Satya Nadella tops tech CEO pay rankings for 2025

Business Dec 16, 2025

Microsoft's Satya Nadella just became the highest-paid tech CEO of 2025, taking home $96.5 million—his biggest payday since becoming CEO in 2014.
Most of that came from stock awards, while his base salary was $2.5 million.

Why the big paycheck?

Microsoft's board credited Nadella's pay to major progress in artificial intelligence, positioning Microsoft as a leader in artificial intelligence.
Other top CEOs also saw big numbers: Apple's Tim Cook earned $74.6 million, NVIDIA's Jensen Huang made $49.9 million after his first raise in a decade, Alphabet's Sundar Pichai took home $10.74 million in 2024, and Meta's Mark Zuckerberg stuck with his symbolic $1 salary.