Financially speaking, the odds are incredibly against you as far as equity goes. One advantage. of working in startup is what Paul Buchheit calls working above

Financially speaking, the odds are incredibly against you as far as equity goes. One advantage. of working in startup is what Paul Buchheit calls working above your correct level, a kind of Peter principle in reverse (https://triplebyte.com/blog/interview-with-gmail-creator-and-y-combinator-partner-paul-buchheit https://triplebyte.com/blog/interview-with-gmail-creator-and...). E.g. if you are one of the few seniors in a team, you can fairly quickly become head of eng, that kind of things, and that definitely helps your career in general. If you want to stay an individual contributor, and can get into one of the famous companies, then I would say there is not much advantage working for a startup today.