FAANG Companies 2026: Full List, MAANG and Big Tech

The FAANG companies are Facebook (now Meta Platforms), Apple, Amazon, Netflix and Google (now a subsidiary of Alphabet). CNBC host Jim Cramer popularized the acronym in 2013 as a label for fast-growing US tech stocks. Developers now use it loosely for large tech employers with high pay and structured interviews, which is why Microsoft is often added.

Key takeaways

• FAANG has exactly five members. Microsoft, Nvidia, Tesla and OpenAI are not among them.
• MAANG is the same five companies after Facebook’s 2021 rename to Meta. MAMAA swaps Netflix for Microsoft.
• The Magnificent Seven is a stock-market group popularized in 2023. It is not a hiring category.
• In Germany, official pages confirm engineering work at Google, Apple and Amazon. Evidence for Meta and Microsoft is thinner, and Netflix’s Berlin office lists no engineering team.
• For a job search, target teams and roles, not the acronym.

Search for FAANG companies and you will find lists with five names, seven names or a dozen. Some include Microsoft, some include Nvidia, and some quietly drop Netflix. If you are planning a job search, you need to know which version a recruiter, a salary site or an interview-prep course actually means. This guide gives you the original list with each company’s current name, explains the newer acronyms, answers the “is X FAANG?” questions and shows what the label means if you want to work for one of these companies from Germany. All facts were reviewed on 26 October 2026.

What are the FAANG companies?🔗

The table shows each original letter, who it stands for today and whether the company has a verifiable engineering presence in Germany. The Germany column is deliberately strict: it only says “yes” where an official company page shows engineering work in a German location.

Sources reviewed on 26 October 2026. Office remits and openings change; check the individual job description before applying.
[1] Meta's German newsroom announced a Munich office opening in October 2023 with room for about 100 people, focused on technology development and partnerships around immersive technologies and AI. We could not confirm current engineering openings in Germany on an official Meta page.
[2] Netflix's Berlin page lists content, legal, global affairs, communications, marketing, advertising, finance and talent teams. Engineering is not among them.
[3] Microsoft is not part of the original acronym. It is included because many job-search resources group it with FAANG.
[4] At review, Microsoft's Munich careers page showed a research internship in audio and speech processing. We found no official Microsoft page describing a product-engineering team in Germany.

The pattern is already visible. Two of the five original names no longer describe the parent company, one original member lists no engineering in Germany, and the company most people add to the list is not in the acronym at all.

What does FAANG stand for, and who coined it?🔗

From FANG to FAANG🔗

FAANG stands for Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix and Google. Jim Cramer, host of CNBC’s Mad Money, coined the term in 2013, according to Fortune’s 2021 report on his updated acronym. The original grouping was FANG, without Apple. Apple was added later, which produced the five-letter version most people know today.

The label was about investing, not employment. It grouped stocks that investors watched together. The move from stock basket to career goal happened gradually, as these companies became known for high compensation, structured interview loops and engineering practices that other companies copied.

Why Facebook is now Meta and Google is part of Alphabet🔗

Two corporate changes broke the acronym. In August 2015, Google announced a new holding company. In the 2015 Founders’ Letter, Larry Page explains that Alphabet Inc. replaces Google Inc. as the publicly traded company and that Google becomes a wholly owned subsidiary of Alphabet.

On 28 October 2021, Facebook’s parent company renamed itself Meta. The Facebook app is still called Facebook. The company that owns it, along with Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger, is now Meta Platforms.

For a job search, the practical consequence is small but real. You apply at metacareers.com and google.com/about/careers, not at a page called “Facebook jobs” or “Alphabet jobs”, and your offer letter will name the specific legal entity that employs you.

FAANG vs. MAANG vs. MAMAA vs. Magnificent Seven: what is the difference?🔗

Several replacement acronyms exist. They overlap but are not interchangeable, so it helps to know who uses which one.

Reviewed on 26 October 2026.
[1] MAANG and GAMMA are descriptive labels without a documented coiner. They are listed because they appear in search and career content, not because any authority defines them.
[2] Fortune describes Hartnett as popularizing the name in an investor note, a reference to the 1960 western. It does not claim he invented the phrase.

MAANG: the minimal update🔗

MAANG keeps the original five companies and only swaps the F for an M. If a recruiter or a course says “MAANG”, they mean exactly the same employers as FAANG. Nothing about the list, the pay bands or the interview format changes.

MAMAA: Netflix out, Microsoft in🔗

Cramer proposed MAMAA on Mad Money the day of the Meta rename, as Fortune reported. He replaced Netflix with Microsoft and Google with Alphabet. This version is closer to how many developers think about Big Tech, but it never displaced FAANG as a search term.

The Magnificent Seven: a stock-market group🔗

The Magnificent Seven is the term you will hear most in financial news. Fortune credits Bank of America’s Michael Hartnett with popularizing it in a May 2023 note to investors. It adds Nvidia and Tesla, keeps Microsoft and drops Netflix.

It is a useful list of very large US tech companies by market value. It is a weak list of comparable employers. Tesla makes electric vehicles and energy products, and Nvidia is best known for GPUs, so their role families and interview processes can differ a lot from Google’s or Meta’s.

Is Microsoft a FAANG company?🔗

Not by the letters. Microsoft is in MAMAA and the Magnificent Seven, but not in FAANG or MAANG. In practice, many job-search guides and interview-prep resources group Microsoft with the FAANG companies, because it runs a comparable multi-round process and pays in a comparable structure. When a source says “FAANG” without defining it, check whether Microsoft is included before you compare its numbers with another source’s.

For Germany specifically, the evidence is thinner than the brand suggests. Microsoft’s official Munich careers page showed research roles at review, and we found no official page describing a product-engineering team in Germany. If Microsoft is on your shortlist, read each listing’s location and team description carefully.

Are Nvidia, Tesla, OpenAI and Netflix FAANG companies?🔗

The acronym has a fixed answer. Everyday usage does not. Here is how to read the most common edge cases.

Is Nvidia FAANG? No. Nvidia is a Magnificent Seven company. Its core business is GPUs and the software built around them, so check each listing for how much hardware, systems or AI-infrastructure depth the role expects. Preparation can look quite different from a classic web-scale product interview.

Is Tesla FAANG? No. Tesla is in the Magnificent Seven because of its market value, not because its hiring resembles Google’s. Evaluate it as an automotive and energy company with software teams, and read each role description for the domain it expects.

Is OpenAI FAANG? No. None of the established acronyms include OpenAI, and they were all built around publicly traded companies. OpenAI is often discussed alongside Big Tech because it competes for senior AI talent. In Germany, OpenAI announced plans for a Munich office in February 2025, and German business press reported its opening in May 2025. Neither source describes engineering roles in Munich.

Is Netflix still FAANG? Technically yes, because it is one of the original letters. It is the member most often dropped from newer groupings, and its Berlin careers page does not list engineering among its teams. For a German engineering job search, it is usually the least relevant name on the list.

Is the FAANG label still useful for developers?🔗

The acronym was built for investors in 2013. Three things have made it a poor guide for career decisions since then.

First, the names are out of date. Two of the five letters refer to brands that are no longer the parent company, which is why MAANG and MAMAA exist at all.

Second, the membership does not match the employers developers actually compare. Microsoft is the obvious omission. Depending on your field, a strong European scale-up or a specialist software company can offer comparable work and interview rigor without carrying any of the letters. Our guide to FAANG alternatives in Germany compares several of them by engineering domain and interview style.

Third, the label hides the variation inside each company. A Google privacy engineer in Munich, an Apple silicon engineer and an AWS solutions architect all “work at FAANG”. Their daily work, required background and interview loop have little in common. Our Munich guide shows how different the teams can be within a single city.

None of this makes the term useless. It is still how people search, and it still signals a certain style of hiring: structured technical rounds, behavioral interviews with explicit criteria and compensation that can include equity. Treat it as shorthand, not a strategy.

How should you use the FAANG label in your job search?🔗

Target teams, not acronyms🔗

If you search “FAANG jobs”, you will get a list of logos. What you need is a list of roles you can credibly win. Start from your own evidence: the systems you have built, the languages you use in production and the problems you can explain in depth. Then look for teams at large tech companies where that evidence matters.

A backend developer with Java and distributed-systems experience has a different shortlist from an embedded C++ engineer, even if both want “FAANG”. The first might look at Amazon or Google product teams, while the second may find a better fit in Apple’s hardware-adjacent work in Munich. If Google is your main target, our guide to Google software engineer jobs in Germany covers locations and the hiring process in detail.

Expect a similar interview structure, with company-specific emphasis🔗

Most of these employers run a multi-stage process: a recruiter conversation, one or more technical screens and a loop of coding, system design and behavioral interviews. The emphasis differs. Amazon builds its behavioral rounds around its Leadership Principles, which we cover in our Amazon interview guide. Other companies weight system design or domain depth more heavily for senior roles.

Track where your applications stop. If few applications turn into first interviews, your targeting or CV evidence is the likely problem. If you reach interviews but rarely pass a particular stage, focus your practice there. A free tool like COMMIT helps you see that pattern instead of guessing.

Compare total compensation, not the logo🔗

Big Tech offers often combine base salary, a bonus and equity, and the mix varies by company and level. Two offers with the same headline number can be worth very different amounts over several years. Before you negotiate, read our FAANG salary guide for Germany to understand which components to ask about.

Which FAANG companies have engineering teams in Germany?🔗

If you want to work for one of these companies without leaving Germany, the realistic list is shorter than the acronym. Based on the official pages in the first table, Google, Apple and Amazon show engineering work in German locations. Microsoft’s official Munich page shows research roles, but we found no official description of a product-engineering team. Meta opened a Munich office in 2023 for technology development and partnerships, but we could not confirm current engineering hiring. Netflix’s Berlin office does not list engineering teams.

For the full picture of offices, cities, interview processes and visa basics, start with our hub guide, FAANG in Germany: Big Tech Offices and Interview Tips. If you are focused on one city, the Big Tech in Munich guide compares engineering teams by role, and our overview of tech companies in Berlin for software engineers covers the capital, where many strong employers sit outside the acronym.

The German context adds a few things the US-centric FAANG material rarely covers: the notice period in your current contract, a probation period at the new employer and how equity is taxed. These are worth clarifying with the recruiter and, for tax questions, with a tax advisor before you sign.

From acronym to application plan🔗

FAANG is a 2013 investor shorthand with two outdated names and at least one obvious omission. Use it to find the companies, then make your decisions at the level of teams, roles and offers.

CodingCareer offers interview coaching by developers and application support focused on the German tech market, from CV evidence through mock interviews to salary negotiation. Coaching is currently booked out through the end of 2026, with a waiting list for 2027.

You can start organizing your applications today with COMMIT. If you want help building a Big Tech application strategy for Germany, email CodingCareer to join the 2027 waiting list and tell us your background, your target companies and the stage of the process you want to improve.