Recruiting Software Pricing Index 2026: 47 Vendors Compared

Key takeaway: Of 47 recruiting and HR software vendors whose pricing pages Noon Research tracks, 22 (47%) publish at least one price and only 9 (19%) publish a full price list; the other 25 (53%) are quote-only. Among the 20 vendors with a published entry plan, the median entry price is $99 per seat per month for per-seat tools and $143.50 per month for flat-priced tools, ranging from $15 per seat (Manatal) to $494 per seat (hireEZ). HCM suites almost never publish prices (1 of 10), ATS vendors do about half the time (12 of 21), and where a vendor publishes both billing terms, month-to-month costs a median 20% more than annual. 29 of the 47 pages were re-read on 21 September 2026; the rest were checked between July and September 2026.

Most "recruiting software pricing" articles quote a handful of vendors and a lot of hearsay. This one is different in a boring way: it is a count. Noon maintains a pricing page for each of these vendors, each one tied to the vendor's own pricing URL and a check date, and this index aggregates them into a single dataset. The dataset and the scripts that produced every number below are published in the Methodology section so the figures can be re-run. If you are budgeting for a new tool, start with the cost-per-hire benchmarks to size the problem, then use the tables here to see what the software line typically looks like.

How many recruiting software vendors publish prices?

Fewer than half. Of the 47 vendors in scope, 22 show at least one dollar figure on their public pricing page without a login or a sales call, and 9 of those show a price for every non-enterprise plan. The remaining 25 sell entirely by quote.

The 9 vendors with a full public price list are ApplicantStack, BambooHR, Breezy HR, Fetcher, JazzHR, Manatal, Workable, ZipRecruiter, and Zoho Recruit. Every one of them sells primarily to small and mid-sized teams, which is the pattern that runs through the whole dataset: the more enterprise the buyer, the less likely a price is public.

Which categories publish prices, and which never do?

HCM suites are the outlier. Nine of ten (ADP, ClearCompany, Cornerstone OnDemand, Oracle HCM, Paycor, Paylocity, Rippling, SAP SuccessFactors, and Workday) publish nothing; BambooHR is the only one with a rate card, listing Core at $10, Pro at $17, and Elite at $25 per employee per month for companies with more than 25 employees (BambooHR pricing, read 21 September 2026). If your recruiting tool comes bundled inside your HR platform, expect to negotiate blind.

The sourcing and CRM category is split between AI-native tools that publish a self-serve seat price (Juicebox, Pin, Metaview, SeekOut, hireEZ, Fetcher, and Gem's small-company tier) and incumbents that do not (LinkedIn Recruiter, ZoomInfo, Eightfold, Paradox, Arya). LinkedIn is a notable case: the Recruiter Lite page says "Try now for $0" and shows the price only at checkout, and Recruiter itself is "Contact sales", so under this index's definition LinkedIn publishes no list price (LinkedIn Recruiter Lite, read 21 September 2026). Our LinkedIn Recruiter pricing page covers the buyer-reported figures.

What does recruiting software cost at the entry level?

Twenty vendors publish a priced entry plan that can be compared on a monthly basis. Eleven price per seat, eight charge a flat monthly fee (usually capped by active jobs, company size, or usage), and one (BambooHR) prices per employee.

By category, the 11 ATS vendors with a published seat or flat price run from $15 to $400 per month with a median of $99, and the 7 sourcing and CRM tools run from $99 to $494 with a median of $115. In other words, the published entry point for an AI sourcing tool now sits in the same band as a small-business ATS.

The full list, with the vendor page each figure came from. Annual-billing prices are used where the vendor publishes both terms.

Two vendors publish a number that is not a comparable monthly plan price and are excluded from the medians above: SmartRecruiters lists Essential at "starting at $14,995" without stating the billing period, and Indeed publishes only a minimum Sponsored Job budget of $5 per day or $150 per month rather than a plan price.

How much more does month-to-month billing cost?

Six of the 20 vendors publish both an annual-billing and a monthly-billing rate for their entry plan. The monthly rate is 20% to 27% higher, with a median premium of 20%.

Three more state the discount without listing both prices: Fetcher (annual saves 30%), JazzHR (up to 24%), and Ashby (10%). Two vendors, Bullhorn and Loxo, publish annual-only plans with no monthly option at all. Where the flexibility is offered, budget roughly a fifth more for it.

Free tiers, free trials, and where the AI sits

Free tiers. Five of the 22 vendors that publish prices offer a permanently free software tier: Breezy HR (one active position), Juicebox, Metaview (first 100 profiles), Pin, and Zoho Recruit (one active job per recruiter license). Indeed and LinkedIn each offer a free job post with published limits rather than a free software tier.

AI behind a paywall. At least 6 of the 22 vendors with published prices place their AI features in a higher tier or a separately priced add-on rather than in the entry plan: Bullhorn (Amplify AI on Pro and above), Crelate (AI Assistant on Business and above), JazzHR (AI matching on Plus and above), Loxo (agentic features on Professional), Recruiterflow (AIRA agents in a separate custom-priced plan), and SmartRecruiters (Winston matching from Professional). This is a lower bound: it counts only vendors whose pricing page states the gating explicitly. The practical consequence is that the entry price of an ATS is often not the price of the AI features it advertises, a point we make in detail in our guide to justifying sourcing tool cost to a CFO.

The 25 quote-only vendors

For completeness, the vendors that publish no price at all as of their last check. Each linked page records the check date and any buyer-reported ranges, which are estimates and not list prices.

Two of these moved into the quote-only column during this check. Recruitee's pricing page now shows Start and Advance plans with a "Get a demo" button and no prices where it previously listed $199 and $349 per month, and Rippling's pricing page is a quote form (the $8 per employee figure that circulates for Rippling comes from a third-party review, not from Rippling). The linked vendor pages record the earlier figures and the dates they were read.

What this means for buyers

1. If a vendor publishes no price, you are the price discovery. With 53% of the market quote-only, the only reliable anchor is other buyers. Our vendor pages carry buyer-reported ranges where they exist, clearly labelled as estimates.
2. Per-seat pricing scales with your team, flat pricing scales with your hiring volume. Six of the 11 per-seat entry prices fall between $99 and $149 per recruiter per month; flat plans run from $29.99 to $400 per month but cap active jobs, company size, or leads. Model your actual seat count and job count before comparing stickers.
3. Ask what the AI costs. At least six priced vendors sell the AI separately or on a higher tier. The entry price and the advertised feature set are frequently not the same product.
4. Annual commitment is worth about 20%. That is the median published premium for monthly flexibility.

Noon, for transparency, sits in the quote-only column too: Noon sells one plan with unlimited sourcing, contacts, agents, and seats, does not publish a dollar price, and quotes per team. Where it differs from most of the vendors above is the pricing model rather than the disclosure: there is no per-seat fee and no tier that gates the AI, so the number you are quoted is the number for the whole team. For the wider category, see our guide to recruiting tools and the best AI recruiting software comparison.

Methodology

Sample. The 50 vendors for which noon.ai maintains a dedicated 2026 pricing page. Three were excluded as out of scope: Deel (global payroll and employer of record, not recruiting software), Jobber (field-service management), and Freshteam (discontinued; pricing page returns 404). That leaves 47 vendors: 21 ATS, 12 sourcing/CRM/talent intelligence, 10 HCM suites with a recruiting module, 3 job boards, and 1 assessment platform. Category assignment follows the vendor's own positioning.

Definition of "published". A price counts as published if a dollar figure is visible on the vendor's public pricing or product page without logging in, starting a checkout, or contacting sales. "Full" means every plan below the enterprise tier carries a price; "partial" means at least one plan does. Third-party figures (review sites, buyer reports, analyst estimates) never count as published, even when quoted on our own vendor pages.

Entry price. The lowest-priced paid plan, in USD per month, using the annual-billing rate where the vendor publishes both terms, and dividing yearly-only prices by 12 (JazzHR). Free tiers are excluded from the entry price. Per-seat and flat prices are reported separately and never averaged together. SmartRecruiters and Indeed are excluded from entry-price statistics for the reasons stated above.

Collection. Structured fields (publishes prices, pricing model, entry plan and price, monthly rate, free tier, AI gating, vendor URL, check date) were first extracted from the 50 noon.ai vendor pages, then hand-checked. On 21 September 2026, 29 vendor pricing pages were re-read live and the dataset corrected where the live page differed (BambooHR, Recruitee, ApplicantStack, Rippling, LinkedIn Recruiter). ZipRecruiter's page could not be re-read (bot protection) and relies on our 2 August 2026 check. The remaining pages carry check dates between July and September 2026 recorded on the linked vendor page.

Reproducibility. The dataset (vendors.json), the corrections applied (overrides.json), and the script that computes every figure in this article (compute.py) are published in the noon.ai website repository under seo/research/pricing-index-2026/. All medians are simple medians of the listed values.

Limitations. The sample is the set of vendors Noon writes about, which over-represents tools relevant to recruiting teams that source candidates and under-represents payroll-led HCM platforms and regional ATS vendors. Vendor pricing pages change frequently; two vendors changed disclosure status between our August checks and this one. Entry prices are list prices for the smallest plan and say nothing about mid-market or enterprise contract values. Per-seat and flat prices buy different things (a seat versus a job slot or company-size band), so the medians describe the market's published stickers, not cost per hire. Noon is a vendor in this category and does not publish a price; the index treats Noon exactly as it treats the other 25 quote-only vendors.

FAQ

What percentage of recruiting software vendors publish pricing?

In this index of 47 vendors, 47% (22) publish at least one price on their public pricing page and 19% (9) publish a full price list. 53% (25) are quote-only. Rates vary by category: 57% of ATS vendors publish something, against 10% of HCM suites.

What is the typical starting price for an applicant tracking system?

Among the 11 ATS vendors with a published entry plan, prices run from $15 per seat per month (Manatal) to $400 per month flat (Ashby), with a median of $99 per month. Flat-priced small-business ATS plans (ApplicantStack, JazzHR, Breezy HR, Workable) sit between $29.99 and $299 per month and cap active jobs or company size.

How much does AI sourcing software cost?

Seven AI sourcing and CRM tools publish an entry price: Juicebox ($99 per seat), Pin ($99), Metaview ($100 per seat), Fetcher ($115 flat), Gem ($130 for companies of 1 to 10 employees), SeekOut ($149 per seat), and hireEZ ($494 for an individual recruiter). The median is $115 per month. LinkedIn Recruiter, ZoomInfo, Eightfold, Paradox, and Arya publish no price.

Is annual billing much cheaper than monthly for recruiting software?

Where both rates are published, monthly billing costs 20% to 27% more than annual, with a median premium of 20% across six vendors. Fetcher advertises a 30% annual saving, JazzHR up to 24%, and Ashby 10%.

Does Noon publish its pricing?

No. Noon sells a single plan with unlimited seats, sourcing, contacts, and agents, and quotes per team. In this index Noon counts as one of the quote-only vendors, and third-party price estimates for Noon are not Noon's prices. The pricing page is the official answer.