The r/biglaw trends worrying lawyers

Norma Harris

Law firms love glossy annual reports full of “strategic realignments,” “market headwinds,” and whatever other euphemism the managing partner’s ghost-writer cooked up.

Reddit’s legal communities, by contrast, tell you what’s actually happening and we wanted to know.

r/biglaw, r/LawSchool, and the lawyer-adjacent subs have become a running diagnostic of the profession: pay anxiety, job instability, hiring chaos, AI confusion, and the creeping suspicion that the whole pipeline from 1L to partnership is held together by duct tape and caffeine.

Below is a breakdown of the six biggest, most-discussed Reddit threads of the past few months that are perfect for LawFuel expansion pieces.
Direct quote slots are included. Insert the lawyerly misery later.

1. Cravath’s 2025 Bonus Bomb

The thread: “Cravath Doles Out Generous Associate Bonuses”

This was Reddit’s legal Super Bowl. Every year, someone in r/biglaw posts the Cravath scale and everyone else reacts like the financial markets just opened. We’ve been reporting the Cravath Scale for years but at the Reddit coalface we get some additional info about what associates and others think.

Why this blew up

• The bonuses were large even by Cravath’s standards and the immediate interest in just how the firms would match the payouts, ranging from $15000 to $115,000.
• Junior lawyers compared hours to dollars in a kind of existential spreadsheet therapy.

Reddit reactions:

$190k/1600 billable – worth it?

I’m a fourth year currently drowning at work and looking for a way out. 2000+ hours suck generally but I also have kids so this really isn’t sustainable. I’m looking at an opportunity to join a small firm with a 1600 hours requirement for $190k and a $40k bonus. Does 1600 offer some semblance of work life balance? And is it worth the pay cut? Supposedly people really do work 1600 hours.

BigLaw turned me into a worse person

I am still relatively young (under 28) but a couple of years into this job has significantly worsened me as a person. The constant – often unwarranted when considered in the grand scheme of things – anxiety has prompted me to get angry too easily and the urge to mechanically check my phone every 2 minutes likewise ruined any semblance of normalcy.

I did not realise the nefarious nature of these somehow subtle changes until my girlfriend – whom I loved so dearly – broke up with me last week. It may be too late for me, but please remind yourself to break the fourth wall and prioritise what really matters before it is too late. Because it is definitely not worth it.

Where We take it – See here

• You can see the Above the Law’s bonus reporting and Bloomberg Law’s comp charts.
• Contrast with Magic Circle reporrts who tend to treat bonuses like dirty secrets.
• The historic Cravath scale table shows:

2. The Milbank/Cravath Salary-Scale Panic

The thread: “Milbank/Cravath scale raise”

In classic Reddit fashion, one anonymous Fishbowl screenshot triggered a chain reaction of hope, denial, and rage ove the whole salary scale and who was paying what.

What the discussion centred on

• Whether Milbank is about to kick off another salary-scale war that will affect everyone – for better or for worse.
• Whether firms can afford it in a down-market situation but where competitors keep upping the ante.
• What happens to hours expectations if salaries go up?

Reddit reactions:

Fishbowl says Milbank will increase the scale but I can’t tell if it’s a joke

No one who actually knows anything would be posting it on Fishbowl. It’s just rumormill gossip or troll posting.

That being said, it has been a few years since a scale increase, so a small inflation adjustment would not be shocking this year. And I believe that Vault surveys are happening on an earlier timeline than previously.

23 hours in one day is insane! Did they not think billing inflation would be flagged lol

Yeah I’ve done 22 hours in one day and several 20 hour days. Could have done 24 (partners probably wanted me to do 24) but I decided I should eat and shower that day.

Salary Growth

The growth in big law salaries has continued unabated, but as we have argued, how long can it continue?

The economics of biglaw salary inflation continue to create issues and private equity-backed clients are resisting the endless fee incrreases.

There is also a widening gulf between US and other law firm compensation models, as evidenced now by the new pay structure for the Coie-Ashurst law firm model.

Times are changing and law firm compensation is going to need to change also.

3. No-Offer Summers and the Collapse of the “Golden Ticket”

The thread: “No-offer summers of 2025 – why?”

This one was enormous. If the Cravath bonus thread is about money, the no-offer summer thread is about survival.

Themes:

• Overhiring during the 2021–22 boom finally catching up.
• Groups with no work quietly bleeding juniors.
• Students realising that a summer clerkship is no longer a guaranteed offer.

Reddit reactions:

No Offered Summer Associate… What is next?

Just got a no offer from my summer AmLaw 100 firm yesterday. While I may not have been the best summer associate, I always worked hard and never made a fool of myself so it definitely stings. Unfortunately, I have no lawyers in my life and my schools career services suck. I am not dead set on BigLaw and actually looking forward to exploring other options. Any tips about other opportunities I should look into and the timeline of such would be appreciated. (No need to leave pity comments, what’s done is done).

Summer Associate 🚩🚩🚩

Preface: I know being an attorney means I will almost never have another weekend where I “Slam laptop shut until Monday”. I’m okay with that.

But do y’all think it’s a red flag for a firm to give summer associates work over the weekend?? I got slammed yesterday with 3 assignments due Monday and not that either are hard or take much time, but it’s kind of giving me the ick. Are a lot of you rising 3Ls having the same experience so this is normal, or just me?

Why the reduced offers in 2025

Deal flow hasn’t recovered from 2022, meaning unproductive groups are being quietly thinned. AI is also having its effect in multiple areas and cutting the low-level grunt work faster than firms will admit. The result is partners are seeking flexibility without going down the ‘layoff’ route.

4. The Silent Layoff Debate

The thread: “Summer 2025 layoffs”

This thread wove together multiple worried posts from associates noticing what had been happening with softly-softly retrenchment.

Reddit reactions:

Summer Associate Confused About the Vibe

I came into the summer excited about big law. I thought I had a strong start, and I’ve been giving it my best. But now that we’re a chunk of the way in, the vibe feels off. The honeymoon phase might be wearing off (or again, maybe I’m just sleep deprived) but either way I’m feeling more and more confused.

Law Firm Silent Panic

The fact is that despite outward confidence, there is also signs that some law firms are displaying inward panic. Stealth layoffs, or ‘quiet cutting’ have occurrrred in both the US and the UK law markets.

The summer layoff issue may in fact be a tidy microcosm of 2025 BigLaw reality.

5. The “One Semester Determines Your Future” Meltdown

The thread: “Whole career balanced on one semester of grades lol”

Every few months this pops up, goes nuclear, and reminds everyone that US legal hiring is held together by a Victorian caste system.

Recruiters run early OCI because BigLaw is terrified of missing out on the top students, even if those students barely know the difference between torts and toast. Firms push timelines earlier each year to lock talent before rivals do, but Reddit’s law students say the system is brutal: one shaky semester can permanently tank a career before it even begins.

Reddit reactions:

Big Law Interviews

 Firms are in a race to the bottom to get recruits earlier and earlier. I think besides NALP the other big driving force is the fact that Texas has become such an important BigLaw market over the past decade, because historically 1L recruiting was more common in Texas but not elsewhere, and as all the big national firms have grown in Texas they’ve had to adapt recruiting there to compete, and are now exporting those Texas practices to all the other offices.

Big Law Hiring is Insane

The screener canceled 1 minute after it started. Rescheduled to next day. Partner showed up 10 minutes late for a 20-minute screener, but was nice enough. Got the callback cool. A callback was scheduled. 1 week before the callback, was informed 1L hiring was full, but they’d like to interview me for 2L positions and to keep the callback. I don’t even have a 1L job yet.

Takeaway Box: What Reddit’s Lawyers Are REALLY Worried About

The Five Themes Running Through Every Thread

So what can we learn about all this Reddit chat? Essentially the issues are the sort of thing we report here constantly but for law associates the cutting edge of compensation, interviews and promotions can be – well, bloody.

Here are key themes –

1. Compensation instability
   The bonuses are big; the workloads are bigger. Associates feel overpaid and under-valued simultaneously, which is not a grreat place to be.
2. Job security (or lack of it)
   Stealth layoffs, no-offer summers, and under-utilisation are the quiet soundtrack of 2025 and look set to continue into 2026.
3. A broken pipeline
   Law school to bar to BigLaw now feels like a lottery with academic landmines.
4. AI anxiety
   Junior work is evaporating faster than firms are willing to admit and the need to adapt to the onset is a key factor for associates and others – quite apart from law firm management.
5. Mental health & burnout
   Behind the dark humour is a profession stretched to snapping point with the mental health issues being a sad constant.