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BambooHR is a well-known talent management system that helps streamline HR functions for small and medium-sized businesses.

While it's certainly a worthwhile solution, it's far from the only option out there, so as part of your search you'll want to consider other BambooHR competitors that could be a better fit for your needs.

Drawing on my personal experience as a former HR specialist, I'll walk you through my recommendations for the best BambooHR alternatives to simplify your HR functions.

What is BambooHR? 

BambooHR is a cloud-based Human Resources Information System (HRIS) designed primarily for small to medium-sized businesses.

The package includes features such as employee information management, recruitment and onboarding (gets good feedback), performance management, leave tracking, and payroll processing.

The tool aims to make HR processes more efficient, improve data organization and reporting, and enhance employee development and engagement.

Why Choose a BambooHR Alternative?

Even though BambooHR is a solid choice when it comes to HRIS systems, there are several reasons why you might want to go with a BambooHR alternative, including:

1. Limited advanced features

BambooHR is great for core HR tasks but lacks deeper functionality like advanced analytics, compensation planning, and complex org management. If you're scaling fast or need strategic HR tools, you might outgrow it quickly.

2. Payroll limitations

Its native payroll (TRAXPayroll) only supports the U.S., and it's fairly basic. If you have or plan to hire globally, you'll need additional systems to manage international payroll.

3. Basic customization

Custom workflows and reporting are somewhat limited compared to more robust platforms. This can be a drawback if your processes are unique or evolving rapidly.

4. Integration gaps

BambooHR integrates with many tools, but the integrations aren't always deep or seamless. You may need workarounds or extra tools to build a complete HR tech stack.

Consensus: The consensus amongst the HR community is that BambooHR is great for smaller companies, but it's not recommended as a scalable solution if your org is 400+ ee or plans to get there soon.

Best BambooHR Competitor Reviews

Below you’ll find a brief description of the top 10 BambooHR competitors in the HRIS market. To help you find the best option for you, I’ve summarized their key features and analyzed what they have to offer that BambooHR doesn’t.

Best BambooHR alternative for global payroll and compliance

  • Free demo available
  • Pricing upon request
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Rating: 4.8/5

Deel is a global payroll and compliance platform designed to simplify the complexities of hiring international talent.

By providing a comprehensive suite of tools for managing contracts, payments, and compliance, Deel enables companies to hire, pay, and support workers in over 150 countries.

Key features

One of the primary reasons Deel stands out as a good alternative to BambooHR is its focus on international payroll and compliance.

While BambooHR is a versatile HR management system with a range of features for handling employee data, performance management, and time tracking, it lacks the specialized tools needed for managing a global workforce.

Deel excels in this area by offering localized compliance solutions and automated tax filings, which are essential for companies with international employees and contractors. 

Additionally, Deel simplifies the process of creating, managing, and storing contracts for both employees and contractors, with customizable templates that ensure compliance with local labor laws. Its payment platform supports multiple currencies and payment methods, offering more flexibility and convenience than BambooHR.

By integrating contract management and payroll into a single platform, Deel eliminates the need for multiple systems and reduces administrative overhead. 

Integrations: Deel integrates with Greenhouse, HiBob, Lever, NetSuite, Ashby, BambooHR, QuickBooks, Slack, Workday, Xero, and others.

Best for scalable recruitment workflows

  • Free demo available
  • Pricing upon request
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Rating: 4.3/5

Greenhouse is a comprehensive hiring platform designed to centralize your recruitment process from sourcing candidates to onboarding new hires.

It offers tools to create structured hiring practices, ensuring fair and efficient recruitment. By consolidating your hiring activities, Greenhouse helps your team make more informed decisions.

Key features

Greenhouse stands out as a strong competitor to BambooHR by concentrating on recruitment-specific features that are essential for companies seeking an effective applicant tracking system.

The platform supports scalable workflows and aims to improve the candidate experience, catering to businesses of all sizes. Unlike BambooHR, which offers broader HR management functions, Greenhouse is designed to manage the entire hiring process from talent sourcing to onboarding.

The platform also emphasizes a consistent and fair hiring approach, enabling your team to make data-driven decisions throughout the recruitment process.

This system ensures that every candidate is assessed using the same criteria, reducing bias and improving the quality of hires.

With its focus on structured hiring, you'll find that your team can create detailed job scorecards and interview kits, which help in standardizing interviews and evaluations. 

Integrations include LinkedIn Recruiter System Connect, BambooHR, DocuSign, Calendly, Slack, HackerRank, Spark Hire, HireRight, Namely, Microsoft Teams, Appcast, and Sterling.

Best BambooHR alternative for mobile-first onboarding

  • Free demo available
  • Pricing upon request
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Rating: 4.7/5

WorkBright is a comprehensive HR software solution designed to streamline the hiring and onboarding process for businesses.

It offers a range of features including remote I-9 verification, automated E-Verify, digital onboarding forms, and an applicant tracking system (ATS). 

Key features

One of the key differentiators is WorkBright’s mobile-friendly onboarding platform, which allows new hires to complete paperwork on their smartphones without the need for apps or downloads.

This feature is particularly beneficial for companies with remote or field-based employees, as it eliminates the logistical challenges often associated with traditional onboarding methods.

Another standout feature of WorkBright is its compliance management, particularly the way it handles form I-9 and E-Verify processes.

WorkBright offers photo-upload functionality, allowing new hires to submit documents directly through their devices, which not only accelerates the verification process but also helps organizations maintain compliance with federal regulations seamlessly.

BambooHR, although equipped with compliance tools, doesn’t offer the same level of specialization in onboarding-specific compliance needs.

Integrations include ADP Workforce Now, E-Verify, iSolved, Netchex, ApplicantPRO, and Universal Background Screening.

Best for company-wide goal alignment

  • Free demo available
  • Pricing upon request
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Rating: 4.3/5

Mitratech Trakstar is a comprehensive performance management solution designed to help organizations align employee goals with business objectives, assess performance, and foster development.

Key features

I like Mitratech Trakstar's goal-setting functionality that lets you align individual goals with your company's objectives, ensuring everyone is on the same page.

You can track progress in real-time, which gives you valuable insights into how your team is performing and allows for timely adjustments.

Plus, Trakstar's flexible appraisal forms mean you can tailor performance reviews to suit your organization’s specific needs, ensuring feedback is always relevant and constructive, boosting a culture of continuous improvement.

Another notable feature is Trakstar's 360-degree feedback system. This tool enhances communication by gathering feedback from peers, subordinates, and managers, giving a well-rounded view of an employee's performance.

Trakstar also has strong reporting capabilities, enabling you to spot trends and development areas across your organization. 

Integrations include ADP Workforce Now, Paylocity, BambooHR, Namely, Ramco, UKG Pro, Syntrio, SFTP, Azure, Okta, Salesforce, Zoom, GoToWebinar, and DocuSign.

Best for an easy-to-use interface with responsive customer support

  • Free demo available
  • Pricing upon request
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Rating: 4.8/5

GoCo is an HR management solution designed to simplify and streamline various HR processes for small to mid-sized businesses.

The platform integrates essential HR tasks such as onboarding, payroll, benefits administration, and performance management into a single, cohesive system.

Key features

One of GoCo’s significant strengths lies in its user-friendly interface, which simplifies navigation and enhances the overall user experience.

The platform includes easy-to-understand reports and a drag-and-drop workflow automation builder, allowing users to customize workflows easily and streamline HR processes without extensive training or technical expertise.

This intuitive design helps HR teams manage tasks such as onboarding, time tracking, and benefits administration more effectively.

Additionally, GoCo excels in providing built-in compliance tracking features, which are essential for maintaining adherence to HR regulations.

The platform offers tools for ACA, FMLA, and OSHA compliance, along with a robust library of compliance materials and law alerts.

This comprehensive compliance support ensures that businesses can navigate complex HR regulations confidently.

Integrations are available with over 100 apps, including QuickBooks, Xero, Gusto, ADP, BambooHR, Namely, Zenefits, Workday, Rippling, Paychex, TriNet, Justworks, Greenhouse, Lever, JazzHR, Indeed, and ZipRecruiter.

Best free BambooHR alternative for candidate sourcing and applicant tracking

  • 21-day free trial
  • From $1.20/user/month + $71/month base fee
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Rating: 4.6/5

Freshteam is a SaaS HRMS (human resource management system) designed to support hiring, onboarding, time-off tracking, employee data management, and other HR workflows like building custom reports.

It’s a great choice for businesses with a heavy sales and marketing focus since Freshteam works seamlessly with other Freshworks products such as Freshdesk (customer support software), Freshsales (sales/lead generation software), Freshmarketer (multichannel marketing software), and Freshservice (IT service management software).

Key features

When stacked up against BambooHR, Freshteam scores higher in their candidate sourcing and applicant tracking tools.

While BambooHR does have an ATS (in their highest paid service level), Freshteam’s recruitment tools are available even in their freemium package.

The tool supports candidate sourcing from multiple sources (job boards, employee referrals, emails and social media), plus the ability to schedule interviews and roll out offers right from within the platform.

Additionally, they’ve built in helpful automations for key tasks like thank you emails or reference check reminders.

On top of all that, they also support candidate skills assessments and kanban-style boards for applicant tracking, plus detailed talent pool analytics so you can see where your recruitment efforts are hitting the mark, or falling short.

Integrations include Adzuna, LinkedIn, Indeed, ZipRecruiter, Office 365 Calendar, Google Calendar, Google Meet, Google Hangouts, HackerRank, HackerEarth, Codility and ClassMarker.

Best BambooHR alternative for managing compliance and advanced data analysis

  • Free demo available
  • From $4.50-$11.70/employee/month
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Rating: 4.8/5

intelliHR’s strategic and sophisticated HR management software covers core HR data processes, performance management, employee engagement and wellbeing, HR analytics, compliance, employee retention, team management and talent management.

Key features

While intelliHR is quite similar to BambooHR in many of their features, intelliHR has more to offer in terms of their strategic HR tools for compliance and advanced data analysis.

It's is a great choice for industries with a heavy focus on training and compliance, and I say that knowing how much work goes into an audit prep process after participating in 9 years of audits under an ISO 9001 designation.

intelliHR’s dashboard provides a quick overview of who is or isn’t compliant at any given time, to help your organization address any gaps and become audit-proof as soon as possible.

Their system can track compliance-related items such as mandatory training certifications, qualifications or licenses and automate follow-up emails to ensure no items expire unexpectedly. You can also run audit reports on all your data at any time, making it easy to prove your compliance status on short notice.

The data visualization tools within intelliHR are also deeper than with BambooHR. For example, their advanced employee analytics include feedback tools to measure team sentiment, employee satisfaction, eNPS (employee net promoter score), and keyword trends in a visual word cloud format.

Beyond that, intelliHR also tracks business performance analytics and workforce management analytics like business sentiment, attrition analysis, survival analysis, recruitment spend, training investment and many other items.

Integrations include 45+ other software tools including Google Suite, Microsoft Outlook, Slack, DocuSign, etrainu, Gol, ADP, WorkJam, DataPay, Xero, Zapier, and others.

Best BambooHR alternative for creating customizable workflows and automating processes

  • Free demo available
  • Pricing upon request
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Rating: 4.3/5

Since Sapling is technically an HCM (human capital management) platform, their main focus is on improving people-centric processes like onboarding and offboarding, and enhancing internal communication through features like intranet services, shared calendars, and mobile app accessibility.

Their HR platform also includes add-ons for other core HR functions such as dynamic org charts, track & approve chains, time off tracking, and employee surveys to monitor your level of employee engagement.

Key features

Since user reviews of BambooHR point to a lack of flexibility and customization options throughout their platform, Sapling is a better fit for companies looking to automate and customize their routine processes.

Sapling allows users to simplify common tasks through auto-assigned workflows, email scheduling, and customizable alerts, to standardize the employee experience while maximizing efficiency.

This is a valuable feature for organizations with distributed teams, as it helps HR both regulate and customize processes across locations, departments or types of employees, as needed.

Using the onboarding process as an example, the onboarding requirements for a frontline sales associate will look very different than the requirements for a senior manager or a lead engineer.

Rather than reinventing the wheel for each new hire, you can build up your automated processes for each segment of your workforce, then let them roll out automatically.

Some additional aspects that may lead you to choose Sapling over BambooHR include Sapling’s extensive forms library, their ability to incorporate background checks into the hiring process, and their deep integration with Google Suite—all of which are missing in BambooHR

Integrations include 50+ leading HR, IT and productivity systems including 15Five, ADP, ChartHop, Greenhouse, JazzHR, Jira, Kallidus, Lattice, Lessonly, Lever, LinkedIn, Okta, OneLogin, Paylocity, Slack, Workday, Zapier, and many others.


Best BambooHR alternative for expense management and unlimited recruiting

  • 30-day free trial
  • From $6/employee/month
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Rating: 4.3/5

Like all the other HRIS systems in this list, Sage HR is well-designed to take care of all your core HR needs, including onboarding, employee record management, leave management, performance reviews, shift scheduling, timesheets, and reporting HR analytics.

Their performance management module also includes modern features such as goals and OKRs (objectives and key results), 360 degree feedback, 1:1 meeting templates, employee surveys, and other feedback tools.

Key features

One area where Sage HR excels over BambooHR is their expense management module. Sage HR simplifies this process by automating the workflow via their mobile app.

Employees who have business expenses can snap a photo of their receipt on their phone, then fill out a simple approval form and submit it directly to their designated expense manager.

This saves a lot of time, and paper, since the entire approval process is digitized. In contrast, BambooHR does not currently include any expense tracking or management functionality to date.

Sage HR’s recruitment module also includes a more robust set of features than those available through BambooHR. With Sage HR, you can customize your pipeline stages and triggers, process an unlimited number of applicants through an unlimited number of pipelines, and also incorporate employee referrals.

Integrations include G Suite and Slack, as well as Zapier, which opens the door to many additional custom software integrations. Sage HR also has an API and supports single sign-on.

Best BambooHR alternative for benefits management and mobile access

  • 14-day free trial
  • From $10/user/month
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Rating: 4.1/5

It’s true that Zenefits and BambooHR do have a lot in common. Both systems have a good handle on employee data management, onboarding, and time-off tracking. As well, both systems have a long list of extra features that can be added on for an additional fee. The main difference is in the way each company has structured their packages. That means it’s extra important to know exactly which modules you’d need to make the best and most cost-effective decision. Several areas where Zenefits outshines BambooHR include their benefits management integration, their mobile app, and their level of customer support.

Zenefits includes a Health Insurance Marketplace, where you can review different group insurance plans to find the best option for your organization. Once you’re ready, you can request a quote through one of their certified brokers, who will also help you administer your plan—a service that’s included for no additional cost, no matter which pricing plan you choose.

The mobile app for Zenefits gives users access to all the same features they’d find in the web interface, whereas the BambooHR app is limited to time off requests, updating personal information, accessing the employee directory, or reviewing company-wide announcements. As well, Zenefits offers customer support via phone, email, or live chat whenever needed. In contrast, BambooHR’s customer support relies heavily on pre-recorded videos that don’t necessarily contain the answer you’re looking for.

Zenefits integrates with 45+ commonly used software systems including BetterWorks, Bonusly, Expensify, Google Suite, Office 365, Slack, Salesforce, Zapier, and many others.

Pricing for Zenefits is transparent, so you know exactly what you’re getting at each price level, which starts at $8 USD/employee/month. You can also request a free demo and a 14-day free trial through their website too.

BambooHR Competitors: Pricing Comparison Chart

This comparison chart summarizes pricing details for my top BambooHR competitor selections to help you find the best software for your budget and business needs.

Other BambooHR Competitors

Here are some additional BambooHR competitors that didn’t make it into my top 10 list, but are still worth considering:

  1. Workday

    For streamlining HR processes with user-friendly, comprehensive solutions

  2. Namely

    Performance management in an all-in-one HR tool

  3. bob

    BambooHR alternative for deepening company culture and employee engagement

  4. UKG Pro

    BambooHR alternative for learning management and high-volume recruiting

  5. ClearCompany

    BambooHR alternative for AI-powered applicant tracking

  6. Paylocity

    For comprehensive HR management

  7. Rise

    BambooHR alternative for Canadian organizations

  8. TimeTrex

    For time and attendance management with customizable payroll options

  9. Zoho People

    BambooHR alternative for organizations with variable workforces

  10. Gusto

    BambooHR alternative for full-service payroll and device management

If you still haven't found what you're looking for here, check out these other related tools that we've tested and evaluated:

Other Resources

I hope these software comparisons helped you gain some clarity on the best HRIS system for you—whether it turns out to be BambooHR or not.

Still interested in additional options? Check out our list of the best HRIS systems on the market, plus our best HCM software list and our best HRMS software list too.

Looking for something specifically designed for a startup or small business? We also have lists covering the best HRIS systems for small businesses as well as the best HRMS software for small businesses too.

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Kim Behnke
By Kim Behnke

Kim Behnke is an HR Tool Expert & Writer for People Managing People. She draws on her 9 years of human resources experience and her keen eye for systematic processes to support her analyses of the top HR tools on the market. She is passionate about maximizing efficiencies and streamlining workflows to ensure internal systems run smoothly. Kim's HR experience includes recruitment, onboarding, performance management, training and development, policy development and enforcement, and HR analytics. She also has degrees in psychology, writing, publishing, and technical communication, and recently completed a Certified Digital HR Specialist program through the Academy to Innovate HR. When away from her desk, she can usually be found outside tending to her ever-expanding garden.