, data show
C-Suite Comp said median CEO compensation climbed 13% without Elon Musk, while the median CEO-to-worker pay ratio reached 99-to-1.
By Hana Yoshida · Markets Reporter
3 min read
Chief executive pay increased again in fiscal 2025, and the gap between CEOs and employees widened for a third straight year, according to compensation data from C-Suite Comp. The findings add to investor scrutiny of equity-heavy awards that can lift executive pay far above worker earnings.
C-Suite Comp, which tracks pay at about 3,700 public companies, said Elon Musk topped its annual executive compensation rankings with a $158.4 billion Tesla stock award. Fortune reported that the award was reinstated by the Delaware Supreme Court after years of litigation.
The Tesla award was so large that C-Suite Comp excluded Musk as an outlier when calculating broader pay trends. Without him, median CEO total compensation rose 13% from a year earlier to $4.75 million, while average CEO compensation increased 26% to $8.96 million, according to the firm.
C-Suite Comp said the CEO-to-worker pay ratio also kept rising. The median ratio reached 99-to-1 in 2025, up from 92-to-1 in 2024, 85-to-1 in 2023 and 84-to-1 in 2022. The average ratio rose to 216-to-1 from 175-to-1 a year earlier.
Stock awards dominated the top of the list
After Musk, the highest-paid CEOs in the dataset received packages driven mainly by stock or options. C-Suite Comp said Figma CEO Dylan Field ranked second with $864.4 million in total compensation, including $861.9 million in stock awards.
Welltower CEO Shankh Mitra followed with $821.1 million, including $813.2 million in stock. Opendoor Technologies CEO Kaz Nejatian ranked fourth with $741.1 million, all of it in stock awards, while Rivian CEO Robert Scaringe placed fifth with $402.6 million, mostly in option awards.
By sector, C-Suite Comp said technology paid CEOs the most, led by Field’s package at Figma. Real estate ranked second, with Mitra at Welltower as its top earner. In health care, Summit Therapeutics co-CEO Mahkam Zanganeh led the sector with $246 million, including an option award modification disclosed in company filings, according to the firm.
Tesla posted the widest pay ratio
C-Suite Comp said Tesla had the largest CEO-to-worker pay ratio in the dataset at 2,522,203-to-1, based on a median Tesla worker salary of $62,786. Liberty Broadband’s Martin Patterson ranked second by that measure at 36,194-to-1, with total compensation of $1.2 million and median employee pay of $33.
Nejatian at Opendoor ranked fourth on the ratio list at 7,581-to-1, measured against median employee pay of $97,759, according to C-Suite Comp. Warren Buffett warned in his final Berkshire Hathaway shareholder letter that executives are becoming more influenced by peer pay levels, Fortune reported.
Other C-suite roles split
Chief financial officers also saw higher pay, according to C-Suite Comp. Median CFO compensation at S&P 500 companies reached $5.94 million, up 3.1%, while the Russell 3000 median rose 6.7% to $2.66 million. Across the overall CFO market, median pay climbed 10.6% to $1.94 million.
Summit Therapeutics executive Manmeet Soni, who serves as both COO and CFO, led CFOs with $249.1 million in option awards. C-Suite Comp said Welltower CFO Timothy McHugh followed at $167 million, and Fermi Inc. CFO Miles Everson ranked third at $134.2 million.
Technology chiefs moved higher, while information chiefs fell. C-Suite Comp said median CTO pay in the technology sector rose 10% to $2.59 million and average pay climbed 32% to $4.88 million. Median CIO pay dropped 7.3% to $1.34 million, and average CIO pay fell 19% to $2.13 million.
This story draws on original reporting from Fortune.