Previously announced on 1/20/2026 On December 18, 2025, President Trump signed Executive Order 14368, which supersedes the Executive Order of December 23, 2024, and increases the Executive Level II salary cap to $228,000, effective January 1, 2026.
NOT-OD-26-034, released on January 1/28/2026, states that NIH will implement the 2026 Executive Level II salary cap, effective January 11, 2026.
Reminder: OSR may apply the 2026 salary cap to all New, Renewal, Revision, and Transfer-in application budgets (and their respective Resubmission application budgets), at the discretion of the Principal Investigator (PI) and Department Post Award.
NIH has implemented the new cap; therefore, new award totals will not be adjusted to accommodate it unless it was requested in the approved budget. However, NIH will allow institutions to rebudget.