Microsoft Corporation 401(k): Fidelity, match 50% of contributions
Microsoft Corporation Savings Plus 401(k) Plan · MSFT · CIK 789019
Fidelity Investments is the recordkeeper named on the Form 5500 filed for this plan, the company that keeps the account records. Where to log in, and what the filing says.
The 401(k) employer match
Stated as a rate, not as a ceiling
Microsoft Corporation matches 50% of contributions (matched-pay ceiling not stated in the filing).
Microsoft filed three Form 11-K reports for plan year 2025, of which one has been read. The other two reports have not, so this page cannot say what the plans they cover pay.
From the Form 11-K filed June 25, 2026 ↗, covering the plan year ended December 31, 2025. Page data last updated July 28, 2026, when the Form 5500 bulk data was last refreshed. Why filings lag
On this page: what the employer actually paid in · the formula, word for word · when the money becomes yours · who can join · who holds your account · what the plan reports to the DOL · how it compares · what to do next
What Microsoft puts in, and what the plan costs
What Microsoft put into the plan, per active participant
$9,360
Microsoft Corporation put $9,360 into this plan for each of its 123,878 active participants in plan year 2024. This is the whole employer side of the plan: matching money, profit sharing, non-elective and safe-harbor contributions, and reallocated forfeitures. The Form 5500 does not separate them, so this is what the employer put in and not the match.
Microsoft put in more per active participant than 93% of plans with 5,000+ participants in software and IT services. The middle plan in that group of 62 reported $4,620. Software and IT services comes from business code 511210, which Microsoft entered on its own Form 5500. Sponsors pick that code themselves, so a code that does not describe what the employer does ranks the plan against the wrong companies.
What this figure cannot separate: how much Microsoft pays, and how much it puts in
This is dollars, not a rate. A Form 5500 carries no payroll, so the figure reflects both how much the employer puts in and how much the employer pays: two plans running the same formula report different amounts when one pays better. Crossing the peer group with industry holds most of that difference still, and none of it disappears.
This is one plan year, not an average. A true-up, a plan merger or a one-off contribution moves a single year on its own.
Source: DOL Form 5500 for the plan year ended December 31, 2024, EIN 911144442, plan 001 · DOL EFAST2 ↗
What Microsoft puts in
Not stated in the filing
Only part of the match formula is disclosed in the filing, so the yearly dollars cannot be computed from it.
The Form 5500 for this plan reports what Microsoft actually paid in: the figure and its peer comparison are above. It is the whole employer side of the plan on one line, so it answers what went in rather than what the formula promises.
Two places state the terms in full: your plan’s Summary Plan Description, which your employer must provide on request, and your recordkeeper’s site, which for this plan is Fidelity NetBenefits ↗.
What you contribute to collect all of it
Not stated in the filing
The filing does not state the contribution rate that collects the full employer contribution.
Vesting score
100 out of 100
How fast the employer’s money becomes yours. Higher than 48% of the 369 schedules we have scored.
It measures vesting speed and nothing else. It says nothing about the size of the match, what the plan charges, or the funds inside it.
Share of the employer's money that is the worker's at hire and at each of the first 6 anniversaries: 100%, 100%, 100%, 100%, 100%, 100%, 100%. The score is the average of those 7 readings.
Vesting, word for word
“Participants are fully vested in Plan accounts at all times.”
The wait before the match starts and the year-end true-up appear above when the filing states them. Neither is part of the score, and a filing that is silent on one of them is not a plan without it.
What the plan costs, against plans of its size
96th percentile
$181.82 per participant in plan-paid administrative cost, more expensive than 96% of plans with 5,000+ participants.
What is Microsoft's 401(k) match formula?
Microsoft's filing does not state a maximum 401(k) employer match. One rate up to one limit is the commonest of the four shapes a match formula takes.
| Match formula | 50% of contributions (matched-pay ceiling not stated in the filing) |
|---|---|
| Conditions | Match applies to eligible pre-tax and/or Roth contributions and is provided for up to 50 percent of the maximum annual 401(k) pre-tax and Roth IRS contribution limit (not including catch-up contributions), a dollar cap rather than a percent-of-compensation cap; participants of inXile Entertainment and Double Fine Productions instead receive $0.25 per $1.00 contributed, up to 25 percent of that IRS limit; after-tax contributions are not matched |
What the filing says, word for word
“The Company and all other participating employers excluding inXile and Double Fine provide participants with a matching contribution on eligible pre-tax and/or Roth contributions of $0.50 for every $1.00 contributed. For inXile and Double Fine, the participating employer provides participants with a matching contribution on eligible pre-tax and/or Roth contributions of $0.25 for every $1.00 contributed. The matching contribution is provided for up to 50 percent, or 25 percent for inXile and Double Fine, of the maximum annual 401(k) pre-tax and Roth Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”) contribution limit (not including catch-up contributions). Participants do not receive a match on after-tax contributions.”
Source: Form 11-K filed June 25, 2026, SEC EDGAR, corroborated by the filing's inline-XBRL facts · SEC ↗
What is Microsoft's 401(k) vesting schedule?
Microsoft vests the employer match immediately: 100% is yours as soon as it is paid in. Nothing is forfeited when you leave, which is not true of the two schedules that vest over time.
| Employer match vesting | Immediate: employer match is 100% vested when contributed |
|---|---|
| Your own contributions | Immediate: always 100% yours |
Vesting, word for word
“Participants are fully vested in Plan accounts at all times.”
Source: Form 11-K filed June 25, 2026, SEC EDGAR · SEC ↗
Who can join Microsoft's 401(k), and is enrollment automatic?
Microsoft's filing does not mention automatic enrollment, which is not the same as the plan having none.
| Plan entry | Regular and retail services employees on U.S. payroll who have reached age 18 may enroll at any time |
|---|---|
| Automatic enrollment | Not mentioned in the filing (not proof of absence) |
Eligibility, word for word
“Regular and retail services employees of participating employers who are on U.S. payroll and have reached age 18 may enroll in the Plan at any time.”
Source: Form 11-K filed June 25, 2026, SEC EDGAR · SEC ↗
Who holds your account
Schedule C of the Form 5500 filed for plan year 2024 reports Fidelity Investments, filed as “FIDELITY INVESTMENTS INSTITUTIONAL”. That is the company paid to keep the account records: what is in an account, what went into it, and usually the site a participant signs in to. The trustee that holds the plan’s assets can be a different company, and this filing does not name it.
10,593 plans on file name Fidelity Investments as their recordkeeper. Of those, the 10,022 with a computable fee have a median plan-paid cost of $97.71 per participant.
Participants log in at Fidelity NetBenefits ↗. 401(k) Monitor is not affiliated with Fidelity Investments or with any other recordkeeper, and takes nothing for this link. It is here because that is where the account is.
| Recordkeeper | Fidelity Investments |
|---|---|
| Recordkeeper EIN | 042647786 |
What does the Microsoft plan report on Form 5500?
The Microsoft plan reported $65.6B in assets and 177,531 participants for plan year 2024.
| Total plan assets | $65,646,011,638 |
|---|---|
| Participants | 177,531 |
| Plan-paid admin cost per participant | $181.82 |
How that cost compares
This plan pays $181.82 per participant. The median across plans in software and IT services is $125.69, from the 2,819 of 2,956 whose Form 5500 yields a per-participant cost.
How does Microsoft's 401(k) match compare?
Microsoft Corporation's filing does not state a maximum 401(k) match as a share of pay. Across the 269 companies in our data that do, the median is 4% of pay.
Employers worth reading next
Of the six employers below, three file in software and IT services, two report the same recordkeeper and one vests on the same schedule.
No employer match in the filing. Also in software and IT services.
Maximum match 4% of pay. Also in software and IT services.
Maximum match 4% of pay. Also in software and IT services.
Employer match vests immediately. Same recordkeeper, Fidelity Investments.
Match formula not disclosed in the filing. Same recordkeeper, Fidelity Investments.
Maximum match 4.5% of pay. Vests immediately too, like Microsoft.
Compare Microsoft Corporation with any company, side by side
What can you do next?
- Read the Form 11-K on SEC EDGAR ↗
Form 11-K filed June 25, 2026, SEC EDGAR. Every match fact on this page comes from it.
- Changed jobs? Find an old 401(k) ↗
The Department of Labor's Retirement Savings Lost & Found, a free government database.
- This year's IRS contribution limits ↗
The official deferral and catch-up limits every formula operates under.
Questions this filing answers
What is Microsoft Corporation's 401(k) match?
Microsoft Corporation discloses its match formula in the 11-K for the plan year ended December 31, 2025. Microsoft Corporation's Form 5500 for plan year 2024 reports $9,360 of employer money per active participant. This is the whole employer side of the plan: matching money, profit sharing, non-elective and safe-harbor contributions, and reallocated forfeitures. The Form 5500 does not separate them, so this is what the employer put in and not the match.
When does the Microsoft Corporation 401(k) match vest?
Immediate: employer match is 100% vested when contributed.
Does Microsoft Corporation's 401(k) plan have automatic enrollment?
Not mentioned in the filing (not proof of absence).
Who is the recordkeeper for Microsoft Corporation's 401(k)?
Fidelity Investments is named as the recordkeeper on the Form 5500 filed for Microsoft Corporation Savings Plus 401(k) Plan for plan year 2024. That is the company paid to keep the account records: what is in an account, what went into it, and usually the site a participant signs in to.
Source
The match formula, the vesting schedule and the enrollment rules on this page were read from one document: the Form 11-K annual report that Microsoft Corporation filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission for the plan year ended December 31, 2025. Each of those fields carries the filing sentence it was read from, expandable where the field appears. Nothing on this page was supplied by the employer to this site.
The plan assets, the participant counts, the plan-paid fees and the recordkeeper come from a different document, the plan’s DOL Form 5500 annual return, and the section that reports them links it. Comparisons with other employers are computed across the filings named in the section they appear in.
Read the filing on SEC EDGAR ↗
| Document | Form 11-K annual report |
|---|---|
| Filed with | US Securities and Exchange Commission (EDGAR) |
| Filed by | Microsoft Corporation |
| SEC CIK | 789019 |
| Accession number | 0001193125-26-282773 |
| Plan | Microsoft Corporation Savings Plus 401(k) Plan |
| Period of report | December 31, 2025 |
| Filed | June 25, 2026 |
401(k) Monitor is not affiliated with Microsoft Corporation, with the Securities and Exchange Commission or with this plan’s recordkeeper, and publishes this page without their involvement. It republishes a public filing and says where it came from.
Cite this page
401(k) Monitor, “Microsoft Corporation 401(k) plan facts”, from SEC Form 11-K accession 0001193125-26-282773, plan year ended December 31, 2025.
