Best Places to Work 2026 Criteria | Glassdoor Blog

Is your company a fantastic place to work? If so, find out how you can qualify for a Glassdoor Employees’ Choice Award for the Best Places to Work 2026.

What to know about the Best Places to Work:

Unlike other workplace awards, there is no self-nomination process and no cost involved. Winners are determined solely based on reviews provided by those who know a company best — the employees.

The Best Places to Work 2026 will feature seven categories across two countries. Company reviews and ratings from current and former employees submitted between October 17, 2024 and October 16, 2025 will be considered for each category. Reviews and ratings submitted after October 16, 2025 will not be eligible for the 2025 awards.

While Glassdoor accepts reviews from former employees within five years of leaving a company, the Best Places to Work 2026 will only consider reviews from those who left the company in 2025 or 2024.

The winners of the Best Places to Work 2026 are based solely on local-country employee feedback shared on Glassdoor. That means reviews from U.S.-based employees will be used to determine if an employer is eligible for the U.S. list, but the company does not need to be headquartered in the U.S. Likewise, reviews from UK-based employees will be used for the UK list. An employer can win a Best Places to Work award in both the U.S. and UK. 

Eligibility Requirements for the Best Places to Work:

To determine the winners of the Best Places to Work 2026, Glassdoor’s proprietary algorithm, created by Glassdoor’s Economic Research team, considers the quantity, quality and consistency of employee reviews during the eligibility time frame.

1. For the quantity of reviews, a minimum number of ratings are required across nine workplace attributes that employees can rate when submitting a company review on Glassdoor. They include overall company rating, career opportunities, compensation and benefits, culture and values, diversity and inclusion, senior management, work-life balance, recommend to a friend and six-month business outlook. A company will not be eligible if there are not enough ratings across all of these workplace attributes.

To be considered for a specific category, an employer must meet the following requirements during the eligibility time frame:

100 Best Places to Work – U.S. large companies: At least 75 ratings across the nine workplace attributes from U.S.-based employees; at least 1,000 employees at the end of the eligibility time frame. 

25 Best Places to Work by Industry - U.S. large companies: At least 75 ratings across the

nine workplace attributes from U.S.-based employees; at least 1,000 employees at the end of the eligibility time frame. Industry lists include: (1) Tech & AI (2) Healthcare, Biotech, & Pharma (3) Manufacturing & Energy (4) Consumer Services, including Retail &

Hospitality (5) Consulting, Finance, & Insurance

50 Best Places to Work – UK large companies: At least 30 ratings across the nine workplace attributes from UK-based employees; at least 1,000 employees at the end of the eligibility time frame. 

For all categories, an employer must have at least a 3.5 overall company rating on Glassdoor and workplace factor ratings (career opportunities, compensation and benefits, culture and values, diversity and inclusion, senior management, work-life balance) of at least 2.5 during the eligibility period. 

Glassdoor will rely on the company size, indicating the current number of global employees, on an employer’s Overview page to help assess eligibility. Employers have until October 16, 2025 to update company ‘size’ on their Glassdoor profile with a Free Employer Account. 

The awards also take into account various types of employment status, including full-time, part-time, contract and freelance, however, intern reviews are not considered. Universities, multi-level marketing agencies, religious organizations, the armed forces and staffing/outsourcing agencies are not considered in 2025.

2. For the quality of reviews, Glassdoor’s proprietary awards algorithm considers what employees have to say about employers. Quality reviews are those that help job seekers by offering insights and feedback into what it’s really like to work at a company, including what’s working well (Pros), what needs improvement (Cons) and advice to senior management, which employees are asked to share when completing a company review. Additionally,  Review Intelligence™, a Glassdoor sentiment analysis tool that reads, analyzes, and categorizes reviews to surface topics, insights, and trends was leveraged to score company reviews.

3. For the consistency of reviews, Glassdoor’s proprietary awards algorithm also looks at trends over time as they relate to both quantitative and qualitative insights shared by employees. Both the volume of reviews throughout the entire eligibility period and the consistency of the content in the reviews themselves are considered. In some cases, if an employer lacks quality and/or consistency of reviews, it can impact results and/or eligibility.

Commitment to integrity for all employers: 

As part of determining award winners, Glassdoor is committed to the highest level of data integrity and reviews quality, including considering all employers who meet the eligibility requirements, regardless of whether they are customers of Glassdoor. An employer may be excluded from awards consideration if Glassdoor suspects and/or determines company representatives have attempted to influence employee reviews or have tampered with the process of collecting authentic, unbiased reviews, including intentional or unintentional acts that violate the Glassdoor Community Guidelines and/or Terms of Use. Exclusion from eligibility can be triggered by such acts as, but not limited to, management (1) attempts to leave false reviews, (2) coercion of employees to submit positive reviews, (3) attempts to suppress reviews or other activities and/or events which could ultimately damage employees' faith in the employer, its senior leadership and/or adversely affect its overall rating on Glassdoor. 

Best Places to Work 2026 winners will be announced in early 2026. 

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