What happens to your RSUs when you move abroad

By Skyler Bissell · July 6, 2026 · 5 min read

If you work in US tech, a large slice of your pay is probably stock. It's also the slice most likely to disappear the day you take a job in another country. People plan the move around their total comp and forget that a chunk of that comp is bolted to an employer and a country they're about to leave.

Here's what actually happens to the equity, and how to stop it from skewing your decision.

The number nobody budgets for

Picture a senior engineer on $400,000 total comp: maybe $200,000 base and bonus, and $200,000 a year in vesting RSUs. The instinct is to compare that whole $400,000 against a European offer and recoil. Of course Amsterdam looks like a pay cut. You're comparing it against $200,000 of stock you won't be keeping.

Equity is a retention tool. It pays you to stay where you are. The moment you leave for a new employer in a new country, the unvested grants stop, and what you carry over is whatever the new role offers, which in Europe is typically a stronger base and a much smaller equity component. The comp shape changes, not just the size.

Two situations, two answers

New employer abroad. The clean case. Your old grants stop vesting when you resign (you keep whatever already vested, minus tax). Your comparison should use the new company's actual offer, base plus whatever local equity comes with it. Pretending your old $200k stock stream continues is the single most common way people talk themselves out of a move that actually pencils.

Same company, internal transfer. Messier. Your grants often keep vesting through the move, which sounds great until tax shows up. Stock that vests after you relocate gets split between the two countries based on where you physically worked during the vesting period (the workday allocation). You can owe US tax on part of it and local tax on the rest, sometimes in the same year, with treaty relief to sort out the overlap. It is very doable and very much a thing to hand to a cross-border accountant before you sign, not after.

(That second case is also where "your real take-home" gets genuinely hard, and where generic calculators are useless. This is not tax advice. It's a flag to get real advice on the equity specifically.)

How to do the math without fooling yourself

The honest version is simple to state. Model the city you're leaving on your full current comp, and model the city you're moving to on what you'd actually earn there. If the new role is base-heavy with token equity, put that in, not a copy of your US stock.

That's exactly how we built it. When you set a target city, the engine zeros out source-side equity rather than carrying your US RSU income across, because that income doesn't follow you to a new employer. It keeps the comparison from flattering the move with stock you wouldn't get. If you're doing an internal transfer that does keep vesting, add the equity you actually expect on the target side and treat the tax as the open question it is.

Either way, the equity question sits inside the bigger one: what's the European salary that leaves you whole? We walk through that in the salary you'd actually need to move abroad, and the related question of whether engineers come out ahead in Europe at all. The tax breaks that can move your target number get their own breakdown in expat tax breaks, decoded.

FAQ

Do my RSUs transfer if I move to another company abroad?

No. Unvested RSUs are forfeited when you leave the employer. You keep what already vested. The new company abroad pays its own package.

What if I transfer within the same company?

Grants usually keep vesting, but the income gets allocated between countries by where you worked during the vesting period, and both may tax their share. Get a cross-border tax accountant before you commit.

How should I compare offers, then?

Use your current total comp for where you are now, and the target employer's actual offer for where you'd go. Don't assume your US equity continues into the new role.

Compare your real numbers in the calculator →

This is general information, not tax advice. Cross-border equity taxation depends on your specific grants, treaty, and workdays; talk to a cross-border accountant before you sign. See the methodology.