AIA Small Firm Compensation Report price, what $98 buys and which architecture firms it fits
The AIA Small Firm Compensation & Benefits Report 2025 costs $98, or $58.80 for AIA members after the 40 percent member discount. It covers only sole proprietors and firms with fewer than three architectural staff, drawing on 405 firms and 994 full-time employees. Firms with three or more architectural staff belong in the main $450 AIA report instead.
Hiring your first employee?
Price the role in under a minute with a band and a postable range, from this year's federal data.
For a one- or two-architect practice, $98 is the cheapest employer-reported pay data in the profession, and it is the only survey that deliberately leaves the big offices out. That is its whole value. It is also a report most small firms buy at the wrong moment: when they are about to hire the person who pushes them out of its scope. Below is what the price gets you, how it compares with the other AIA editions, and three firms working out which one to buy.
What the $98 buys
One PDF, national, with compensation tables for six roles at small firms, plus benefits, professional development and workplace practice data. AIA's own figures for the 2025 edition:
| Price | $98 list, $58.80 for AIA members |
|---|---|
| Who is in it | Sole proprietors and firms with fewer than three architectural staff |
| Sample | 405 firms, 994 full-time staff |
| Roles with pay tables | Six |
| Released | February 24, 2026, from the spring 2025 survey |
| Cadence | Every two years, next edition 2027 |
| Editions | One. No regional, metro or Excel versions |
The headline findings AIA published are worth knowing before you pay. Staff architects and emerging professionals at small firms saw average compensation rise 4.4 percent from 2023 to 2025. Leaders at small firms saw their pay fall over the same period, which AIA ties to softer billings and backlogs. And 55 percent of small firms with five or more employees hired at least one architecture student for part-time work in 2024. AIA also counts small firms as 74 percent of all architecture businesses, which is why the report exists at all.
The small firm report against the other AIA editions
| Edition | List | Member | Built from |
|---|---|---|---|
| Small firm report | $98 | $58.80 | 405 firms under three architectural staff |
| One regional report | $265 | $159 | One of nine regions of the main survey |
| Top metro areas report | $295 | $177 | 12 largest metros of the main survey |
| Full national report | $450 | $270 | 817 firms, 13,227 positions, 45 roles |
| Full report + Excel tables | $520 | $312 | Same, with spreadsheets |
| Full report + benchmark tool | $550 | $330 | Same, with an online filter tool |
Every edition of the main report, and the small firm report, is also free to a firm that completes the AIA compensation survey when invited, so the cheapest route of all is to answer the 2027 survey. The full breakdown of the main report, with the regional arithmetic and federal pay for six architecture roles, is on our architecture salary survey page.
The cut-off problem at three architects
The small firm report stops at fewer than three architectural staff. That line matters more than the price, because the moment a small firm usually needs pay data is the moment it hires, and hiring the third architect is exactly what moves it into the other report's population. Six roles also cover far less than the 45 in the main report, so a two-architect firm hiring its first interior designer or project manager may find the role is not in the small firm tables at all.
So the question is not "which report is cheaper" but "which market am I about to compete in". A candidate for your third architect position is also interviewing at 20-person and 60-person firms. Their pay is in the main report, not the small firm one.
Three firms, three orders
A sole practitioner in Denver hiring a first drafter. The small firm report at $98 is the right comparison for what similar practices pay. But Colorado's pay transparency law applies to any employer with even one employee in the state, so the posting itself needs a good faith range. The May 2025 federal middle half for architectural and civil drafters at design firms is $55,640 to $80,760 nationally, which gives a defensible starting shape to adjust for Denver. The rules are on our Colorado pay transparency page.
A two-architect firm in Atlanta hiring a third architect. Skip the small firm report. Buy the South Atlantic regional report at $265, or $159 as a member, because the candidate's alternatives are larger Atlanta firms. If the firm expects to hire remotely outside the Southeast, the full $450 report is the better buy, since two regional reports would cost $530.
A two-architect firm in Brooklyn with four non-architectural staff. It is still inside the small firm scope, because the cut-off counts architectural staff. The $98 report fits its architects. For the office manager and the bookkeeper, no architecture survey is the right peer group; those roles are priced against every employer in New York. New York's law applies once an employer has four or more employees, so every one of those postings needs a range too.
What to price yourself, and what the report cannot tell you
Small firm owners often buy the report to answer a different question: what should I pay myself? The report's finding that leader pay fell from 2023 to 2025 is useful context, but a principal's pay at a two-person firm is as much a return on the business as a salary. If you are setting your own pay because a partner is joining or you are thinking about selling the practice, it helps to estimate what the firm itself is worth before you settle the number, and if the practice is an S corporation, the salary side has its own rules, covered on S corp reasonable salary.
The report also cannot tell you anything about 2026. It describes spring 2025. A small firm hiring now can age those figures forward by a stated rate, or pair them with the latest federal release, which comes out every spring. That pairing is what WageList does: pick the role and the metro and you get a band and a range you can paste into the job ad, from current federal data, with the source and date attached. Plans are on the pricing page, from $99 a month or $588 a year, and if you are setting ranges for the first time, how to create salary bands walks through the method.
Is the AIA Small Firm Compensation Report worth $98?
Yes, for a firm under three architects that is hiring or reviewing pay for a role in its six tables. It is the only data built from firms that size, and at $58.80 for members it costs less than an hour of most principals' billing rate. It is not worth buying if you are about to hire your third architect, if the role is not an architecture role, or if you need a number for a job ad next week and the figures are already a year and a half old. In those cases the main report, a regional edition or a current federal band is the better tool.
Sources: AIA Design Shop product pages for the AIA Small Firm Compensation & Benefits Report 2025 and the AIA Compensation & Benefits Report 2025 (read 30 September 2026); AIA resource center and press release of February 24, 2026; BLS OEWS May 2025 national industry estimates. Confirm current pricing with AIA directly.