Best Applicant Tracking System for Small Businesses 2024

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The best applicant tracking systems (ATS) for small businesses will save your company time by automating the recruitment process. They can help you streamline the hiring of new talent by collecting, sorting, and organizing resumes and placing applicants in a talent pool.

These applicant tracking systems can boost efficiency in the hiring process by automatically creating job posts and filtering resumes, allowing you to quickly identify the best applicants. To help you find the solution that best meets your needs, I’ve reviewed and compared the best applicant tracking systems for small businesses today.

The Best ATS for Small Businesses Tested by Our Experts

ClearCompany - Best ATS for Start-ups

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Rippling - Best for Full Talent and HR Management

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Monday.com - Best Free ATS for Small Businesses

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Zoho Recruit - Best for Self-Employed or Very Small Businesses

Free forever plan
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Manatal - Best Use of Social Media

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BreezyHR - Best Unique Recruitment Features

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Workable - Best for Small Businesses with Global Aspirations

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TeamTailor - Best ATS with a Career Website Builder

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BambooHR - Best for Small to Medium-Sized Businesses

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The Best ATS Solutions for Hiring Ranked

This list of ATS systems is based on my hands-on testing, which includes criteria like features, security, scalability, and overall value for money.

  1. ClearCompany — Best ATS for Start-ups
  2. Rippling — Best for Full Talent and HR Management
  3. Monday.com — Best Free ATS for Small Businesses
  4. Zoho Recruit — Best for Self-Employed or Very Small Businesses
  5. Manatal — Best Use of Social Media
  6. BreezyHR — Best Unique Recruitment Features
  7. Workable — Best for Small Businesses with Global Aspirations
  8. TeamTailor — Best ATS with a Career Website Builder
  9. BambooHR — Best for Small to Medium-Sized Businesses

How to Choose an ATS for Small Businesses

Selecting the best applicant tracking system (ATS) amidst the abundance of choices available can be tricky. Here are several key factors to consider:

Define Recruitment NeedsIntegration CapabilitiesPricing ConsiderationsEase of Use and SupportData Security and Access

Assess the roles you need to fill and the volume of applicants you anticipate. Also, think about the primary pain points in your hiring process. Then, look at the features above to see which provider best fits your needs.

Check that the platform can integrate with your overall tech stack and other HR tools like HRIS system, payroll, and email systems. You’d also want it to integrate with hiring tools like Zoom for video interviews and LinkedIn for job posting.

Determine your budget and choose an ATS that fits within it. Some systems offer free options with limitations, while others charge per user or offer tiered pricing plans. Consider scalability costs as your business grows.

Opt for an ATS that is easy to use and implement, minimizing disruptions to your workflow. Ensure the provider offers reliable customer support to address any technical issues promptly.

The Best Applicant Tracking Systems for Small Businesses Reviewed

In a crowded marketplace brimming with applicant tracking systems (ATS), I undertook a comprehensive evaluation to refine our selection.

Our rigorous assessment criteria at Techopedia include pricing, user-friendliness, integration capabilities, and each system’s overall efficiency in enhancing recruitment workflows.

1. ClearCompany — Best ATS for Start-ups

ClearCompany Logo

Free Trial N/A
Price From Quote-based
Top 3 Features Video interviews, Smart forms, Performance management suite for employees
Why We Picked It

ClearCompany is a reliable ATS and talent management platform that truly makes recruitment easy. The user-friendly ATS is perfect for businesses that are just dipping their toe into the world of applicant tracking system software, thanks to its clearly signposted widgets and intuitive interface.

Features
  • Video interviewing – While TeamTailor requires you to use external software to host video interviews, ClearCompany lets you do everything in app–which is great if you’re recruiting remote employees.
  • Talent management – ClearCompany’s software doesn’t just help with the recruiting process. It also helps you manage broader HR processes–and at no extra cost. By contrast, providers like BambooHR also offer additional features, but for an extra fee.
  • Automated texts – ClearCompany has a unique feature that enables you to automate the process of contacting candidates via text message to confirm interviews, making scheduling interviews easier.
  • Smart forms and resume management – After uploading their CVs, candidates often find themselves having to re-enter their employment data. ClearCompany auto-populates forms to prevent this, while apps like Monday and Manatal don’t.
  • Background checks – Another great feature of ClearCompany is its background check capability, which uses AI to screen top candidates autonomously. Saying that, Zoho and BreezyHR also offer this functionality.
Pricing Plans

ClearCompany distinguishes itself with two versatile plans: a comprehensive option that grants full access to the entire platform and a modular plan that allows users to select specific functionalities tailored to their needs. This flexibility enables you to choose the best fit for your recruitment strategy.

Plan Price
Modular Custom
Enterprise Custom

For both plans, ClearCompany maintains an opaque pricing structure, likely due to its scalability. The platform caters to a diverse range of companies, from small businesses to large enterprises, making a one-size-fits-all pricing model impractical.

Who's It Best For?

ClearCompany is a solid option for small businesses looking for a reliable, easy-to-use ATS that can grow with their business.

Pros pros

  • User-friendly interface
  • Great for ATS beginners
  • AI-powered recruitment
  • Excellent employee experience capabilities

Cons cons

  • No mobile app
  • No free trial
  • Pricing structure can be complex
ClearCompany ATS

 

2. Rippling — Best for Full Talent and HR Management

Rippling logo

Free Trial No
Price From Starts at $35/month (platform fee) + $8/user/month
Top 3 Features Global payroll, Onboarding, Great customer support
Why We Picked It

Rippling is a superb applicant tracking system that serves plenty of global organizations. I picked it because it’s much more than a recruitment platform. It also helps with employee engagement, payroll, and IT management. However, all these great features come at a price—and with a steep learning curve. In fact, from reading user reviews, Rippling is probably the most expensive provider on this list.

Features
  • One-stop shop – Rippling offers a comprehensive solution for HR, IT, and finance operations, integrating every facet of employee management. However, compared to Monday.com and Manatal, Rippling is on the pricier end of the spectrum.
  • Pipeline templates – Rippling’s arsenal of templates empowers users to tailor the candidate journey based on specific roles. Whether hiring for executive positions or entry-level roles, these templates offer flexibility to adapt recruitment processes accordingly.
  • Effortless scheduling – While Monday.com requires you to schedule interviews separately, Rippling lets you effortlessly schedule interviews directly within the ATS interface with just a click.
  • Unparalleled reporting – Rippling’s data and analytics dashboard was the most in-depth we saw, giving you access to detailed reports on recruiting vs headcount, pipeline by department and much more. That said, these reports are more fit for businesses with a global footprint than micro organizations.
  • Retention risk identifier – Rippling allows you to conduct employee surveys to identify employees at risk of leaving and inform your recruitment pipeline and employee engagement strategy.
Pricing Plans

Rippling doesn’t list its pricing on its website, meaning you’ll need to request a custom quote to gauge an idea of the cost. The good news is that Rippling offers modular functionality, meaning you’ll only pay for what you use.

Who's It Best For?

Rippling is one of the good applicant tracking systems options for fast-growing, global SMBs that want an end-to-end talent management solution.

Pros pros

  • Powerful automations
  • Simplified interviews
  • Next-level reporting
  • Broader employee engagement features

Cons cons

  • Opaque pricing
  • The complexity of the software can be intimidating
  • Might have too many features for micro-businesses
Rippling ATS

 

3. Monday.com — Best Free ATS for Small Businesses

monday.com Logo

Free Trial Free Plan + 14-day free trial
Price From Starts at $22/user/month
Top 3 Features Step-by-step applicant tracking, Endless automation triggers, Excellent array of integrations
Why We Picked It

I picked Monday.com for its cost-efficiency and flexibility. However, to say it’s a ready-to-go ATS wouldn’t be fair. To get the most out of Monday, you’ll need to spend some time setting up the platform to meet your exact needs. It’s more of a generic dashboard-based application that you can personalize.

Features
  • Complete business management suite – It’s one of the best automated project management solutions on the market. Monday’s drag-and-drop interface can be customized to fit your organization’s various business needs.
  • Step-by-step workflows – I found it easy to track each stage of the recruitment process step-by-step, although it doesn’t post jobs to job boards like ClearCompany or Zoho.
  • Solid data analytics – Monday visualizes data gathered from the recruitment process, like the number of applicants and referral sources. However, this data doesn’t go as deep as the likes of Rippling or TeamTailor.
  • Automations – Like all providers on this list, Monday.com offers recruitment automations to save you time and money. These are exceptionally simple to use, although TeamTailor’s AI bot takes the overall win.
  • Onboarding – You can design your recruitment dashboard to link to an onboarding dashboard for a truly end-to-end hiring experience at no extra cost.
Pricing Plans
Plan Price
Basic $10/seat/month
Standard $12/seat/month
Pro $20/seat/month
Enterprise Bespoke

Monday.com provides both monthly and annual pricing plans, with a minimum requirement of three users. Beyond the free plan, which includes three workboards, unlimited documents, over 200 templates, and mobile app access, their tiered offerings are as follows:

  • Basic – $10 per seat/month: Features unlimited viewers and items, 5GB of file storage, along with all free plan features.
  • Standard – $12 per seat/month: Adds calendar view, guest access, and up to 250 task automations per month, plus all Basic features.
  • Pro – $20 per seat/month: Incorporates private boards and documents, chart views, time tracking, and 25,000 task automations per month, along with all Standard features.
  • Enterprise – Price on request: Offers enterprise-level security, large-scale automations and integrations, advanced reporting, multilevel permissions, and premium support, including all Pro features.
Who's It Best For?

Monday.com is best for small businesses looking for a straightforward, cost-effective ATS and business automation suite. Ideally, you’ll have some technical knowledge if you use Monday.com, as it takes a little time to set up all the automations and get to grips with the platform.

Pros pros

  • Cost-effective ATS
  • Wider business automation suite
  • Over 200 templates for creating boards and using automations
  • Built-in collaboration tools for small HR teams

Cons cons

  • Requires technical know-how
  • Lacks next-level features like background screenings and job board posting
  • Pricing can escalate quite steeply based on a few new hires
Monday.com ATS

 

4. Zoho Recruit — Best for Self-Employed or Very Small Businesses

Zoho Logo

Free Trial 14-day free trial
Price From Free
Top 3 Features Free plan, Video interviewing, Plenty of customizable features
Why We Picked It

Zoho is a powerful suite of business applications–and its ATS certainly doesn’t fall short. With plenty of customization options, an AI assistant, and powerful recruitment features, Zoho would be a great applicant tracking system choice for self-employed or very small, busy recruitment agencies looking to uplevel their approach to sourcing candidates.

Features
  • AI-driven Screening – Zoho Recruit’s robust AI features screen candidates and boost the likelihood of you finding top-tier candidates who best fit the requirements. Saying that, Zoho’s AI features aren’t as easy to use as TeamTailor. You’ll need some scripting and coding knowledge to use the platform to its full potential.
  • Video Interviewing – Like ClearCompany, Zoho’s video interviewing features help to streamline the hiring process.
  • Wider system functionality – Zoho Recruit has expansive integration capabilities, encompassing a robust Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system and Zoho’s extensive suite of business products.
  • Resume management – This nifty, unique feature allows applicants to submit their resumes to your company through a dedicated widget, meaning candidates can show their interest even if their resumes don’t match an exact job posting.
  • Step-by-step oversight – The platform includes customizable features to track each step of recruitment, from receiving applications to onboarding new hires. Advanced analytics help optimize the process, ensuring only suitable candidates move forward.
Pricing Plans

Zoho Recruit offers a free-forever plan that allows one active job at a time. This may suit some small businesses. However, fast-growing organizations will likely want to post more jobs simultaneously, which is where the paid plans come in.

Plan Price
Standard $25/seat/month
Enterprise $50/seat/month

Zoho’s paid plans pack quite the punch for the price, especially if you only require one or two seats. Here’s a breakdown of what’s included:

  • Standard — $25/user/month billed annually — The standard plan enables you to post 10 active jobs at any one time. You’ll also get access to plenty of job boards and can build a branded careers website.
  • Enterprise — $50/user/month billed annually — This plan allows you to post up to 20 active jobs. You’ll also benefit from AI candidate matching.
Who's It Best For?

Zoho is a great choice for small businesses that already rely on the Zoho ecosystem. If you’re looking for a free ATS and only have limited recruitment needs, it could also be worth trying out the free plan.

Pros pros

  • Free option
  • Integration with Zoho’s other products is smooth and effortless
  • Plenty of options available for customization
  • 45-day money-back guarantee for added peace of mind.

Cons cons

  • Quite a steep learning curve
  • AI features only available on the most expensive plan
  • Limited number of job postings per month
Zoho Recruit

 

5. Manatal — Best Use of Social Media

Manatal Logo

Free Trial 14-day free trial
Price From Free
Top 3 Features Drag-and-drop recruitment interface, Candidate discovery, Staffing tracker
Why We Picked It

Manatal’s unique offering is its use of platforms like LinkedIn and Instagram to enrich candidate discovery and selection. Instead of relying solely on CVs and manual research, Manatal equips you with all the insights you could need about a candidate by using AI to discover and import candidate data from their social media profiles.

Features
  • LinkedIn data enrichment – If you aren’t happy with the candidate data you get from the applicant information, you can refine your candidate profiles by tapping into LinkedIn and other social media platforms.
  • Intuitive ATS – As with Monday, Manatal features a drag-and-drop recruitment pipeline that is super easy to use, and automated using AI.
  • Candidate discovery – Instead of waiting for candidates to come to you, Manatal enables you to take a proactive stance in candidate sourcing by importing profiles directly from LinkedIn and LinkedIn Recruiter.
  • Powerful AI assistant – Manatal’s AI assistant was excellent at finding desirable candidates. It analyzes job postings, cherrypicks the core skills and requirements, and cross-references this data with your talent pool to identify top talent.
  • Staffing tracker – This provider comes with a built-in staffing tracker that enables you to oversee every stage of the employment lifecycle for new hires.
Pricing Plans

Manatal is a powerful and cost-effective platform, especially for hiring teams of only one or two people. Here’s a closer look at pricing.

Plan Price
Professional $15/month
Enterprise $35/month

Manatal comes with a 14-day free trial, so you can get to grips with the platform before purchasing. Here’s a look at what you get:

  • Professional — $15/user/month — Post up to 15 jobs per month, and receive access to up to 10,000 candidates.
  • Enterprise — $35/user/month — Post an unlimited number of job postings and access unlimited candidates.

Read our full Manatal review

Who's It Best For?

Manatal is a great option for small businesses that typically rely on LinkedIn for the hiring process but want to make use of automation to make applicant tracking more seamless and low-touch.

Pros pros

  • Cost-effective
  • Access to candidates who don’t apply for roles
  • Kanban board tracking
  • Easy to use

Cons cons

  • Style of the interface is a little outdated
  • Not suitable for organizations with minor recruitment needs
Manatal ATS

 

6. BreezyHR — Best Unique Recruitment Features

breezy logo

Free Trial 14-day free trial
Price From Free
Top 3 Features Free plan, Personality testing, Simplified job posting
Why We Picked It

BreezyHR is a great option for small businesses that don’t want to just find qualified candidates but the best possible candidates for the roles they have available.

With features like personality testing, templates for industry-specific interview questions, and access to niche job boards, this innovative ATS candidate management will serve small businesses with specific candidate requirements excellently.

Features
  • Effortless job postings – This feature simplifies the hiring process by allowing job openings across more than 50 free and premium job boards with just a single click. Moreover, it empowers users to target niche and diversity-focused job sites, broadening the reach to a wider pool of qualified and diverse applicants.
  • Intuitive AI-infused process – Leveraging the power of AI, you can analyze resumes at scale by aligning required qualifications with the vacant position. Once you’ve narrowed down your candidates, you can lean on the AI feature to initiate an automated interview process, offering a selection of over 400 tailored questions based on skills, roles, or industry specifics.
  • Career site builder – Similar to Zoho and TeamTailor, users can create an engaging and mobile-friendly career site that effectively showcases the brand and available job opportunities. These sites are highly customizable or can be built from templates. Notably, it offers the unique feature of embedding job listings directly onto the company’s website through its widget or API.
  • Detailed applicant process – Offering exclusive features uncommon among other ATS providers, BreezyHR allows users to implement custom scorecards, candidate assessment, and background checks–all of which help you find the right candidate faster. It’s also one of the only providers that allows applicants to schedule their own interviews.
  • Broader HR capabilities – Like ClearCompany and Zoho, BreezyHR extends beyond traditional ATS capabilities to serve as a comprehensive HR and employee management solution.
Pricing Plans

BreezyHR offers a free plan with limited features like the ability to create a career website and post to job boards. However, you’ll be limited in the number of job postings you can implement. Then, there are the paid plans, which are as follows:

Plan Price
Startup $157/month
Growth $273/month
Business $439/month

Each of BreezyHR’s paid plans comes with unlimited users, candidates, and customer support. Here’s a breakdown of what’s included:

  • Startup Plan – $157/month: Offers unlimited candidate pools, along with background screening integrations, in addition to Free plan features.
  • Growth Plan – $273/month: Includes automated reference checking and customizable interview guides, alongside Standard features.
  • Business Plan – $439/month: Incorporates advanced questionnaires tailored for various industries, assessment integrations, and the capability to compare different candidates, building upon the features of the Growth plan.
Who's It Best For?

BreezyHR is a great choice for hiring managers in small businesses with industry-specific requirements or who want to take their recruitment process to the next level with features like personality tests and scorecards.

Pros pros

  • Free plan
  • Candidates have the ability to schedule their own interviews.
  • Unique recruitment features
  • Unlimited users

Cons cons

  • Can be expensive
  • Features might be too in-depth for some SMBs

 

7. Workable — Best for Small Businesses with Global Aspirations

Workable Logo

Free Trial 15-day free trial
Price From Starts at $149/month
Top 3 Features Onboarding features, Background screening, Wide array of job boards
Why We Picked It

Workable’s standout feature is its localized approach to recruitment. This ATS is perfect for companies that want to target talent globally. With features like native-language job postings and access to over 200 job boards across the world, Workable can help remote companies find international candidates that they may not otherwise come across.

Features
  • Excellent templates and widgets – Workable’s range of features make hiring a breeze. For example, you can use built-in templates to craft precise job descriptions and establish a structured hiring workflow. While these features aren’t as intuitive as those of Rippling and TeamTailor, Workable is still great to use.
  • Global job board access – Besides Rippling, Workable boasts access to the most extensive array of global job boards among its peers. With just a few clicks, users can post job listings to over 200 boards worldwide.
  • Local language recruitment – While platforms like TeamTailor and ClearCompany are confined to English-language recruitment, Workable breaks barriers by enabling job postings in the native language of the target country.
  • Find passive candidates – Workable interfaces with numerous job boards to identify passive candidates aligning with specific requirements. The software can even reach out to them on your behalf once you approve their selection.
  • Careers page – Like TeamTailor, Workable allows you to create an SEO-optimized career page to attract top talent to your company website.
Pricing Plans

Workable is a great tool, but it’s also expensive when compared to providers like Manatal and ClearCompany.

Plan Price
Starter $149/month
Standard $350/month
Premier $599/month

Workable offers three plans. The starter plan requires a monthly payment, while the higher-tier plans must be paid annually.

Starter — $149/month — For organizations with less than 50 employees. This plan allows you to post two active jobs at any one time. You can also use its AI sourcing tool to view up to 200 profiles, which runs out pretty quickly!

Standard — $360/month (monthly) or $299/month (annual) — This plan allows for unlimited active jobs along with 1,000 AI sourcing profile views per month.

Premier — $599/month — With this plan, you can get up to 20,000 AI sourcing profile views a year, along with a dedicated account manager and single sign-on support.

Who's It Best For?

Workable is suitable for small, growing businesses that want to run a remote, global organization.

Pros pros

  • Local language job postings
  • Global job boards
  • Passive candidate sourcing
  • Intuitive interface

Cons cons

  • Expensive
  • Not suitable for small, regional organizations

 

8. TeamTailor — Best ATS With a Career Website Builder

Teamtailor Logo

Free Trial 14-day free trial
Price From Starting from $200/month
Top 3 Features Powerful automations, Net Promoter Score (NPS) survey feature, Attractive and intuitive interface
Why We Picked It

TeamTailor makes omy list for its extremely intuitive interface and powerful recruiting software. With this platform, you can automate almost all of the recruitment process: from job posts written by TeamTailor’s AI assistant to smart triggers that autonomously message candidates and arrange interviews.

Most appealingly, TeamTailor makes it super simple for hiring teams to create a professional, eye-catching careers website, which can do wonders for small businesses looking to attract top talent.

Features
  • Self-scheduled interviews – Instead of relying on you to schedule interviews, TeamTailor empowers candidates to to their own interview scheduling by booking their own interviews based on your availability. This is a pretty rare feature only offered by TeamTailor and BreezyHR.
  • Strategic analytics – The platform equips you with insights about your recruitment funnel, helping you to identify potential areas for improvement. While this feature isn’t as robust as Rippling’s data-driven offering, it’s still impressive.
  • Career site builder – TeamTailor’s career site builder was, hands down, the best we tried. With drag-and-drop widgets and super simple navigation, it took us just minutes to create an attractive career website.
  • Mobile app – TeamTailor is amongst the minority of ATS providers that have invested in building a mobile app for on-the-go recruitment. Not only is this handy, but TeamTailor’s mobile app is exceptionally easy to use.
  • AI assistant – TeamTailor’s platform is embedded with an AI assistant, which can help with SEO-optimization for job ads, replying to candidates, video meeting summaries and much more. While this feature isn’t unique amongst the top ATS providers, TeamTailor’s AI assistant was the easiest to use in our view.
Pricing Plans

TeamTailor’s pricing plan used to start at $200 per month. However, since we last reviewed the software, its pricing structure has become opaque. You’ll now need to request a custom quote to gauge how much the software will cost your organization, with prices varying based on the size of your business.

Who's It Best For?

TeamTailor applicant tracking system is best for small businesses with ambitious hiring plans that require a unique career website and an always-on approach to recruitment.

Pros pros

  • Excellent customer support
  • Extremely easy to use
  • Great mobile app
  • Reliable AI-based assistant

Cons cons

  • The software might be too powerful for some small businesses
  • Can be expensive
  • No free plan
  • Onboarding comes at an extra cost.
TeamTailor ATS

 

9. BambooHR — Best for Small to Medium-Sized Businesses

BambooHR Logo

Free Trial 7-day free trial
Price From Custom
Top 3 Features Payroll, Employee mobile app, Onboarding and offboarding
Why We Picked It

BambooHR is a fantastic ATS for small businesses that don’t just want to find qualified candidates but want to make sure they keep them. With plenty of HR and employee engagement features, BambooHR helps small businesses attract, retain, and motivate their employees.

Features
  • HR suite – BambooHR is a comprehensive Human Resources Information System (HRIS), bundling together an array of features including an Applicant Tracking System (ATS), time tracking, payroll processing, and tools for employee engagement and satisfaction.
  • Complete employee lifecycle management – BambooHR facilitates seamless management of the entire employee lifecycle, encompassing hiring, onboarding, and even employee departures. This feature sets it apart from recruiting ATS solutions like Workable and Manatal.
  • Retention tools – BambooHR comes with an employee mobile app that covers everything from annual leave to goal performance setting.
  • Great candidate experience – This provider puts the emphasis on making a great first impression, using automation to ensure timely communication with applicants throughout the recruitment process, which can help your business standout from competitors.
  • Offer letters made easy – BambooHR simplifies the process of creating offer letters with customizable templates that automatically populate candidate information for various positions, job types, and other requirements. This feature sets it apart from other ATS providers, which don’t have this feature.
Pricing Plans

Like Rippling, Bamboo HR’s pricing is opaque. You’ll need to request a custom quote to gauge an idea of the cost for your organization.

Who's It Best For?

BamooHR is a solid choice for small businesses that want an end-to-end talent acquisition, management, and HR software solution.

Pros pros

  • Complete HR tool
  • Excellent onboarding features
  • Employee mobile app
  • Intuitive ATS

Cons cons

  • Opaque pricing
  • Features might be too extensive for very small companies

 

The Top Applicant Tracking Systems for Small Businesses Compared

ATS TeamTailor ClearCompany Monday.com Zoho Recruit BreezyHR Manatal Rippling Workable BambooHR TeamTailor
Best For Career site builder Beginners Cost-efficiency Zoho customers Unique recruitment features LinkedIn recruitment Businesses seeking a HR management solution Companies with global aspirations Free ATS Career site builder
Free Version 14-day free trial Live demo only Free plan + 14-day free trial 15-day free trial + Free for one recruiter Bootstrap plan is free forever 14-day free trial Free demo only 15-day free trial 7-day free trial 21-day free trial + plan for 50 users
Starting Price Starts at $200/month Request quote Starts at $22/user/month Starts at $25/user/month, billed annually Starts at $157/month Starts at $19/month Starts at $35/month (platform fee) + $8/user/month Starts at $149/month On request Starts at $200/month
Top Features Powerful automations and an attractive, intuitive interface Video interviews and smart forms Step-by-step applicant tracking plus endless automation triggers Free plan and plenty of customizable features Personality testing and simplified job posting Drag-and-drop recruitment interface and great candidate discovery Global payroll with great customer support Background screening and a wide array of job boards Powerful employee mobile app
Methodology

How We Review And Test HR Products

To provide our readers with accurate and well-informed recommendations, we test the most popular HR products on the market to find the best options for you. Our methodology consists of the following criteria:

  • Features: We examine each product’s features to determine what capabilities are offered, and how well it performs crucial HR management tasks, such as tracking a sick leave.
  • Integrations: We evaluate the integrations of each piece of HR software to determine how well it fits in with other key pieces in a business’s software stack, and whether its functionality can be expanded as required.
  • User Experience: Usability is paramount when it comes to HR software. That’s why we put ourselves in the shoes of a new user, testing each platform to gain a firsthand understanding if the platform is easy to use or requires onboarding.
  • Price and Value for Money: Our approach to pricing involves a thorough review of the structure and plans offered by each platform. Beyond just the initial cost, we delve into the details to assess affordability and value for money.
  • Security: We dig into the security policies of each company, interrogating the safeguards they have in place to ensure the software protects user data properly.
  • Compliance: A critical requirement for most HR departments, we assess HR software on whether it offers local compliance when it comes to payroll, taxes, and more.
  • Reporting and Documentation: We look at the reporting and documentation capabilities of each software to make sure they offer comprehensive data sets, takeaways, and collaboration options for documentation.

How do ATS Systems Work?

Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) use the power of automation and data analytics to effectively manage every aspect of the recruitment process — including job posting, interviewing candidates, onboarding, and handling all communication through the recruitment process.

Benefits of Using an ATS for Small Business

Besides expediting the hiring process, here are some additional reasons why utilizing an applicant tracking system (ATS) can prove advantageous for HR departments and recruitment agencies:

  • Streamlined Hiring Process – Increased efficiency in hiring translates to saved time and access to a broader pool of applicants, enhancing the chances of finding the ideal candidate for your organization.
  • Improved Brand Reputation – Applicants aren’t afraid to take to social media to share a poor recruitment process these days. Plus, a cumbersome application process can deter potential candidates. Simplifying the process with an ATS attracts more applicants and conveys professionalism.
  • Automation – Leading ATS solutions swiftly identify qualified candidates matching specific criteria, ensuring time isn’t wasted on candidates unsuitable for the role.
  • Better company performance – Vacancies in the team can disrupt timelines and affect employee morale. A good ATS will help you to rapidly fill positions with the right candidates, so your employees are never left trying to do too many people’s jobs at once.

ATS Features for Small Businesses

An ATS for a small business will look vastly different from one for a large, multinational company. With that in mind, here are the features you should look for:

Plenty of automationsEasy to useCost-effectiveOnboardingPassive candidate sourcingIntegrationsReady-made templates

A good ATS will take the stress and hassle out of hiring through automation triggers, so your team can focus on higher-value tasks.

Your ATS should have an intuitive, easy-to-use interface so your team can start benefiting from your investment quickly.

The ATS should match your budgetary requirements.

Ideally, you’ll choose an ATS that assists with employee onboarding once you’ve found candidates.

Great ATS providers help you find candidates that aren’t already on your radar.

Choose a system that can integrate with your broader business software tools like Slack and Microsoft Teams.

Your ATS should feature templates that enable you to quickly complete tasks like sending offer letters and rejections.

Applicant Tracking System Pricing

As you can see from the above list, ATS pricing varies widely depending on the features included within the platform. The more expensive providers on this list tend to include more in-depth, robust features that help with broader HR and business management functions.

On the other hand, the less expensive providers on this offer solely ATS software. Instead of jumping straight into a more costly solution, it’s a good idea to experiment with the free and low-cost options above, as you might be able to find something that meets your needs without needing to pay for an expensive subscription.

FAQs

Is an ATS worth it for small businesses?

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Hannah Pisani
Tech Expert
Hannah Pisani
Tech Expert

Hannah Pisani is a seasoned writer with a keen focus on the intersection between technology and the evolving nature of work. Over the last five years, she has written content for numerous leading technology brands, including Microsoft, AWS and Oracle. She regularly contributes to international technology publications such as Silicon Angle, Cloudwards and Techopedia. Hannah's depth of knowledge encompasses HR software, cybersecurity, SaaS tools and marketing optimization. She thrives on leveraging her expertise to empower business leaders, guiding them towards informed decisions that optimize efficiency and drive productivity.