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With so many different talent acquisition software solutions available, figuring out which is right for you is tough. You know you want to optimize the recruitment process for your company, making it more efficient and effective—but now need to figure out which tool is best. In this post, I'll help make your choice easy, sharing my personal experiences using dozens of different talent acquisition tools with teams of all sizes, with my picks of the best talent acquisition software overall.

What is Talent Acquisition Software?

Talent acquisition software is a digital tool designed to assist organizations in efficiently finding and hiring suitable candidates. It encompasses functionalities for job posting, applicant tracking, candidate sourcing, resume screening, and communication management.

The purpose is to streamline the recruitment process, from initial candidate attraction to final selection, by automating and organizing key tasks. It enables recruiters to manage large volumes of applicants, enhances candidate engagement, and provides insights for data-driven hiring decisions.

Overviews of the 10 Best Talent Acquisition Software

Here’s a brief description of each top 10 talent acquisition software to showcase each tool’s best use case, their noteworthy features, and some pros and cons. Keep reading to find additional bonus picks at the bottom of the list.

Best talent acquisition software for AI-driven candidate sourcing

  • 14-day free trial
  • From $15/user/month
Visit Website
Rating: 4.9/5

Manatal is an advanced talent acquisition system that utilizes artificial intelligence to efficiently and effectively source and identify the best candidates for job positions. With its AI-driven candidate sourcing capabilities, Manatal stands out as the best tool for HR teams, recruitment agencies, and headhunters to source and hire candidates faster and more effectively.

Why I picked Manatal: I decided to include Manatal in this list after evaluating its AI-driven candidate sourcing capabilities. Their AI Engine simplifies the hiring process by suggesting the best candidates for a job and automating redundant tasks. This technology, combined with the ability to enrich candidate profiles with data from over 20 social media and public platforms, makes Manatal distinct in the market. Their AI-sourcing agent is an intelligent matching system with extensive reach to over 2,500 job boards, making it an effective solution for sourcing top talent.

Manatal Standout Features and Integrations

Features include candidate sourcing from various channels, an applicant tracking system with customizable fields and powerful search capabilities, a recruitment CRM for tracking leads and managing client relationships, AI recommendations to automate tasks and score applicants, collaboration and activities management, reports and analytics tools, a branded career page, support and assistance, and data privacy compliance.

These features, combined, offer a comprehensive solution for all aspects of the recruitment process, aiming to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of recruitment operations. And for recruiters on the go, Manatal also provides a full-feature mobile app.

Integrations are available with LinkedIn, Gmail, Outlook, Mailchimp, and other platforms. They also have an open API to support custom integrations.

Pros and cons

Pros:

  • Ability to share job openings on many job boards with one click
  • Customizable job pipeline and recruitment stages
  • Responsive and helpful customer support

Cons:

  • Could use more native software integrations
  • No multi-lingual user interface abilities

Best for detailed tracking across the candidate journey

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

Greenhouse is a comprehensive hiring platform designed to manage the recruitment process from talent sourcing to onboarding. It offers scalable workflows, supports structured interviewing and decision-making, and provides robust reporting and insights. The platform integrates with various tools and caters to businesses of all sizes.

Why I picked Greenhouse: I like Greenhouse's robust Applicant Tracking System (ATS), which provides detailed tracking and management capabilities for each candidate's journey. This system allows for efficient management of resumes, scorecards, and candidate communications, ensuring that hiring managers can make data-driven decisions.

Additionally, Greenhouse offers customizable job postings, which enable companies to tailor job descriptions to resonate with their desired audience and align with company values. This level of customization ensures that job postings are not only attractive but also effective in drawing in the right talent.

Greenhouse Standout Features and Integrations

Features include automation and personalization tools to identify and attract qualified candidates, keeping them engaged throughout the process. The customizable dashboards allow organizations to highlight the metrics that matter most, making impactful improvements to the hiring process. Additionally, the AI email generator optimizes candidate outreach by fine-tuning the length, tone, and grammar of emails.

Integrations include LinkedIn, Indeed, Monster, ZipRecruiter, BambooHR, Calendly, Checkr, Codility, Criteria Corp, Crosschq, DocuSign, GoodTime, HackerRank, and HireRight.

Pros and cons

Pros:

  • Good candidate tracking and communication tools
  • Allows for personalized workflows
  • Provides in-depth analytics

Cons:

  • Can be complex to set up
  • Limited customization options

Best talent acquisition software for AI matching

  • 15-day free trial + free demo
  • From $149/month, with up to 20 seats
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Rating: 4.6/5

Workable is a recruitment and applicant tracking software that uses AI to connect acquisition teams with qualified candidates. 

The solution maintains a database of over 160 million job seekers and automatically provides you with a list of 50 candidates every time you post a job. This helps you speed up your hiring process and enables you to build a contact list of qualified people. 

Workable’s passive candidate search functionality crawls social media platforms and creates detailed candidate profiles that include email addresses and social links, so you can contact highly skilled individuals directly. The platform also enables you to share your job on 200+ job sites, so you can increase your reach. Workable’s automation features make it ideal for businesses that are looking for candidates with specific skill sets, such as those operating in tech or SaaS. 

Workable Standout Features and Integrations

Features include job advertising, onboarding, candidate assessments, AI-powered matching, video interviews, background checks, offer letters, and e-signatures. 

Integrations are natively available with dozens of apps, including BambooHR, Factorial, Gmail, HR Cloud, Microsoft Outlook, Namely, Sapling, ZipRecruiter and Zoom. 

Workable Plans and Pricing

Plans begin at $129 per job posting, per month. They also offer a 15-day free trial. 

Pros and cons

Pros:

  • Offers a variety of templates
  • Workflows are easy to set up
  • Good onboarding

Cons:

  • Search filters could be better
  • Some email templates need more customization options

Best for skill-based, auto-scored assessments

  • Free trial available
  • From $45/month (billed annually)
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Rating: 5/5

Canditech is a pre-employment assessment platform that offers over 500 customizable skill assessments and job simulations to help employers evaluate candidates' technical and soft skills, cognitive abilities, and personality traits. 

Why I picked Canditech: The platform's extensive library of over 500 skill assessments can be customized to fit specific roles and employer branding. This allows companies to evaluate both technical and soft skills through job-simulation tests and video interviews, providing a more holistic view of a candidate's potential. 

The software also automates many time-consuming tasks, such as resume screening and interview scheduling, which not only speeds up the recruitment process but also reduces the resources spent on lengthy hiring procedures. Additionally, Canditech restricts the collection of personal information such as age, gender, and race, to promote a more diverse and equitable hiring process.

Canditech Standout Features and Integrations

Features include job simulation assessments that predict future job performance through real job task simulations, helping to avoid costly mis-hires. The platform's cheat-proof assessments also ensure the integrity of candidate evaluations with advanced anti-cheating measures, including ChatGPT detection. 

Integrations include Lever, SmartRecruiters, Greenhouse, Workable, Pinpoint, Ashby, Comeet, JazzHR, Salesforce, HubSpot, Slack, OpenAI, Microsoft Dynamics CRM, Microsoft Teams, and Zendesk.

Pros and cons

Pros:

  • Tests are highly customizable
  • Assesses both technical skills and soft skills
  • Comprehensive library of tests suitable for various roles and industries

Cons:

  • Customization may present a learning curve
  • Initial setup and integration with existing systems can be time-consuming

Best for global recruitment automation

  • 14-day free trial
  • From $50/user/month
Visit Website
Rating: 4.8/5

Recruit CRM is a comprehensive software platform designed to streamline the recruitment process for agencies and executive search firms. It offers a suite of tools that facilitate candidate tracking, client management, and team collaboration, all integrated into a user-friendly interface. 

Why I Picked Recruit CRM: Recruit CRM excels as a talent acquisition software due to its powerful combination of applicant tracking system (ATS) and customer relationship management (CRM) tools, which are essential for modern, efficient hiring processes. It supports recruiters by providing a centralized database where all candidate information, including resumes, communication history, and interview notes, is easily accessible. This streamlines the candidate management process, ensuring that no details are lost and every candidate is accurately tracked through each stage of the hiring process.

Additionally, the software's analytics capabilities are a significant asset for talent acquisition. Recruit CRM generates detailed reports on various recruitment metrics, such as time to hire and source effectiveness, allowing recruitment teams to identify bottlenecks and optimize their strategies. This data-driven approach helps in making informed decisions that can significantly enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of recruitment campaigns.

Recruit CRM Standout Features and Integrations

Recruit CRM offers a variety of features to enhance recruitment processes, including applicant tracking system capabilities, customer relationship management tools, and job board integrations. It allows users to automate workflows, manage candidate pipelines, and generate detailed analytics and reports. The software also supports email and calendar synchronization, offers a mobile app for on-the-go access, and provides tools for team collaboration and communication.

Recruit CRM integrates natively with several tools to streamline recruitment activities. These integrations include LinkedIn, Gmail, Outlook, Zapier, QuickBooks, Xero, Twilio, RingCentral, Mailchimp, and Google Calendar. These connections help users efficiently manage communications, accounting, marketing campaigns, and scheduling directly from the platform.

Recruit CRM offers multiple pricing tiers starting from $69 per user per month.

Pros and cons

Pros:

  • Comprehensive integration capabilities
  • Effective and intuitice candidate management
  • Extensive analytics and reporting features

Cons:

  • Limited customizations for certain niche industries
  • Learning curve for some advanced features

Best talent acquisition software for recruiting and onboarding

  • Free demo available
  • Pricing upon request
Visit Website
Rating: 4.6/5

ClearCompany is a talent acquisition software that provides recruiters with an all-in-one solution for finding and managing the best talent available, while centralizing their entire recruitment process.

ClearCompany offers a full suite of products designed to make recruiting easier and more efficient. Its applicant tracking system (ATS) allows employers to post jobs on their website or other job boards and track applicants through the hiring process. You can create job descriptions and postings, manage incoming applications, conduct interviews, and onboard new hires.

Recruiters can easily search for candidates based on criteria such as experience level, skillset, or location. It also has automated workflow tools that allow them to quickly identify qualified candidates from the applicant pool, saving hours of manual work on their part.

ClearCompany provides recruiters with data-driven insights into their performance and how it compares to industry standards. This allows employers to get an objective view of how effective their recruiting efforts are and adjust accordingly, if necessary.

The software provides guidance on best practices when it comes to talent acquisition strategies. For instance, the platform offers advice on how to create more attractive job postings that will draw in more qualified applicants and tips on how to conduct better interviews that focus on assessing soft skills rather than just technical knowledge.

The software also includes an automated onboarding system that makes the process of bringing new employees into an organization simpler and faster. The system creates personalized onboarding plans for each employee based on their role in the company and provides tools such as checklists, reminders, documents, and approvals needed throughout the process. This helps reduce paperwork and administrative time while ensuring accurate data is collected from each new hire before they start work.

ClearCompany Standout Features and Integrations

Features include an applicant tracking system, branded career sites, job postings & job board management tools, video interviewing, text recruiting tools, background-checking workflows, interview scheduling automation, rich candidate profiles, and detailed reports & analytics covering all aspects of your recruiting funnel, including time-to-hire metrics.

Integrations are available natively with 100+ popular HR software solutions, including payroll providers, time-tracking apps, and performance management solutions. Key integrations include Absorb LMS, ADP, BambooHR, eSkill, Glassdoor, Gmail, Indeed, LinkedIn, Microsoft Office 365, Okta, OneLogin, ScreeningOne, SimpliVerified, Sterling, and many others.

ClearCompany Plans and Pricing

Pricing details for ClearCompany are available upon request. You can also request a free demo through their website.

Pros and cons

Pros:

  • Integrated e-signature capability saves time and removes hassles
  • User-friendly virtual onboarding process works well for remote staff
  • Well-rounded talent management features cover the whole employee lifecycle

Cons:

  • No free trial available
  • Pricing details are not transparent

Best talent acquisition software for candidate sourcing

  • 15-day free trial + free plan available
  • From $25/user/month (billed annually)
Visit Website
Rating: 4.4/5

Zoho Recruit is a recruitment management solution that helps in-house talent acquisition specialists and staffing agencies source great candidates. 

The solution integrates with dozens of free and premium job boards and with your social media channels, so you can maximize your reach and increase your chances of finding top talent. Hiring specialists can map skill sets to job descriptions, allowing the software’s artificial intelligence to match candidates automatically. 

Zoho Recruit makes candidate sourcing easy, so it’s ideal for freelance recruiters, staffing agencies, and the HR departments of medium to large organizations. 

Zoho Recruit Standout Features and Integrations

Features include social recruiting, reference checking, onboarding tools, AI matching, and career site creation. 

Integrations are natively available with dozens of solutions, including all Zoho products, Checkr, DocuSign, LinkedIn, Mailchimp, Microsoft Outlook, and Slack. 

Zoho Recruit Plans and Pricing

Plans begin at $30 per user, per month. They also offer a 15-day free trial and a free-forever version for one active job. 

Pros and cons

Pros:

  • Customizable workflows
  • Free plan available
  • Customizable career page

Cons:

  • Tool may seem overwhelming at first
  • Career page can sometimes look bad on mobile devices

Best talent acquisition software for career site creation

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

Freshteam is a HR software that enables businesses to create customizable career sites without writing code. 

Thanks to its drag-and-drop website editor and the variety of templates it offers, Freshteam makes it easy to create a branded career site to attract job seekers. The software also integrates with free and premium job boards, so organizations can attract leads from multiple channels. 

Freshteam is an ideal recruiting tool for startups and small businesses because it offers a free-forever plan for organizations with up to 50 employees. Businesses can use the software to find the right candidates as they scale and upgrade their plans whenever necessary. 

Freshteam Standout Features and Integrations

Features include applicant tracking system, talent pool management, interview scorecards, offer management, onboarding and offboarding, and recruitment reporting. 

Integrations are available natively with multiple tools, including Indeed, Jooble, LinkedIn, Instahyre, Microsoft Office 365, and ZipRecruiter. 

Freshteam Plans and Pricing

Plans begin at $71 per month plus $1.20 per employee, per month. They also offer a 21-day free trial and a free-forever plan for up to 50 employees. 

Pros and cons

Pros:

  • Free plan for startups and small businesses
  • Good automation features
  • Comprehensive learning guides and tutorials

Cons:

  • Automatic triggers can be difficult to set up
  • User interface could be improved

Best talent acquisition software for AI-driven candidate matching

  • 14-day free trial + free demo
  • Pricing upon request
Visit Website
Rating: 4.5/5

SeekOut is a talent intelligence platform that helps recruiters attract and retain job seekers with AI. 

SeekOut allows you to expand your talent pool with AI-driven candidate matching. The tool can automatically identify candidates based on your job description, and you can trim your results using software’s advanced search capabilities with a combination of keywords and filters.

SeekOut is a talent sourcing tool that helps businesses connect with the right candidates. Thanks to the software’s ability to access platforms like GitHub to source candidates, it’s ideal for organizations that are looking for tech talent. 

SeekOut Standout Features and Integrations

Features include AI matching, ATS rediscovery, candidate engagement, diversity hiring, and talent analytics.

Integrations are available natively with multiple apps, including Ascendify, Greenhouse, iCIMS, Lever, SAP SuccessFactors, and Workday. 

SeekOut Plans and Pricing

SeekOut offers custom pricing upon request, as well as a free demo. 

Pros and cons

Pros:

  • Great for advanced, niched searches
  • No outreach limits
  • Sources talent from rarely used social platforms

Cons:

  • Candidate social profiles could be updated more frequently
  • The large number of features can seem overwhelming at first

Best talent acquisition software for diversity recruiting

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

Yello is a talent acquisition software that enables recruiters to connect with top diverse talent from 7,000+ campuses across the US. 

The software allows businesses to access a database of over 6 million candidates in WayUp and use their self-reported data to create engaging job opportunities. The data is Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) compliant, and recruiters can segment candidates based on their major, gender, location, ethnicity, and more. 

Yello allows recruiting teams to speed up their hiring process. The software can automatically identify qualified candidates with its built-in screening feature and can knock out unqualified individuals based on custom criteria. The tool sends an automatic response to all candidates within 24 hours, improving their application experience. 

Yello Standout Features and Integrations

Features include campus recruiting, events management, built-in screening, and automated messages. 

Integrations are available natively with several tools, including iCIMS, Lever, Pymetrics, SAP SuccessFactors, Taleo, WayUp, and Workday. 

Yello Plans and Pricing

Yello offers custom pricing upon request, as well as a free demo.

Pros and cons

Pros:

  • Event management tools
  • Mobile-friendly career site
  • Branded job boards

Cons:

  • Not many native integrations
  • Pipeline progression reports could be more detailed

10 Best Talent Acquisition Software Comparison Chart

Here’s a comparison chart that summarizes basic details about each of my top talent acquisition software selections. You can view pricing details and the availability of free trials or demos side-by-side to help you find the best software that works for your budget.

Tools Price
Manatal From $15/user/month
Greenhouse Pricing upon request
Workable From $149/month, with up to 20 seats
Canditech From $45/month (billed annually)
Recruit CRM From $50/user/month
ClearCompany Pricing upon request
Zoho Recruit From $25/user/month (billed annually)
Freshteam From $1.20/user/month + $71/month base fee
SeekOut Pricing upon request
Yello Pricing upon request
Compare Software Specs Side by Side

Compare Software Specs Side by Side

Use our comparison chart to review and evaluate software specs side-by-side.

Compare Software

Other Options

Here are a few more options that didn’t make the best talent acquisition software list. I didn't have room for a full review for each of these but they are still worthy of consideration:

  1. Eightfold.ai

    Talent acquisition software for unbiased candidate selection

  2. iCIMS Talent Cloud

    Talent acquisition software for customizable workflows

  3. LeverTRM

    Talent acquisition software for referral tracking

  4. Evolve Talent Acquisition Suite (by Jobvite)

    Talent acquisition software for applicant tracking

  5. Pinpoint

    Talent acquisition software for all stages of the hiring process

  6. Teamtailor

    Talent acquisition software for automated candidate engagement

  7. Fetcher

    Talent acquisition software for automated outreach sequences

  8. TalentReef

    Talent acquisition software for sourcing and hiring hourly workers

  9. Unnanu Hire

    Talent acquisition software for mitigating bias in candidate scoring

  10. SmartRecruiters

    Talent acquisition software for conversational recruiting

Selection Criteria

Wondering what criteria I used to select the best talent acquisition software for this list? Here’s a summary of my evaluation criteria: 

  1. User Interface (UI): Talent acquisition solutions can help your team perform a lot of tasks. I look for tools with clean layouts so your team members can quickly find the right functionality for anything they want to achieve. 
  2. Usability: Hiring managers have a lot on their plates, so they shouldn’t have to waste time learning how to use a new tool. I selected software that’s easy to use so your team doesn’t have to go through a complex onboarding process. 
  3. Integrations: Talent acquisition software works best when paired with other solutions, such as your HR software, human resources information system (HRIS), customer relationship management (CRM), or human capital management (HCM) apps. I chose tools that offer multiple native integrations or can connect to other apps via third-party integration providers. 
  4. Value for $: The best talent management tools help you simplify and speed up your recruitment process. I selected solutions that enable your team members to achieve multiple tasks so you get a nice return on your investment.

Talent Acquisition Software: Frequently Asked Questions

Other Resources

Talent acquisition strategies can help your business scale. As Marc Benioff, co-CEO of Salesforce, said:

"Acquiring the right talent is the most important key to growth. Hiring was — and still is — the most important thing we do."

Read our article on Why And How To Create A Proper Talent Management Strategy if you want to discover how to build a long-term strategy that makes your business attractive to top performers. 

Our article on How To Attract And Retain Top Talent Through The Employee Life Cycle explains how to improve the way you’re perceived as an employer. And our article – Talent Management Versus Learning And Development – helps you understand how to promote a culture of self-development in your organization. 

If you want to receive actionable advice on how to improve your talent acquisition efforts in order to increase your organization’s performance directly in your inbox, subscribe to the People Managing People newsletter

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.