Electronic Arts has confirmed that CEO Andrew Wilson's total compensation for the past fiscal year came to $38.65 million — a 27% jump from $30.53 million the year before. The disclosure lands just months after EA laid off staff across four of its own studios, reigniting a familiar debate about executive pay during rounds of cuts.
Wilson's package breaks down into a $1.3 million base salary, $28.48 million in stock awards, a $6.5 million bonus, and $2.37 million in "other benefits" — a category that reportedly covers things like private jet use and personal security. Put in context, that total is roughly 305 times what the median EA employee earns in a year: $126,612.
This isn't the first time Wilson's name has come up alongside layoffs. He became CEO in 2013 after John Riccitiello resigned abruptly following what EA described as "financial shortcomings," making Wilson — who'd spent the prior years building out EA Sports and the early Origin platform — the first EA studio executive to take the top job. Cuts followed at several points during his tenure: around 350 jobs and the closure of EA's Japan and Russia offices in 2019, and roughly 5% of the workforce along with a cancelled Respawn Entertainment Star Wars shooter in 2024, a move EA framed as a shift toward "deeper, more connected experiences" that would "grow fandom."
The March 2026 round specifically hit DICE, Criterion, Ripple Effect, and Motive — the four studios responsible for Battlefield 6 — just months after that game became the best-selling title of 2025 in the US. That timing is what's drawn the sharpest criticism: a studio's biggest commercial win in years, followed almost immediately by layoffs at that same studio.
There's also a reason this particular disclosure might not repeat much longer. EA is currently in the process of being taken private by an investor consortium that includes Saudi-backed capital. If that deal closes, EA would no longer be required to file the public reports that make this level of pay transparency possible in the first place — meaning this could be one of the last times figures like these are laid out this clearly for anyone outside the company to see.