Wisconsin non-compete law: Wis. Stat. 103.465 for recruiters

Wisconsin enforces a non-compete only if every restriction in it is reasonably necessary to protect the employer. The statute, Wis. Stat. 103.465, is short and strict: a covenant that imposes any unreasonable restraint is "illegal, void and unenforceable even as to any part of the covenant or performance that would be a reasonable restraint." Wisconsin courts therefore do not rewrite an overbroad clause the way Texas, Florida or Georgia courts can. The statute also covers employee non-solicits, and the Wisconsin Supreme Court has used it to strike a staffing company's no-hire clause with a client. That is the law as of October 2026; 2026 bills to change it all failed.

General screening questions are in non-compete questions for candidates, and the agency and client clauses are in non-solicitation clauses for recruiters. This page covers what is different in Wisconsin, which is a lot for agencies.

What does Wis. Stat. 103.465 say?

The whole section is two sentences. Wis. Stat. 103.465 says a covenant by an "assistant, servant or agent" not to compete with the employer during or after employment, "within a specified territory and during a specified time is lawful and enforceable only if the restrictions imposed are reasonably necessary for the protection of the employer or principal." It then adds that any such covenant "imposing an unreasonable restraint is illegal, void and unenforceable even as to any part of the covenant or performance that would be a reasonable restraint." The Wisconsin Supreme Court has noted that the Legislature enacted it in 1957.

The Legislature's annotations to the section summarize how courts apply it. Since Chuck Wagon Catering, Inc. v. Raduege (1979), a covenant must:

1. be necessary for the protection of the employer;
2. provide a reasonable time period;
3. cover a reasonable territory;
4. not be unreasonable to the employee; and
5. not be unreasonable to the general public.

Failing any one of these sinks the covenant. Wisconsin has no salary threshold and no advance-notice rule; the strictness comes from the all-or-nothing rule instead.

What does "void even as to any part" mean in practice?

It means no blue pencil. In most states that enforce non-competes, a court faced with a two-year, nationwide clause can cut it to something reasonable. In Wisconsin, if the restraint is unreasonable, it fails.

The one qualification is divisibility. In Star Direct, Inc. v. Dal Pra (2009), the Wisconsin Supreme Court held that the statute did not eliminate the common-law rules on divisibility: covenants in one contract are divisible when they support different interests and can be read and enforced independently. In that case a clause barring contact with "past customers," defined as those who bought from the employer within one year before the employee left, was reasonable, while a clause barring work in "any business which is substantially similar to or in competition with" the employer was not.

The annotations give other examples of what fails: a provision that an insurance agent have no contact with company clients without any geographic limit, and a ban on working for a named competitor in any capacity, were held overbroad in Mutual Service Casualty Insurance Co. v. Brass (Ct. App. 2001). On consideration, the Supreme Court held in Runzheimer International, Ltd. v. Friedlen (2015) that an employer's forbearance from firing an at-will employee is lawful consideration for a covenant signed during employment.

Does it cover non-solicits and no-hire clauses?

Yes, and this is where Wisconsin matters most to recruiters.

• Employee non-solicits. In Manitowoc Co. v. Lanning (2018), the Court held that a provision barring a former employee from soliciting or encouraging any company employee to leave is a restraint of trade governed by section 103.465. It found the provision unenforceable because, without a specified territory or class of employees, it covered each of the company's roughly 13,000 employees "regardless of the business unit in which they work or where in the world they are located." The clause had been invoked over the recruiting of colleagues for the employee's new employer.
• No-hire clauses between companies. In Heyde Companies, Inc. v. Dove Healthcare, LLC (2002), a company that placed physical therapists at nursing homes sued a client that hired four of its therapists after ending the contract, claiming a fee of 50 percent of each therapist's annual salary under a no-hire clause. The Court held that "a no-hire provision agreed to by employers that restricts the employment opportunities of employees without their knowledge and consent constitutes an unreasonable restraint of trade," in violation of section 103.465 and public policy, and refused to enforce it.

For a staffing or recruiting agency with Wisconsin placements, Heyde is the case to know. A client contract that charges a fee or bars hiring your contractors, where the workers do not know about and consent to the restriction, is at risk in Wisconsin. Conversion-fee terms, how they are worded and whether workers agree to them are questions for your counsel; the federal antitrust side is covered in no-poach agreements and antitrust law.

Wisconsin non-compete rules at a glance

What should a recruiter ask a Wisconsin candidate?

Ask the same restrictive-agreement question of every candidate for the role and record the exact wording where the candidate can share it, because in Wisconsin the wording decides everything.

WISCONSIN CANDIDATE — restrictive agreements

1. "Have you signed a non-compete, a customer non-solicit, an employee
    non-solicit, or a confidentiality agreement?"
2. "How long does it last, and what territory, customers or
    employees does it name?"
3. "Is it one clause or several separate ones?"
4. "When did you sign it: at hire, or later during the job?"
5. "If you came through a staffing agency, did you agree to anything
    about being hired by the client?"
6. "Could the hiring company's lawyer see it, as far as it allows?"
Always: "We don't want any confidential information, documents or
client lists from your current employer."

• Do not tell the candidate "Wisconsin voids these." It voids unreasonable ones; a narrow, well-drafted clause can be enforced.
• If a placed contractor's client wants to hire them directly, check what the worker actually agreed to before invoking a no-hire or conversion clause.
• Be careful when a candidate offers to bring colleagues along. Their own employee non-solicit may be enforceable if it is narrow.

What is the risk to the hiring company?

Because a Wisconsin court will not narrow an overbroad covenant, disputes tend to be all-or-nothing: either the covenant is enforced as written or not at all. A narrow, reasonable clause, such as a one-year ban on contacting customers the employee served, is the kind most likely to survive and the kind most likely to affect the first months of a sales hire. Former employers also sometimes bring claims against the new employer, for example that it interfered with the contract or received confidential information; that turns on what the new employer knew and did, and is for its counsel.

Is Wisconsin changing the law?

Not as of October 2026. In the 2025–2026 session, Assembly Bill 567 would have made most post-employment non-competes void while keeping certain nondisclosure and customer-list protections, according to the Legislative Reference Bureau's analysis. Assembly Bill 675 and its companion Senate Bill 657 dealt with non-competes for medical practitioners. All three "failed to pass pursuant to Senate Joint Resolution" on March 23, 2026. The FTC's 2024 federal rule does not apply either: the Commission voted on September 5, 2025 to accede to its vacatur, and a February 12, 2026 Federal Register notice removed it from the Code of Federal Regulations.

For licensing and hiring basics, see the Wisconsin staffing agency license guide and hiring employees in Wisconsin. For a state at the other end of the scale, compare Texas, where courts must reform an overbroad covenant rather than void it.

A Wisconsin checklist

• Restrictive-agreement question asked of every candidate, in the same words.
• Exact scope recorded: time, territory, customers or employees, and whether clauses are separate.
• Employee non-solicits treated as covered by 103.465, not as harmless.
• Your own client contracts checked for no-hire or conversion terms the workers never agreed to.
• No opinion on enforceability; candidate pointed to their own lawyer.
• Client and counsel informed before the offer; "no confidential information" repeated in writing.