What should a founder be paid?
It sounds like a relatively simple question, but it’s surprisingly difficult to answer.
Founder remuneration sits in a slightly unusual place. Founders are employees, shareholders and often directors of the same business. Their pay needs to make sense for the company, its stage and its shareholders, while also recognising that founders still need to earn a salary.
The problem has always been knowing what “normal” actually looks like.
There’s plenty of salary data available for CEOs and executives, but far less visibility into what founders of New Zealand businesses are really paid. And when founder pay does get discussed, it tends to be based on anecdotes rather than actual market data.
That’s why LiveRem and Oxygen Advisors created the NZ Founder Pay Report.
We’ve now released the 2026 NZ Founder Pay Report, using real, anonymised payroll data to look at what founders across New Zealand are being paid and how that has changed over the past year. And there are some interesting shifts in this year’s numbers.
Founder pay is up 8%
Overall founder pay has increased 8% since last year.
After a few years where many founders have been incredibly conscious of cash, runway and the wider funding environment, it’s an interesting movement. But the overall increase only tells you so much.
Once you start breaking the data down by company size, location and gender, the picture becomes much more nuanced. The report looks at where founder salaries actually sit in 2026 and gives founders and boards a much better reference point for understanding whether remuneration is broadly in line with comparable businesses.
The founder gender pay gap is 30%
One number that is particularly hard to ignore is the gender pay gap. In 2026, the median difference between what male and female founders are paid sits at 30%. That’s a sizeable gap.
It also raises a much bigger question than simply what the average founder earns. As founder pay increases, who is benefiting from that movement and are male and female founders seeing the same changes?
We’ve broken the data down further in the report, including the actual remuneration figures behind the gap.
Auckland founders attract a premium
Location also makes a difference.
Our 2026 data shows founders in Auckland are paid a premium compared with founders elsewhere in New Zealand.
That might not be entirely surprising given Auckland’s labour market, concentration of larger businesses and higher cost of living. But seeing the difference in actual payroll data gives some useful context to remuneration conversations, particularly for founders and boards outside Auckland trying to work out which market they should be comparing themselves against.
The report looks at just how much of a difference location makes.
So what are founders actually paid?
The headline trends are interesting, but the real value is in seeing the actual salary benchmarks and understanding where you sit against them.
The 2026 Founder Pay Report, brought to you by LiveRem and Oxygen Advisors, looks at founder remuneration across New Zealand, including how pay changes by gender, location and company size.
If you’re a founder wondering how your remuneration compares, an investor looking across a portfolio or a board having a conversation about founder pay, it gives you real data to put behind that decision.
Founder pay is up 8%. The gender pay gap is 30%. Auckland founders attract a premium. But what are New Zealand founders actually paid?
Download the full report to access full insights
Curious how your pay compares? Download the full NZ Founders Pay Report 2026 to explore how founders at every stage are being compensated and why it matters for long-term success.
