How are Meta RSUs taxed at vesting and sale?
By Vaibhav Goel, registered financial advisor (SEC record) · Formerly a product director at DoorDash, ex-Google, ex-Microsoft · LinkedIn
Updated September 17, 2026
Twice, on two different things. The shares are wage income the day they vest, at that day’s price, and Meta withholds the tax in shares before the rest reach your account. Whatever the stock does afterward is a capital gain or loss when you sell. Holding for a year does not turn the original income into capital gains.
How the tax works
The IRS treats the vest as wage income and the later sale as a capital gain or loss against that basis.[11][13] With numbers:
Worked example / 100 shares
100 shares × $600
$60,000
Wage income the day it vests
Later sold at $660
$66,000
Sale proceeds before fees
$66,000 − $60,000
$6,000
Capital gain on that basis
Assumed prices for the arithmetic, not a forecast. Assumes all 100 shares are kept, and excludes withholding, fees, and basis adjustments.
What actually lands in your account
Meta’s agreement gives the committee five ways to collect the tax, and the one its 10-K shows at scale is share withholding: $18.40 billion of taxes paid on net share settlement of RSUs in 2025 alone.[2][1] The same 100 RSUs, followed through:
- 01
100 RSUs vest
$60,000 of wages at $600 a share, on your W-2.
- 02
22 shares withheld
If the flat 22% federal supplemental rate applies: $13,200. State income tax and payroll taxes take more on top.
- 03
78 shares before other withholding
Fewer arrive after state and payroll taxes. Each one you keep carries a $600 basis.
- 04
You may still owe
At a 35% or 37% bracket, 22% was a deposit, not the bill.
Illustration at the flat federal supplemental rate only, an optional method that applies up to $1 million of supplemental wages in a year, assuming the shares settle on the vest date; the agreement allows up to 30 days, and the value on your paystub is the one that counts.[12] The shares Meta withholds depend on the statutory rates where you work, and the agreement caps share withholding at the maximum statutory amount.[2]
Before a large vest: take your year-to-date paystub, expected remaining compensation, withholding elections, and last year’s return to whoever does your taxes. Raising payroll withholding on salary is usually easier than an estimated payment later.
Following the shares through your paperwork
Award statement
The grant, units settled, price used, shares withheld, and shares delivered. One per vest; keep them all.
Paystub and W-2
The vest is in Box 1 wages and the withheld shares are in the tax boxes, already run through payroll. Any dividend equivalent paid with the vest shows up here too, not on a dividend statement.
1099-B and supplement
Sale proceeds and the broker’s basis. Brokers may not add compensation income to the basis they report on awards granted after 2013, so the reported basis is often low or zero.
Form 8949
Where that basis is corrected with the supplement, so the $60,000 you were taxed on at vest is not taxed again as gain.
The broker basis rule is in the 1099-B and Form 8949 instructions.[22][25]
Two things specific to Meta
- The withholding method is Meta’s choice, not yours. Cash from you, withholding from wages, withholding shares, withholding from the proceeds of a sale the company arranges, or another arrangement it approves — all at the committee’s direction.[2] Which one applies to your vest determines whether cash ever passes through your hands.
- Dividend equivalents arrive with the vest. The cash on an unvested RSU is settled within 60 days of the vest it attaches to, under the award, not as a dividend on stock you owned.[2] Compensation is taxed when you receive it, so check how the paystub reported it before assuming dividend treatment.[11]
Sources for this section
A common question
Does waiting a year to sell eliminate the income tax on RSUs?
No. The share value is wage income the day it vests. Holding longer only changes how the gain or loss after that day is treated, not the original income.
Connect this to your wider plan
Meet your financial advisor
Simple Money Advisors LLC is a California state-registered investment adviser.
Vaibhav Goel
Co-founder of Simple Money · Registered financial advisor · SEC record
Investment adviser representative, registered with the State of California.
Vaibhav spent fifteen years building products at Google, DoorDash and Microsoft before becoming a licensed advisor. He works with people in tech on the whole picture, equity, taxes, investments and cash flow, as one plan rather than four.
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