What are your salary expectations? How to answer on the form and the call
'How to answer "what are your salary expectations" on an application form and a recruiter screen, with scripts, the state laws that apply, and a count of 243 real application forms.'
"What are your salary expectations?" usually arrives before you know much about the job. It sits in a required box on the application form, or it's the third question on a 20-minute recruiter call. Either way you are asked for a number at the point where you have the least information.
This guide covers that early moment: the form field and the first screen. We counted how often real application forms ask, read the state laws that decide what an employer may ask, and wrote a script for each situation. Negotiating the offer itself comes later, and has its own guide.
How often application forms ask, and what they already tell you
Most advice assumes the desired salary field is everywhere. So on 1 October 2026 we checked.
Method. We pulled US job postings from the public Greenhouse job-board API (boards-api.greenhouse.io/v1/boards/<company>/jobs/<id>?questions=true) for 62 employer board names. 52 were live Greenhouse boards with US postings. For each one we took up to 5 postings with distinct titles, oldest first, 243 in all. We read every application question whose label mentioned salary, compensation or pay, and checked whether the posting itself printed a dollar range.
What we found:
- 5 of the 52 employers ask for your number on the form: Sweetgreen, Bombas, Parachute Home, BuzzFeed and Justworks. When a company asks, it asks on every form we sampled. It's a company habit, not something tied to the job.
- 20 of those 22 fields are required, and all 22 are a one-line text box. None was a number-only field or a dropdown, so you can type a range and a few words.
- 2 more employers ask a yes/no question instead. Samsara asks "Do you accept the listed salary range for this position?" and Webflow asks whether you are aligned with the stated on-target earnings.
- 217 of the 243 postings printed a pay range in the description. That is a floor: Stripe and SoFi showed none in the API text, probably because their careers sites display pay separately.
21 of 22
forms asking for your salary expectations
sat on a job posting that already printed the pay range. The employer was asking for a number it had already published.
Source: HiredFolio count of 243 US Greenhouse application forms, October 2026
That changes the question. On most US forms you are not guessing in the dark. You are telling the employer where you sit inside a range it already chose. The sample has limits: one applicant tracking system, mostly tech and consumer brands, one day's snapshot. But the habit of reading the posting's pay line before you touch the salary field holds anywhere.
What the law allows them to ask
Every guide mentions that "many states" ban salary questions. The detail matters, because those laws ban questions about your past pay, not your expectations.
California's Labor Code 432.3 is the clearest. An employer "shall not ... seek salary history information" about an applicant. But the same section says that nothing in it prohibits an employer "from asking an applicant about the applicant's salary expectation for the position being applied for." The expectations question is legal by name.
The same section gives you something back. An employer "upon reasonable request, shall provide the pay scale for a position to an applicant", and employers with 15 or more employees must put the pay scale in the job posting. In California you can ask for the range before you give yours, and the employer has to answer.
Other states with laws worth knowing:
- Washington. Employers may not seek your wage history (RCW 49.58.100), and employers with 15 or more employees must put the wage scale or salary range and a description of benefits in each posting (RCW 49.58.110).
- New York. Employers with four or more employees must post the range they "in good faith" believe is accurate (Labor Law 194-B). It covers remote jobs that report to a supervisor or worksite in New York.
- Colorado. The Equal Pay for Equal Work Act (SB19-085) requires the pay range in job openings and bans seeking your wage history, since 2021.
These are US rules, and they change. Outside the US, check your own country's rules. If a recruiter asks what you earn now, the answer is in our negotiation guide. The rest of this article is about the question they are allowed to ask.
Find your number before the form
You need one researched range before you open any application. Start with the posting: if it prints a range, that is the employer's budget, and your job is to place yourself in it. If you meet every requirement and some of the "nice to haves", you belong in the upper half.
If there is no range, look at similar postings in the same city. In the states above, most of them now print one. Then check the government's number. The Bureau of Labor Statistics' Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics covers about 830 occupations by state and metro area, with percentile wages including the median, and the latest release covers May 2025.
One detail about that data most people miss. OEWS counts "wages and salaries only". Overtime, year-end bonuses and benefits are left out, as the OEWS FAQ explains. So compare it with the base salary you ask for, not with a total package that includes bonus and equity.
From there, set your private minimum, your target and the range you will say out loud. How to do that, and why the bottom of the range you state should be your target, is covered step by step in our negotiation guide.
What to write in the desired salary field
Every field in our sample was free text, so you have room for more than a number. Use it, but keep it to one line. The examples below use a posting that lists $70,000 to $85,000.
The form field one line, three cases
Answer inside their range, at the part you can defend. Below it gives money away. Above it says you didn't read the posting.
"$78,000-85,000 base, within the posted range, open to discussing the full package"
Give your researched range, say it's base pay, and leave the door open.
"[target]-[target + 8-10%] base, flexible depending on scope and benefits"
Enter your target, not 0, 1 or 999999. A fake number reads as a mistake or a dodge, and a text box gives you no chance to explain it.
"[your target]"
Write "base" every time. A bare number lets the reader assume it includes bonus.
Writing "negotiable" alone in a required field answers nothing, and the recruiter will ask again on the call. A range plus "open to discussing" says the same thing and still gives them a number.
If the form asks a yes/no question like Samsara's, answer "yes" when the posted range overlaps your target. The negotiation happens later. Answer "no" when the top of the range sits below your private minimum. A "yes" there only wastes two weeks of interviews for both sides.
When the posting asks for salary requirements in your cover letter
Some postings skip the form field and ask you to "include your salary requirements with your cover letter". We wanted to know who still asks that way. On 5 October 2026 we read the text of every live posting on 84 Greenhouse boards, 11,092 postings in all, mostly US tech and consumer brands.
- 4 of the 11,092 mention a cover letter at all.
- 48 ask you to send your salary expectations with the application. All 48 are HelloFresh postings, and 47 of them are outside the US (22 in Berlin, 19 in Manila, the rest in the Netherlands, the Philippines or several EU cities).
- None asks for your salary history.
The scan has limits: one tracking system, one day, and it read the posting text, not the form questions counted earlier in this article.
Write requirements, never history
The state bans also say what happens to salary information you volunteer. For a letter, that is the part that matters.
The bans stop the employer from asking. They don't stop you from telling, but what the employer may then do with it differs by state. California's Labor Code 432.3(i) says that if an applicant "voluntarily and without prompting discloses salary history information to a prospective employer, nothing in this section shall prohibit that employer from considering or relying on that voluntarily disclosed salary history information in determining the salary for that applicant." New York's Labor Law 194-a(2) only says the ban does not prevent you from "voluntarily, and without prompting, disclosing or verifying wage or salary history", and it still bars the employer from relying on that history in setting your pay (194-a(1)(a)). Washington's RCW 49.58.100(2)(a) lets an employer confirm your wage history "If the applicant has voluntarily disclosed the applicant's wage or salary history".
A cover letter you write on your own is exactly the unprompted disclosure these clauses describe. "I currently earn $68,000" in the closing paragraph hands over the number the law was written to keep out of the offer, and in California the employer may rely on it. Write what you want for this job, not what you earn now.
If a posting asks for your salary history anyway, you can leave it out in these states. California's 432.3(b) says an employer "shall not, orally or in writing, personally or through an agent, seek salary history information". New York's 194-a(1)(e) bars an employer from refusing to interview or hire you "because such applicant or current employee did not provide wage or salary history". Give your requirements instead. Outside the states with a ban the request is legal, and the same answer still works: a range for this role, with no past figure attached.
The sentence itself
The request goes in the last paragraph, after the paragraphs that make your case and before the sign-off. Our cover letter structure guide shows where that paragraph sits. One or two sentences is enough. Use the same posting as above, which lists $70,000 to $85,000.
The closing paragraph two cases
As requested, my salary requirement is $78,000 to $85,000 base, within the range in your posting. With five years running paid acquisition, I would expect to sit in its upper half, and I am happy to discuss the full package.
As requested, my salary requirement is $72,000 to $78,000 base, based on what similar roles pay in Columbus. I am open to discussing it once we have talked about the scope of the role.
"As requested" tells the reader you are answering their question, not opening a negotiation. If the posting doesn't ask, leave the number out of the letter entirely and wait for the form or the call.
What to say on the recruiter screen
On a call, the question comes in many forms: "what are you looking for?", "what's your range?", "what would it take?". They are the same question. You want a range in the first answer, not a speech.
When the posting gives a range
Confirm the range and place yourself in it, with one reason:
"The range in the posting works for me. With five years running paid acquisition, I'd expect to be in the upper part of it, depending on how the rest of the package looks."
That keeps the conversation inside a band the employer already approved and points to the part of it you want. You don't need to repeat the posting's numbers back to them.
When it doesn't
Ask for theirs first, once and politely. In California you can point to the law if you have to, since the employer must give the pay scale on reasonable request.
"Could you share the range budgeted for this role? That would help me give you a useful answer."
If they won't share it, give your researched range and say where it comes from:
"From what similar roles pay in Chicago, I'm looking at $72,000 to $78,000 base. I'd want to confirm that once I know more about the scope."
When they push for one number
Some recruiters ask for "one number for the form". Don't hand them the bottom of your range. The offer gets built from the number you give, so leave room above your target: give the middle of the range you stated.
"If you need a single figure, put down $75,000 base. I'm flexible on how the package is put together."
If they push back because the number is above budget, ask what the budget is before you move. That is the point where the negotiation guide takes over.
Remote roles and relocation
Remote pay is often set by where you live. Calm's form asks for your ZIP code because the company "uses a geographic pay model" to set the pay tier. Ask before you answer:
"Is the range for this role the same everywhere, or does it depend on location? I'm based in Columbus."
If you are moving for the job, research the destination's metro area in OEWS, not your current one, and treat relocation help as a separate item. Name your salary for the city you will live in, then ask whether the company covers moving costs.
After the screen
Write down what you said, word for word, and the range they gave you. A second interviewer may ask the same question three weeks later, and a different number is the quickest way to lose trust. If the recruiter's reply afterwards is vague, our guide to recruiter phrases explains what the usual ones mean.
The screen only gets you to the interviews. To prepare for those, see our guide to succeeding in a job interview.
Using HiredFolio to keep your numbers straight
When several applications run at once, the number you typed into each form is easy to forget. HiredFolio keeps each job description in your tracker, including the posted range, next to your notes from the recruiter call. Before a second interview you can check what you said and what they offered.
Key takeaways before the next application
Read the posting's pay line first, and answer the salary field inside that range, with the word "base".
Check your role's base pay in BLS OEWS for your metro area and write down your target before the first call.
On the call, ask for their range once, then give yours, and record word for word what you said.
When the offer arrives, the work changes: here is how to negotiate it.
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