US law firm lateral hiring ramped up in 2024 following two-year slump, report shows

U.S. law firm lateral hiring was up 14% in 2024 after two years of declines, according to data released Wednesday by the National Association for Law Placement.

Much of the lateral growth reported by NALP, which tracked non-entry level attorney hires at firms, was fueled by lateral associate hiring, which increased 25% over 2023. Lateral partner hiring, generally less volatile than associate hiring, was up by 2% in 2024.

The vibrant lateral market last year came as law firms enjoyed a profitable 2024, buoyed by strong demand across practice areas and higher billing rates, according to the Thomson Reuters Institute, which shares a parent company with Reuters. Corporate practices rebounded in 2024 after several slow years while litigation remained strong, the institute found.

The lateral market has seen dramatic swings since the COVID-19 pandemic, NALP executive director Nikia Gray said. Lateral hiring surged 111% in 2021, fueled by a post-pandemic M&A boom. But large firms pulled back in both 2022 and 2023, which had the lowest median and average number of lateral hires since 2010.

U.S.-based firms hired nearly 4,300 lateral lawyers across 434 offices in 2024, NALP data shows. The majority of those offices are in firms with 1,000 or more lawyers. The median number of lateral hires was four, while the average was almost 10. The NALP report does provide information on firm-specific hires.

Hiring patterns shifted in 2024 by firm size, NALP found. While firms with 250 or fewer lawyers were more aggressive with lateral hiring in both 2022 and 2023, their number of 2024 lateral hires declined 11%. Meanwhile, lateral hiring increased 21% among firms of 1,001 or more lawyers last year.

Lateral hiring also varied by city in 2024. Overall hiring was up last year, but Boston, Miami, Minneapolis, Nashville and Seattle were among the markets that saw a decline in lateral hires.

NALP gathered information on remote hiring policies and found that slightly more than half of firm offices (51%) have policies against hiring fully remote laterals.

Read more:

Lateral hiring at law firms hits lowest level since 2010, NALP report finds

U.S. lawyers swapped firms at record pace in 2021, report finds