To add to the vesting discussion, there's typically a cliff. What this means is that you have access to none of your options until that time, a 1 year cliff is

To add to the vesting discussion, there's typically a cliff. What this means is that you have access to none of your options until that time, a 1 year cliff is pretty common. If you see in your packet something about a 1 year cliff this means that on you're 1 year anniversary you have access to 20% of your available options. Typically you'll then vest the additional amount each month following until you've fully vested after 5 years. In addition to exercising your options during a liquidity event it's common that a company requires you to either exercise or expire your options when you leave the company. There's typically a time period allowing you to decide to exercise these or not, often it's 30 days after you leave that you have available to decide to purchase your options or not.