> Also, do FAANGs typically grant more equity after the 4 year vesting period?

Yes, they typically hand it out every year with their additional stock grants/refreshes.

When you start, you initially get a big dump of shares that vest over 4 years. Then every year, you get some more shares that vest over another 4 years. By the time your big initial stock grant is fully vested in 4 years, you already accumulated 4 years worth of yearly stock grants, that they pretty much replace and outnumber (in aggregate) that initial big stock grant, esp. since each year your yearly stock grant will probably be larger than the previous one.

Note: that's not the case at every single FAANG. For example, MSFT (which I know specifically isn't in the FAANG abbreviation, but is still often counted as a part of it; and I know that what I am describing below holds true for Amazon too, but they have it even harder, according to my friends working there) is specifically known for those yearly grants (that usually come at the annual rewards time) being too small. I can attest from my own experience, because all of my additional stock grants pooled together over the past 3 years accumulate to less than a half of my last vest of the initial big stock grant. Even if those 3 years of accumulated stock grants were to fully vest all at once on the same day. And, mind you, my situation isn't even that bad compared to the average, because I have been hitting the rewards performance metrics significantly above the 100% target, hovering around 180-200% every single year.

Yes. There is usually a base retention grant every year, which is roughly one quarter of a new hire grant, with a 4 year vest.

Then there are tiers of additional performance grants on top of the retention grant, which can be significant, perhaps as much or more as an entire new hire grant.

In a well-designed RSU grant system, employees basically end up on an RSU vesting treadmill that always has that carrot on a stick in front of them. The golden handcuffs to keep them around.

Specifics vary by company, but that's the template most start from.

They do grant enough to keep your comp in the similar range (but usually comp does go down). So general rule of thumb is to just switch every 4 years to get another grant :P

Yes, they do. It’s typically slightly less than what you get initially, although that can vary depending on your performance.