No. The ethics rule on point — ABA Model Rule 5.6 in the ABA's model text — bars partnership, employment and similar agreements that restrict a lawyer's right to practice after the relationship ends, which is exactly what a law firm non-compete agreement tries to do.
The Model Rules bind no one until a state adopts its own version; the version adopted where you practice is the one that governs you.
What the rule says, its exceptions, and where it stops.
What Rule 5.6 says
ABA Model Rule 5.6 is the profession's rule on restrictive covenants — the rule any law firm non-compete agreement runs into.
In the ABA's model text, Rule 5.6(a) says a lawyer shall not participate in offering or making "a partnership, shareholders, operating, employment, or other similar type of agreement that restricts the right of a lawyer to practice after termination of the relationship," with one carve-out for "an agreement concerning benefits upon retirement."
Two features of that language do a lot of work.
The rule is not limited to documents titled "non-compete": it reaches any partnership, shareholder, operating or employment agreement whose effect is to restrict a lawyer's right to practice once the relationship ends.
And it is addressed to lawyers — the model text says a lawyer shall not participate in offering or making such an agreement, which puts any lawyer who offers or makes one, including the partner proposing it, inside the rule's reach.
The model rule has a second part: Rule 5.6(b) bars agreeing to restrict a lawyer's right to practice as part of settling a client controversy, so a practice restriction cannot be traded away in the resolution of a dispute.
The rule's own commentary explains the reasoning behind the ban: restrictive covenants limit the lawyer's autonomy and clients' freedom to choose a lawyer.
The model text is not the rule you are bound by
Do financial-penalty clauses get around Rule 5.6?
A clause does not have to use the words "non-compete" to raise a Rule 5.6 question, because the model text is written by subject matter rather than by label: it bars covered agreements that restrict the right of a lawyer to practice after termination of the relationship.
A financial-penalty clause — a bonus or benefit forfeited on departure, a clawback triggered when you go — is the clause family that raises the question whether the restriction has simply been moved into the wallet.
Whether a particular clause does restrict a lawyer's right to practice within the meaning of the adopted rule is the question that language raises.
Our research for this page did not surface court or disciplinary decisions treating specific forfeiture or clawback clauses in lawyer employment agreements, so this page cannot tell you how those clauses fare — and we will not guess at outcomes, because they turn on the version of the rule a state has adopted and on each agreement's own terms.
The bodies that answer the question are the disciplinary authority and the courts where you practice, working from the rule as adopted there.
Exceptions: retirement benefits and practice sales
The first route around the bar is written into Rule 5.6(a) itself: the prohibition does not reach "an agreement concerning benefits upon retirement."
A partnership or employment agreement can therefore address what a lawyer receives when they retire.
The second runs through a different rule.
ABA Model Rule 1.17 allows a lawyer or a firm to sell or buy a law practice — or an area of a practice — including goodwill, when the rule's conditions are met.
Rule 5.6's commentary states that its ban does not include restrictions that are part of the sale of a law practice under Rule 1.17.
That is why a covenant sits differently in a practice sale than in an employment agreement: the seller is transferring a practice and its goodwill under a rule built for the transaction, rather than trading a practice restriction for a job.
How a state pairs the two rules — and what counts as a qualifying retirement-benefit agreement or a qualifying sale — is set by the version adopted there, so treat both exceptions as questions to confirm rather than loopholes to assume.
Do non-competes apply to in-house lawyers?
Nothing in the rule's text is limited to law firms: the model rule reaches "employment" agreements, and the words do not say employment by a firm.
A restrictive covenant in an agreement with a corporate employer therefore raises the same language.
But how that question is answered for in-house counsel is not something our research documents — we did not surface a rule or decision settling how states' adopted versions of Rule 5.6 treat in-house counsel, so this page cannot tell you what your state would say.
Treat the question as open and checkable: the version of the rule adopted where you are admitted, and the ethics authority that administers it, are the bodies that answer it for in-house agreements in your state.
If you are weighing the move itself, our in-house counsel guide covers what the role looks like.
What about paralegals and staff?
Rule 5.6 is a rule about lawyers.
Its text, by its own terms, covers agreements restricting "the right of a lawyer to practice" — so it is not the framework for restrictive covenants covering paralegals, legal assistants and other nonlawyer staff.
Those agreements are ordinary state contract and employment law questions instead, and state law varies: what a firm can ask a staff member to sign is decided under each state's own rules, not under the profession's ethics rules.
One federal development people ask about: the FTC's Noncompete Rule is not in effect.
As of October 2, 2026, the FTC's own page said the rule is not in effect and is not enforceable — a district court stopped its enforcement on August 20, 2024, and the FTC moved to dismiss its appeal of that decision on September 5, 2025.
Enforceability of any covenant, a lawyer's or a staff member's, is state-law territory, so for a staff member the answer turns on their own state's contract and employment law.
Where to find attorney jobs
Whatever your offer or departure looks like on paper, the practical half of any move is the market itself: which firms are hiring, in which practice areas and cities.
That is the piece a job board shows you in real time.
Browse attorney jobs on LawFirmHires — the board carries legal jobs only, so every listing is a legal role, and you can narrow it by pay and benefits.
For the wider picture — firm types, practice settings, the ladder from associate to partner — start from the attorney careers hub.
Career information, not legal advice. The rules discussed here are model text adopted state by state — confirm Rule 5.6 as adopted where you practice with your state bar or the disciplinary authority there.