You want your company on a military-friendly list. Maybe a competitor just landed one. Maybe leadership asked why you are not on it. So you start digging, and you hit a wall of names. Military Friendly. VETS Indexes. Best for Vets. HIRE Vets Medallion. They all sound the same. They are not.

Each program is run by a different group. Each one scores you in a different way. Some are free. One charges a fee. Some rank you against other companies. Some just hand you a badge if you clear the bar. Picking the wrong one wastes a quarter of your HR team's time. That is time spent on a survey that does not move the needle.

I built BMR after my own messy transition out of the Navy, and now I watch veterans pick employers every day. The badge on your careers page does get noticed. But only if it is one veterans actually trust, and only if you can back it up. This guide breaks down the three big private programs plus the one federal award, how each scores you, what it costs, and how to choose.

What does "military friendly employer" actually mean?

There is no single official "military friendly" stamp. The term is a brand, not a legal status. Several private companies run their own rating programs. Each owns its own name and its own method.

So when a job seeker sees a logo on your site, the value depends entirely on which program issued it and how hard it was to earn. A veteran who has job-hunted knows the difference between a real designation and a pay-to-display sticker. So does Google.

There are four programs worth your time. Three are private. One is federal. Here is the short version before we go deep.

How does the Military Friendly Employer designation work?

This is the one most people mean when they say "military friendly." The rating is owned by VIQTORY, a service-disabled veteran-owned small business. It is the biggest brand of the four. You have seen the logo on careers pages for years.

Each year, more than 1,500 organizations compete for the designation. Over 1,200 companies took the 2026 survey. So the field is large, and a designation puts you in good company.

The scoring and thresholds

VIQTORY scores you on a proprietary survey plus public data. A rules-based algorithm runs the final math. The published methodology weights six areas. Here is how they break down.

Notice where the weight sits. Support and retention is the heaviest block at 28 percent. The program rewards keeping veterans, not just hiring them. You also have to clear at least three benchmarks. Those cover things like veteran retention above 50 percent and military employee turnover below 20 percent.

Cost and timing

The survey is free. There is no fee to take it or to earn the designation. But you must have hired veterans in the last 12 months to qualify. The cycle is annual. The survey opens, you submit, and the list comes out for the next year. You can find the full survey guide on the Military Friendly company survey page.

How is VETS Indexes different from Military Friendly?

VETS Indexes runs the VETS Indexes Employer Awards. This one is built around hard numbers. The survey runs about 65 questions and focuses on metrics, not essays. So you are not writing a story about your culture. You are reporting your actual data.

The program was built with input from veteran employment experts across government agencies, nonprofits, and corporate America. For most metrics, they ask for two years of data. That could be 2024 and 2025, calendar year or fiscal year. So you need clean records before you start.

One thing veterans respect here: the data stays private. Everything you report in the VETS Indexes survey is treated as confidential and never published. They grade on numbers, then give you an award tier. There is no cost to participate, be evaluated, or receive an award.

So the choice often comes down to this. If your story is strong but your raw numbers are still growing, Military Friendly may suit you. If your retention and hiring numbers are genuinely good, VETS Indexes lets the data speak.

What is Military Times Best for Vets?

Best for Vets is run by Military Times, a media brand veterans already read and trust. That trust is the whole point. A ranking from a publication that covers the military for a living carries weight a vendor badge does not.

This one is a ranked list, not a pass-fail badge. You compete for a spot, and your rank is public. The Best for Vets methodology scores you across weighted KPI domains. Recruitment and employment practices and retention and support programs count the most. So the same theme repeats: keeping veterans matters as much as hiring them.

There is a catch on completeness. Only survey submissions that are at least 85 percent complete get included in the rankings. A half-finished survey does not just lower your score. It drops you out entirely. So block real time to finish it.

To participate, you ask to be added to their contact database, then they email you the survey when the window opens. It is free, and the window is limited each year. Miss it and you wait until next cycle.

Should you go for the HIRE Vets Medallion instead?

The three programs above are private. The HIRE Vets Medallion is federal. It is run by the U.S. Department of Labor's Veterans' Employment and Training Service. It is the only federal-level veterans' employment award. That alone gives it a different kind of weight.

The award recognizes hiring, retention, and professional development of veterans. There are tiers for small businesses, nonprofits, and large companies. You apply at HireVets.gov through the DOL. The application window has closed around April 30 in recent years, so mark your calendar early. For a full walkthrough of the criteria, tiers, and application steps, see our guide on how to apply for the HIRE Vets Medallion Award.

Two things make this one stricter. First, you must certify that you comply with both USERRA and VEVRAA. Second, there is a required application fee, unlike the free private surveys. So this is the one designation that costs money up front. For many companies, the federal seal is worth it.

If you take government contracts, this award also signals you take your VEVRAA compliance obligations seriously. That is a real edge in the GovCon space.

How do you prepare to win a designation?

Most companies lose points on the same things. Not because their veteran program is weak, but because they walk into the survey unprepared. You can fix that before you ever open the form.

Start by pulling your numbers. Every program asks for veteran hiring, retention, and turnover data. VETS Indexes wants two full years of it. If your HR system does not flag who is a veteran, you cannot report a clean number. A guess will hurt you. So set up that tracking now, well before survey season.

Next, write down what your program actually offers. Not what you wish it offered. Surveys ask about veteran mentorship, leadership development, a veteran employee resource group, and military leave policy. If you run a real veteran employee resource group, that scores. If you have a vague intent and no program, it will show.

Then assign one owner. These surveys pull data from recruiting, HR, benefits, and legal. A single person chasing answers from four teams the week of the deadline is how submissions end up incomplete. That is how you miss the 85 percent threshold. Give it a real owner and a real timeline.

One more habit pays off. Keep your survey answers from year to year. When the next cycle opens, you update rather than rebuild. That alone turns a multi-week scramble into a two-day refresh.

Which designation should your company pursue?

You do not have to pick just one. Many strong veteran employers hold two or three. But if you are starting out, sequence it. Do not blast all four surveys in one quarter and burn out your team.

Size matters too. A midsize company with a small HR team should not try to win a public ranking against a Fortune 100 program in year one. Start with the free badge, build your numbers, then climb. The point is to earn each one honestly, not to collect logos.

What happens after you earn the badge?

Here is the part most companies get wrong. They win the designation, slap the logo on the careers page, and expect veteran applicants to flood in. Then nothing happens. The badge is a starting line, not a finish line.

A designation tells a veteran you are worth a look. It does not write your job descriptions, screen your applicants, or fix a hiring process that confuses military candidates. If your badge is not bringing in applicants, the problem is usually downstream of the badge. I wrote a full breakdown on why a military-friendly brand stops converting veterans and how to fix it.

The work that actually fills your pipeline lives in three places. Your job descriptions, your sourcing, and your interview process.

• Write postings veterans understand. A title and a skills list that match military experience pulls applicants a badge alone never will. See how to write a job description that attracts veterans.
• Build a real sourcing motion. A badge is passive. Active sourcing is what fills reqs. Map it out with a veteran recruiting strategy playbook.
• Make the workplace match the badge. The designation promises a veteran-friendly culture. Deliver it with a veteran-inclusive workplace checklist.

Remember the scoring. Every program weights retention heaviest. So the same investments that earn the badge are the ones that keep it. Treating veteran hiring as a real part of your diversity and inclusion strategy is what makes the badge true.

Where do you find the veterans to back it up?

A designation works only if you can actually hire and keep veterans. That means you need a steady flow of qualified military candidates. The badge gets attention. The pipeline gets results.

That is where BMR comes in. We add over 1,000 new veteran and military spouse profiles every month, and our community has built more than 60,000 resumes. These are service members translating their experience into civilian terms and actively looking for the right employer.

If you want to put the designation to work and reach veterans who are ready to be hired, reach out to access BMR's veteran talent pool. The badge tells veterans you care. The candidates we connect you with let you prove it.