Plan your Scale AI ISO exercise
Calculator · free · no signup · pre-IPOScale AI is pre-IPO. Plan your AMT impact at any valuation: current 409A, expected IPO price, or post-IPO scenarios.
AlphaLatitude Inc. · Free ToolsOur tools respect your browsing privacy. Independently verified:
Your grant
Seeded from secondary-market data, as of Oct 27, 2026
Tax inputs
Schedule A, line 7. The 2026 deduction is capped at $40,400, less above $505,000 of income.
Grant timeline
Net final value at year 3 sale — optimized plan
$101,802
After-tax dollars at end of year 3, net of all federal + state taxes through the sale.
This year: exercise 3,094 shares (of 10,000 total).
= gross gain at sale − federal + state LTCG − AMT premium above baseline regular tax (time-valued)
AMT premium for exercising: $3,824 (on top of $230,496 regular tax across the horizon)
Optimized plan keeps $4,017 more than lump-sum, $44 more than even split.
Federal AMT crossover this year: 3,093 shares ($41,138 bargain element). Above that, each additional share this year adds federal AMT.
Estimates only. Not financial advice.
Net final value by year
Running tally: NTV from shares exercised through year y, minus AMT premium paid through year y. The last year matches the plan's headline NTV. Hover a year for plan totals.
Optimized exercise schedule
You pay the higher of Regular tax and Tentative AMT per jurisdiction, then subtract Credit recovered. The result is Net tax. Hover any number for the bracket-by-bracket breakdown.
| 1 | 3,094 | |||
| 2No AMT | 2,987 | |||
| 3 | 3,919 |
Federal AMT credit
Earned
$3,827
Recovered
$3
Remaining
$3,824
The AMT credit only recovers in years where regular tax exceeds AMT — typically a year with no ISO exercise. Try a longer horizon or fewer total shares to introduce a recovery year.
Plan comparison
Net value at the end of your hold horizon.
Lump-sum
All in Year 1
$97,785
−$4,017
Even split
Equal shares each year
$101,757
−$44
Optimized
Tax-aware schedule
$101,802
Highest
Estimates only. Excludes disqualifying dispositions, NSOs, multi-state moves, and AMT preferences other than ISO bargain elements. Long-term capital gains tax assumes a qualifying disposition (ISO held ≥1 yr from exercise and ≥2 yr from grant); state LTCG follows ordinary brackets except where the state grants preferential treatment (HI, ND, SC, WI, AR, NM) or has a dedicated LTCG-only tax (WA). Assumes you are within the $100K ISO limit (any portion of an annual ISO grant whose FMV at grant exceeds $100K is treated as NSO from the start, §422(d)). State AMT figures are 2025 (next-year values published in late 2026). Not financial advice.
QSBS note. If your shares qualify (typically pre-IPO C-corp grants held 5+ years), a federal rule lets you exclude up to $10M of gain on a future sale from federal tax. That single rule shifts exercise-timing math more than AMT does. (This is §1202 “qualified small-business stock”.) Modeled in beta, not here.
You optimized one grant in isolation. The beta optimizes ISOs alongside your RSUs, NSOs, and stock in one plan.
Request beta access →Related calculators: Year-End ISO Exercise Calculator · QSBS Qualification Checker · Post-Termination ISO Exercise Calculator
About Scale AI
Scale AI is a privately held AI company, headquartered in San Francisco, CA.
Last reported secondary-market price: $18.3 per share (as of 2026-10-27). Your own 409A may differ.
~$13B; data labeling.
Equity grants at Scale AI typically include incentive stock options (ISOs) and non-qualified stock options (NSOs).
Scale AI, Inc. is an American artificial intelligence infrastructure and software company based in San Francisco, California. Originally focused on data annotation, the company also offers RLHF services, large language model (LLM) evaluation, and enterprise software suites to build and deploy AI applications.
Source: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Scale AI's data labeling, model evaluation, and enterprise AI platform serves frontier model developers and U.S. defense programs from its San Francisco headquarters. MIT dropout Alexandr Wang and Lucy Guo founded the company through Y Combinator in 2016; Wang later joined Meta as Chief AI Officer under a June 2025 deal that gave Meta a roughly 49% non-voting stake at a $29B valuation, with Jason Droege elevated to CEO. Defense work includes the Donovan LLM on classified networks and the Thunderforge planning contract with Anduril and Microsoft. 2026 revenue tracks toward $2B.
Sources: en.wikipedia.org · scale.com · cnbc.com
OptionsAhoy is an independent tool and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Scale AI.
The calculator works at any Scale AI valuation: enter your strike, the current 409A FMV, an expected IPO price, or anywhere in between. AMT is triggered on the bargain element (FMV minus strike) when you exercise; the calculator models federal AMT, state AMT, and the multi-year credit-recovery path.
Example: at Scale AI's last reported price of $18.3, exercising 5,000 ISOs with a $5.49 strike creates a $64,050 bargain element. For a single filer with $200,000 of taxable income, that adds $8,815 of federal AMT in the year of exercise under 2026 rules, before any state AMT (CA, CO, CT, MN). The credit recovers in later years when your regular tax exceeds AMT. The calculator above runs your exact figures.
All Scale AI tools → · Use the generic Multi-Year ISO Exercise Schedule Calculator for any company.
Scale AI equity questions
- How much alternative minimum tax (AMT) will I owe exercising Scale AI ISOs?
- Exercising incentive stock options (ISOs) does not create regular income tax, but the bargain element (the fair market value at exercise minus your strike price) counts toward the alternative minimum tax (AMT). The amount depends on the bargain element, your other income, your filing status, and your state. The calculator above models federal and state AMT, the AMT crossover point, and how the credit recovers in later years for your exact Scale AI figures.
- Does Scale AI grant ISOs, NSOs, or RSUs?
- Equity compensation at Scale AI typically takes the form of incentive stock options (ISOs) and non-qualified stock options (NSOs). Incentive stock options can trigger the alternative minimum tax (AMT) when you exercise.
- Are Scale AI shares eligible for QSBS?
- They might be. Qualified small business stock (QSBS) under Internal Revenue Code Section 1202 can exclude federal tax on much of the gain when shares were acquired at original issuance from a C-corporation while its gross assets were under $50 million, and held at least five years. Whether your Scale AI shares qualify turns on when you acquired them and the company's asset size at that time.
One piece of the puzzle.
OptionsAhoy plans your Scale AI equity alongside hedging, vesting, and de-concentration, across bullish, neutral, and bearish market scenarios. Free during beta.