Associates Are Leaving Faster Than Ever — But Let’s Be Honest, Biglaw Designed It That Way

Every year, the NALP Foundation drops its annual Update on Associate Attrition, and every year, it feels like law firms should be desperately wringing their hands over all those associates walking out the door — especially as the departures hit record levels. But before we get into the 2025 numbers, let’s remember: for a significant portion of Biglaw, associate attrition isn’t a bug. It’s a feature.

Biglaw firms make enormous amounts of money off junior and midlevel associates billing at rates that have little to do with their actual compensation. Better, from a pure profit standpoint, to have a constant stream of fresh first- and second-years hungry to prove themselves than to accumulate too many expensive senior associates who might start asking uncomfortable questions about the partnership track. The up-or-out model didn’t become the industry standard by accident.

The splashy number this year is that a record-breaking 83% of associates who departed in 2025 did so within five years of being hired, up from 2024’s 80%. The NALP Foundation’s own Fiona Trevelyan calls this a “talent management imperative” worth close attention. Which, sure. But it’s worth asking which firms are actually alarmed by that figure and which accept it as business as usual.

The overall attrition rate landed at 19%, down a hair from last year’s 20%. The smallest firms (100 or fewer attorneys) still showed a much higher rate at 24%, while the larger cohorts came in between 16% and 18%. The gap between small and large isn’t mysterious — smaller firms can’t readily match the compensation or platform of their bigger competitors — but it’s also worth noting that for a firm printing money on associate billing, 16–18% annual attrition is a perfectly calibrated churn rate. Not so fast it creates chaos, not so slow that expensive senior associates start clogging the pyramid.

Here’s the data point that actually deserves scrutiny: firms classified 47% of 2025 associate departures as “unwanted” — meaning they genuinely didn’t want those people to leave. That’s less than half. A substantial 27% were flagged as “desired” departures. In plain English: more than one in four associate departures in 2025 was a firm quietly, or not so quietly, showing someone the door or at minimum being perfectly fine watching them walk out.

And the report notes that firms more often designated lateral associates, male associates, and associates of color as “desired” departures compared to their entry-level, female, and white peers. Make of that what you will.

Associates of color departed at a 25% rate versus 16% for White associates — a gap that has persisted stubbornly across multiple years of this report. Associates of color also made up just 33% of 2025 hires, down from 36% in 2024. So they’re being hired at lower rates and leaving faster. This is the definition of a leaky pipeline, and no amount of affinity group programming is patching it.

On the hiring side, lateral hires (3,296) outpaced entry-level hires (3,039) in 2025, reversing last year’s trend. Firms are buying experience off the shelf rather than growing it, which makes sense if your junior associate factory is producing people who leave before year five anyway. Lateral hires cost more upfront, especially given that headhunters and search firms remain the top source for them at 39%, but firms can better control quality and the practice areas they grow with laterals.

The boomerang associate trend — firms rehiring their own former people — cooled significantly. In 2024, former associates made up 11% of all hires. In 2025, just 6%. The share of firms reporting at least one rehire dropped from 49% to 44%. Whether that’s fewer former associates wanting back in, or fewer firms willing to take them, is an interesting question.

For the first time, this year’s survey asked whether a desire for AI training or support influenced associates’ decisions to leave their firms. That’s smart future-proofing on NALP Foundation’s part, because this is only going to become a bigger factor. Associates who feel their firms are dragging their feet on AI tools and training while simultaneously using AI to justify staffing fewer associates will not quietly accept that bargain.

The 2025 attrition data shows firms hiring more, losing more, and doing so at a pace their business model was more or less designed to sustain. The record early-departure rate is worth watching. The diversity gap is inexcusable and persistent. And the next time a firm’s managing partner tells you associate retention is a top priority, you might want to ask them what percentage of their departures they flagged as “desired.” 

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Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of The Jabot podcast, and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter @Kathryn1 or Bluesky @Kathryn1