Brex
Large (~1,600)
Cognition
Medium (~300)
Best For
Brex
Best for: Engineers who want to build AI-powered fintech at massive scale with smart colleagues
Cognition
Best for: Elite engineers who want to build frontier AI coding agents and own a meaningful equity stake
Ratings
BrexCognition
4.0
3.8
Overall
3.9
3.2
Work-Life Balance
3.8
3.9
Culture & Values
4.0
3.8
Comp & Benefits
3.5
3.6
Senior Mgmt
3.6
3.6
Career Opps
👍 77% Recommend
👤 71% CEO Approval (Pedro Franceschi)
👍 76% Recommend
👤 80% CEO Approval (Scott Wu)
Culture Values
Brex only
🌱 Learning & Growth🪟 Transparent
Cognition only
💎 Strong Comp & Equity
Shared
🚀 Ship Fast & Iterate⚙️ Engineering-Driven🎯 Direct Product Impact
Pros & Cons
Brex
- Innovation-driven culture with incredibly smart, passionate, and supportive colleagues
- Strong benefits and time off actively encouraged with flexible scheduling
- Culture of overworking — many departments understaffed relative to workload expectations
- Multiple rounds of layoffs in recent years have created uncertainty and morale challenges
Cognition
- Elite engineering team with strong equity
- Cutting-edge AI agent work
- High-intensity startup pace
- In-person SF expectations
Bottom Line
Brex
Choose Brex if you want to build AI-powered fintech at massive scale with smart colleagues — but expect intense workloads and some organizational instability from recent layoffs.
Cognition
Choose Cognition if you want world-class AI agent research (makers of Devin) with strong equity upside — but expect top-tier intensity and mandatory in-person in San Francisco.
Open Roles
Brex — 235 jobs
💼 Sales / GTM
72
💻 Engineering
49
📋 Product
18
🎨 Design
15
📣 Marketing
14
👤 HR / People
13
📊 Data
10
⚖️ Legal
6
💰 Finance
3
⚙️ Operations
3
🎧 Support
2
Cognition — 62 jobs
💻 Engineering
21
💼 Sales / GTM
10
📊 Data
3
⚖️ Legal
2
⚙️ Operations
2
💰 Finance
1
👤 HR / People
1
📣 Marketing
1
🧠 ML / AI
1
Summary
Brex scores 4.0/5.0 on Glassdoor with a 3.9 work-life balance rating. Cognition scores 3.8/5.0 overall with a 3.2 WLB. That’s a 0.2-point gap on overall satisfaction.
Both companies share these culture values: Ship Fast & Iterate, Engineering-Driven, Direct Product Impact. Brex also emphasizes Learning & Growth, Transparent. Cognition also emphasizes Strong Comp & Equity.
On the hiring front, Brex has 235 open roles and Cognition has 62 open roles.