Written by
Jessica Dennis, Lead Writer
Read more by Jessica →
Reviewed by
Kaiti Norton, Managing Editor
Read more HR content →
Written by
Jessica Dennis, Lead Writer
Read more by Jessica →
Reviewed by
Kaiti Norton, Managing Editor
Read more HR content →
In this article...
What is applicant tracking system software?
Applicant tracking system (ATS) software allows recruitment teams to organize and track candidates for more efficient hiring. ATS software streamlines most recruitment operations, including creating job posts, screening candidates, and scheduling interviews. This results in decreased time-to-fill for open positions.
The best applicant tracking systems also have built-in, automated communication channels to centralize communication between recruiters and candidates. Similarly, most platforms offer internal collaboration features so hiring teams can make faster decisions and avoid bottlenecks.
I reviewed 10 top ATS software solutions and narrowed my list of recommendations to the best of the best:
- Teamtailor is the best ATS overall.
- Breezy HR is best for fast-growing companies.
- BambooHR is best for first-time ATS users.
- Greenhouse is best for candidate experience and DEI.
- Workable is best for hiring pipeline management.
- Honorable mentions:
- Rippling is best for reporting and analytics.
- JazzHR is best for SMBs.
- Zoho Recruit is best for automated workflows.
Our picks for the best ATS software
Teamtailor: Best overall ATS
Pros
Cons
Our Rating: 4.16/5
Applicant tracking features: 4.88
Platform/interface: 4.63
Reporting and analytics: 3.75
Pricing: 2.06
Support: 3.55
User reviews: 4.6
Although an ATS at its core, Teamtailor is unique in the way it blends strategic recruitment functions, like candidate experience tools, directly within its hiring pipeline. This makes it easier for you to understand the importance these features play in the success of your hiring initiatives.
Teamtailor lets you change and access the following directly from its visual pipeline:
- Job settings.
- Hiring stages.
- Job requisition automations.
- Promotions.
- Analytics.
As a result, you can adapt quickly when your hiring process needs to change. For example, it only takes two clicks to adjust interview stages, approval workflows, job posting boosts, or pre-employment assessments as you move candidates through your pipeline.
Teamtailor’s anonymous mode, which you can turn off and on at any stage of the hiring process, even helps minimize unconscious hiring bias. By comparison, Breezy HR’s Incognito Apply is a paid add-on, while Workable’s anonymize candidates feature is limited to hiding candidate information in the sourced and applied stages of your hiring funnel. Even Greenhouse, which stands out for its diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) options, lacks anonymized screening altogether.
However, Teamtailor’s modern interface, with drag-and-drop capabilities, mouse hover actions, and collapsible toolbars, comes at the cost of more granular customization tools. For example, experienced hiring teams may not like defining the stages for each new job post instead of creating and saving a template for use later.
Its custom reports are also rather limited — instead of starting a report from scratch, you must choose from one of the following base reports first and then manipulate the data to fit your needs:
- Jobs.
- Candidates.
- Job applications.
- Employees.
Viewing historical data trends in Teamtailor has also only been a feature since late 2023. However, you can export CSV files or connect with your business intelligence (BI) software if you need more in-depth insights.
Email nurture campaigns
With Teamtailor, you can create email nurture campaigns to engage with passive candidates or keep silver medalists updated on your company’s latest opportunities, position updates, blogs, and events. You can add candidates individually or in bulk so they can start receiving plain text or branded emails from you.
Teamtailor’s nurture customization options are somewhat limited. Compared to candidate relationship management (CRM) tools like Avature, it doesn’t offer email analytics and has few text placeholder fields.
However, Teamtailor’s simple visual campaign builder with adjustable wait times between emails is unheard of for most ATS, which are primarily concerned with managing candidate pipelines. If you have modest hiring needs or expect to fill particular difficult or key positions soon, nurture campaigns can help source candidates and keep them invested with minimal effort.
Generative AI
Most modern ATS include AI features, such as machine learning algorithms, to help with recruitment pipeline management. Teamtailor offers this feature plus its new Co-pilot generative AI assistant that can craft job descriptions, summarize résumés, write candidate emails with specific feedback, and even develop interview questions.
If you lack formalized job descriptions, Teamtailor’s generative AI tools will speed up your job posting process. They also improve the efficiency of your hiring funnel by suggesting screening questions to help hiring managers narrow down qualified candidates and minimize bottlenecks.
Heads up!
I’ll be the first to tell you that I love Teamtailor’s AI functions, but they should never replace the human element. Teamtailor’s Co-pilot is possible because of its integration with Open AI’s ChatGPT, which means it does make mistakes. Remember to review what it produces to ensure it aligns with the details of your open position and your company brand and culture.
With the passing of New York City’s Automated Employment Decision Tools (AEDT) law and the European Union’s Artificial Intelligence Act, become familiar with how your ATS makes candidate decisions. It never hurts to review automatically disqualified candidates to ensure fair decision-making.
You can learn more about AI in recruitment by visiting AI Recruiting: Uses, Advantages, & Disadvantages.
Customizable career site
Teamtailor’s drag-and-drop page builder allows you to create a customized career site. You can add text, images, videos, and links that match your company branding, colors, and style. Although Teamtailor’s career site builder targets recruiting teams without coding abilities, you can apply custom HTML and CSS blocks and embed them on existing websites.
Unlike Rippling and BambooHR’s career sites, which let you customize your brand colors and logos only, Teamtailor allows you to accurately reflect your company culture and values. Its embedded candidate chat function, multilingual support, and campaign pages can be great tools for attracting qualified applicants and keeping them engaged.
I’m particularly fond of its team stories feature, which allows some employees to record snippets about the company workplace and post them to your career site. This personal touch boosts your authenticity with candidates and gives them a clearer idea of whether your company is right for them.
Teamtailor does not reveal its pricing on its website; you must contact its sales team for a personalized quote. Unfortunately, its lack of transparency regarding price, discounts, and contracts made it second-to-last in my roundup for pricing, with a score of 2.06. Teamtailor only saved itself from last place in this category with its free 14-day trial. But even then, you must speak with its sales team before accessing a trial.
While this is disappointing for an ATS platform, many users find Teamtailor relatively affordable for the features you get. Some review websites indicate the software starts at or around $1,250 annually for unlimited users, candidates, and job openings. However, this amount will likely be more to access sophisticated features, such as advanced automations, AI, and employee referrals.
With a score of 4.16 out of 5, Teamtailor performed well in almost all the categories I evaluated. It got a near-perfect score for ATS, missing points only for its lack of robust candidate DEI reports and bias checkers. Teamtailor’s interface includes automated workflows, candidate experience options, and CRM tools that appeal to new and seasoned recruiting teams with modest hiring needs.
Teamtailor is not the best ATS if you need more specialized reports, access controls, and pipeline stages. It also lacks options to simplify in-person sourcing, like optical character recognition (OCR) for uploading paper documents. Yet, its features straddle operational and strategic needs, making it approachable for recruiters’ day-to-day processes and powerful enough to support future business hiring objectives.
Breezy HR: Best for fast-growing companies
Pros
Cons
Our Rating: 3.9/5
Applicant tracking features: 4.39
Platform/interface: 4.31
Reporting and analytics: 3
Pricing: 4.31
Support: 2.55
User reviews: 4.3
Breezy HR checks all the boxes for a well-rounded ATS:
- Visual pipeline: See all your candidates for a position in one place and drag them to the appropriate stages in your hiring process.
- Résumé parsing: Makes résumés searchable in more than 20 languages.
- Collaboration tools: Tag hiring team members inside candidate profiles and take public or private notes during conversations with the candidate.
- Interview management: Schedule multiple interviews with the candidate and various stakeholders, plus enable candidates to self-schedule.
- Talent pools: Create separate pools to organize potential candidates for future roles and continued engagement.
- Offer letters and rejections: Use pre-built offer letters and rejection templates to move forward with your hiring process.
Breezy HR also offers strategic hiring tools, like email nurture campaigns, a custom career site with its Hello Messenger AI chatbot, and employee referrals. However, most of these tools are only available in Breezy’s highest-paid plans, making Breezy a more expensive option for startups needing candidate engagement features to establish a brand presence.
Another drawback is that Breezy requires you to subscribe to its Business plan or higher to integrate with HR platforms and send offer letters. This means more manual work to onboard hired candidates, as their applications, assessments, interview notes, and offer letters don’t seamlessly transfer to your HR platform. Your recruitment teams must also spend more time crafting offer documentation and receiving it from your new hire.
But Breezy is easy to navigate, making it ideal for first-time ATS users or small recruitment teams. If you have more advanced hiring needs, you’ll appreciate some of the small touches to make hiring more efficient, such as responding directly to candidate questions on Slack or sending to-dos to various team members from candidate profiles.
Candidate messaging
Breezy HR lets you directly engage with candidates via email and text without leaving the platform. Although you can access SMS messaging on Teamtailor and JazzHR, Breezy HR takes this an extra step by consolidating all messages to and from the candidate in one place in their candidate profile. With a click, you can switch between email and SMS texts to easily converse with the candidate in their preferred medium.
Even more convenient is its Slack integration, which allows you to respond to candidate messages within Slack. Hiring managers may find this particular useful since they can message promising candidates without logging into Breezy HR. It also means more timely responses to candidates, speeding up hiring efficiency and preventing great candidates from getting hired elsewhere.
Candidate management automations
Breezy HR gives you a lot of control over the automations of your hiring pipeline, including notifications, email drip campaigns, and sending assessments or questionnaires to candidates. Its automations are also very flexible so you can speed up processes in your hiring funnel with little involvement from you.
You can also move candidates to different stages in your pipeline or talent pool based on how they answer particular questions. Besides saving you time from screening candidates who don’t meet the minimum position requirements, you can also curate lists of great candidates to source for future roles.
For instance, if you’re hiring a Staff Writer II but a potential candidate doesn’t have the required years of experience, you can automatically add their application data to a Staff Writer I talent pool. This way, you can return to it when you need talent for the entry-level role without starting the job search from scratch.
Breezy HR offers several price plans: Bootstrap, Startup, Growth, Business, and Pro. You can start with its free Bootstrap plan or choose its Startup plan, which starts at $157 per month. Breezy HR includes several paid add-ons, such as SMS/text messaging, incognito apply, and candidate match score.
Breezy HR’s transparent fees, lack of long-term contracts, discounts, free plan, and 14-day free trial earned it top marks in pricing at 4.31 out of 5, behind only Zoho Recruit. For this reason, Breezy HR can be particularly attractive to fast-growing companies that want a single source of truth for their hiring process, have a minimal budget, and expect more complex hiring needs down the road.
Bootstrap
- Forever free plan.
- Unlimited users.
- Access to candidate information for 30 days.
- Career site.
- Job post syndication to more than 50 job boards.
- GDPR compliance controls and automations.
- Résumé parsing.
Startup
- Annual: $157 per month.
- Monthly: $189 per month.
- Includes everything in Bootstrap plan plus:
- Unlimited candidates, positions, and talent pools.
- Background check integrations.
- Customizable automations, questionnaires, and pipeline stages.
- EEO/OFCCP reporting.
- Calendar, video, and Slack integrations.
- Mobile app.
- Interview self-scheduling.
- Analytics and reporting.
- Task management.
- Video assessments.
Growth
- Annual: $273 per month.
- Monthly: $329 per month.
- Includes everything in Startup plan, plus:
- Reference checking.
- Interview guides.
- Employee referrals.
- E-signatures.
- External recruiter support.
- Hello Messenger AI chatbot (for career site).
- Multiple position locations and recruiting pipelines.
Business
- Annual: $439 per month.
- Monthly: $529 per month.
- Includes everything in Growth plan, plus:
- Multi-path questionnaires.
- Assessment and HR system integrations.
- Candidate comparison.
- Nurture campaigns.
- Custom roles and permissions.
- Job and offer approval workflows.
- Offer management.
Pro
- Contact sales for a quote.
- Includes everything in Business plan, plus:
- Dedicated account manager.
- Advanced reporting.
- Custom domains.
- Data export/import.
Add-ons
- SMS/Text Messaging: $165 per month.
- Candidate Match Score: $165 per month.
- Incognito Apply: $165 per month.
Note: Annual pricing subscriptions include two months free.
Breezy HR is best for growing businesses that want affordable candidate engagement features and automations to quickly attract and recruit needed talent. What’s great is that startups can leverage Breezy HR’s Bootstrap plan for free, giving them access to a career site that can also aid in brand marketing.
With a total score of 3.90, Breezy HR also performed well for its platform interface, screening questionnaires and assessment options, and collaboration tools. Moving to a paid tier also gives you access to advanced automations, a must-have as your hiring needs grow and you need smarter ways to sort and evaluate candidates.
Breezy HR’s reporting and analytics are adequate, with standard visualizations and dashboards for time-to-fill, pipeline efficiency, and GDPR compliance. Still, custom dashboards and reports are available only on Pro plan subscriptions. This may make sense for scaling businesses, but enterprises might want to look to Greenhouse or Rippling for more robust analytics options.
BambooHR: Best for first-time ATS users
Pros
Cons
Our Rating: 3.88/5
Applicant tracking features: 3.48
Platform/interface: 4.38
Reporting and analytics: 3.88
Pricing: 3.13
Support: 4.34
User reviews: 4.4
BambooHR differentiates itself in this roundup by being the only all-in-one HR software on my list of the top five ATS platforms. It beat Rippling, another comprehensive HR suite, by a very slim margin. This is because BambooHR is a highly user-friendly ATS with customer support available via phone, chat, and email. Plus, it’s more affordable to start with than other all-in-one platforms that reserve the hiring function in a separate module or paid add-on.
BambooHR’s biggest benefit is that it serves as the single source of truth for your hiring and HR teams — you don’t need to integrate with or import data into your HR platform from a standalone ATS like Teamtailor. Its ATS also uses the same interface as the rest of the platform, including its navigation tabs, lowering the learning curve for users already familiar with BambooHR’s layout.
However, BambooHR is not the best ATS for teams with more than an occasional hiring need. For example, the system is still largely manual, requiring you to move candidates to the next stage in the pipeline since it does not include stage automations or knockout questions like Teamtailor and JazzHR. This can quickly become overwhelming if you have multiple positions and applicants to manage at once.
Nevertheless, BambooHR is significantly more approachable for new recruiting teams that need to understand the various aspects of the recruitment process. Its lack of automatic candidate scoring or pipeline movements dramatically reduces the chance of violating AI transparency in hiring laws since every move has human involvement.
Custom talent pools
BambooHR lets you create custom talent pools to source qualified candidates from past or current applications. The goal is to keep a talent reserve for future open roles. Talent pools also ensure you keep records of your silver medalist candidates to tap if your first choice for a position does not work out or you need sources for backfilling an urgent role.
Many other ATS offer talent pool functionality, which is one of the cornerstones of more strategic hiring. However, BambooHR excels in one key arena: simplicity. For instance, Breezy HR’s talent pool functionality is rolled into its open positions dashboard, making it difficult to distinguish between the two.
BambooHR, on the other hand, has a separate dashboard for talent pools. You can customize talent pools with icons to make them quicker to differentiate from one another. You can also include reasons why you added candidates to different talent pools to provide context when you return to their applications in the future.
Document management
One major benefit of choosing BambooHR as your ATS is that any candidate who becomes your new employee keeps all their documents. The candidate’s application, résumé, and offer letters move automatically with the candidate into your human resources information system (HRIS) without manual imports or data entry.
Unlike Breezy HR and JazzHR, which relegate offer letter management to higher price tiers, BambooHR offers these features standard. You can also upload existing company offer letters and edit them with placeholders that populate with candidate data, like name and address. Candidates are immediately funneled into BambooHR’s onboarding workflow, which collects additional documentation that candidates can e-sign for faster ramp-up periods.
In 2024, BambooHR changed its pricing plans. What were once the Essentials and Advanced subscription tiers are now the Core and Pro plans. The lower Core tier has significantly more features, making it comparable to all-in-one HR software like Rippling and TriNet HR Platform.
However, because it is an HR suite, it is quite expensive compared to standalone ATS platforms. Workable’s lowest pricing tier starts at $149 per month, and it includes significantly more features than BambooHR, like in-app interview scheduling, anonymized screening, and candidate surveys. In contrast, to access BambooHR’s hiring module, you must pay a minimum of $250 monthly for its Core plan.
With a pricing score of 3.13, BambooHR is the best choice if you’re also looking for an HRIS or onboarding system since you can access its ATS in all plans.
Core*
- For up to 25 employees: $250 per month flat rate.
- For more than 25 employees: $10 per employee per month (PEPM).
- Volume discount applies after 25 or more employees.
- Includes:
- HRIS and reporting.
- Hiring and onboarding.
- Time off and benefits tracking.
- Access to integrations marketplace.
Pro*
- For up to 25 employees: $425 per month flat rate.
- For more than 25 employees: $17 PEPM.
- Volume discount applies after 25 or more employees.
- Includes everything in Core plus:
- Performance management.
- Employee experience and rewards.
- Employee community.
Add-ons:
- Payroll.**
- Benefits administration.
- Time tracking.
* There is a one-time implementation fee for the Core and Pro plans and the Payroll add-on. If you have fewer than 25 employees, you can opt for the QuickStart implementation for a lower fee.
** Please note that additional factors, like the number of FEINs or states where you need payroll, can affect this price. Please contact BambooHR for specific pricing quotes.
Currently, BambooHR offers a 15% discount if you combine its payroll and benefits administration add-ons with its Core or Pro plans. Visit BambooHR below to learn more.
Although BambooHR is not the most powerful ATS on my list, if you’re new to recruiting, its simple interface and clean layout make it quick to learn and start hiring. In particular, creating a new job opening can take less than 10 minutes since it only has a few steps and customization options before job board syndication.
That said, BambooHR’s overall score of 3.88 mainly results from its ease of use. For example, reports and approval flows are pre-built, making BambooHR an ideal plug-and-play HRIS and ATS for infrequent hiring needs and onboarding.
If you’re a more advanced ATS user, you may be frustrated by its lack of customizable pipeline stages, hiring team controls, interview kits, and interview management. I would look to Breezy HR or Workable instead if you need these features at an affordable starting price.
Greenhouse: Best for candidate experience and DEI
Pros
Cons
Our Rating: 3.78/5
Applicant tracking features: 4.33
Platform/interface: 4
Reporting and analytics: 4.13
Pricing: 1.25
Support: 3.18
User reviews: 4.32
Greenhouse’s recruiting platform combines the capabilities of an ATS and a CRM. Where it lacks some of the user-friendly interface features of Teamtailor and Breezy HR, it makes up for this through its focus on structured hiring and DEI. This provides quality hiring experiences for job seekers plus tools to ensure you source applicants with respect to values fit.
Greenhouse includes all features typical of an ATS, from candidate auto-advance and rejections to visual drag-and-drop pipelines and collaborative application reviews. But Greenhouse embeds candidate-centric aspects throughout its platform, such as:
- Job kickoff forms: Help stakeholders agree on job position requirements and candidate scoring.
- Diverse job board distribution: Syndicate job posts to more than 1,000 job boards, including those targeting minority groups.
- Anonymous assessment grading: Minimize hiring manager and recruiter bias when evaluating candidate skills.
- Interview prep kits and scorecards: Create alignment and consistency during interviews.
However, Greenhouse’s emphasis on more strategic sourcing, candidate experience, and careful applicant evaluations can slow the hiring process. Many of Greenhouse’s features also fall outside those of a traditional ATS, even in its starter subscription. As a result, Greenhouse is better suited for experienced ATS users who want some of the strategic features for attracting passive candidates and making progress on company DEI initiatives.
Events hiring tool
Greenhouse’s events hiring tool is a unique mobile application for sourcing candidates from in-person events, like career fairs or industry conventions. Although the tool is specifically designed for iOS devices, it allows candidates to apply for jobs on the spot and have their information instantly transferred to your Greenhouse ATS.
The events hiring tool also lets you capture photos of résumés and other documents on the spot, plus important notes from conversations with candidates. Once the information is added to the ATS, Greenhouse’s reporting and analytics track these candidates’ progress in your hiring pipeline so you can invest in the hiring events that source the best recruits.
Career fairs are only one of many original ways to find candidates besides online job boards. For tips on finding top talent, check out 6 Creative Ways to Find and Hire Employees.
Anti-bias controls
Greenhouse provides a series of anti-bias tools that promote inclusivity throughout the software. For example, creating a new job requisition always includes job kickoff forms and scorecards to ensure all of your recruiting stakeholders evaluate each candidate based on their measurable skills and attributes rather than their personal backgrounds and personalities.
Surprisingly, Greenhouse does not include anonymous candidate controls like Teamtailor and Breezy HR. Instead, Greenhouse keeps candidates’ names and biographical information transparent, choosing to “nudge” recruiting stakeholders with reminders inside job posts, application reviews, interview kits, and scorecards to avoid biased thinking. The idea is to bring our biased tendencies to the forefront so that we can acknowledge and be less likely to act on them.
Greenhouse also asks candidates for their personal pronouns and name pronunciations before an interview. Besides giving you a chance to prepare and make the candidate feel comfortable, it is one of the most obvious ways to demonstrate your company’s DEI commitment to incoming talent. It also reduces the chance you make incorrect assumptions about candidates.
Greenhouse has three subscription plans: Essential, Advanced, and Expert. The company does not reveal its pricing, so you must contact its sales department for a custom quote.
Pricing depends on your employee headcount rather than the number of system users or recruiting stakeholders you have. Because even its lowest plan includes several CRM capabilities, like employee referral portals and surveying, Greenhouse is not ideal for small businesses that hire infrequently. You should not be surprised to pay thousands to tens of thousands of dollars annually for a Greenhouse Essential subscription if you have 50 or more workers.
With a score of 1.25, Greenhouse performed the worst in pricing of anyone in my roundup for reasons like its unclear contract requirements and lack of free trial. But remember, you may have some leeway negotiating your price as a result, especially if you’re evaluating multiple ATS simultaneously.
Essential
Includes:
- Applicant tracking.
- Talent pools.
- Talent finder.
- One Greenhouse Event.
- DEI tools (name pronunciation, personal pronouns, and company initiatives).
- Structured hiring.
- Team collaboration.
- Automated task management.
- Multi-channel sourcing.
- Core reports.
- GDPR compliance.
Advanced
Includes everything in Essential plus:
- 10 Greenhouse Events.
- Automated workflows.
- Advanced data configuration.
- Single sign on.
- Custom reporting.
- Advanced career page options.
Expert
Includes everything in Advanced plus:
- Unlimited Greenhouse Events.
- Expert data configuration.
- Developer sandbox.
- Connector to BI software.
Greenhouse stands out for its dedication to fair and equitable hiring practices that create a better candidate hiring experience. It is the best choice if you want an ATS that forces your recruiting stakeholders to be more conscientious in their hiring decisions.
Greenhouse’s CRM tools, such as outbound recruiting functions, email outreach campaigns, talent pools, social media posting, and candidate experience surveys, also make it a better tool for planning future talent needs.
Despite this, Greenhouse only earned a 3.78 overall because its strategic hiring, reporting, and customization functions can be overwhelming for teams that only need an ATS. Its interface is more complex than Teamtailor or BambooHR, requiring more effort to locate the data to act quickly on incoming prospects.
Workable: Best for hiring pipeline management
Pros
Cons
Our Rating: 3.72/5
Applicant tracking features: 4.11
Platform/interface: 3.81
Reporting and analytics: 2.63
Pricing: 3.5
Support: 4.48
User reviews: 4.24
Workable’s ATS focuses on hiring speed compared to platforms like Greenhouse. While all of my top five choices offer some automations to increase the efficiency of your hiring process, Workable uses a combination of AI and customizable pipeline triggers to source, schedule, and send offers to the best talent with little recruiter input.
Workable uses automation templates with easy-to-understand sentences to designate triggers and actions. For example, you can modify the “when a candidate in [job requisition] is moved to a stage that includes a Workable assessment, then send them [template] from [user]” to automatically email candidates screening assessments.
Workable includes knockout questions for automatically disqualifying job seekers that mirror the capabilities of other ATS like Teamtailor. However, Workable sets itself apart with hiring plans that budget recruitment spending, enable approval workflows for new requisitions, and monitor costs over time.
That said, Workable is relatively weak in reporting and analytics, despite providing access to its full reporting suite in all price tiers. Its home page dashboard is also surprisingly lackluster since it doesn’t allow you to customize it with widgets, reports, or links to quickly access the recruitment data, tasks, meetings, and applications assigned to you.
The good news is that Workable plans to change its interface in April 2024, so navigation will likely improve.
Note to readers: Workable will modify its homepage and interface in April 2024. I took the images in the gallery below in March 2024.
In-app candidate sourcing
Workable allows you to search for candidates directly on the platform using its AI recruiter, People Search. As Workable’s strongest strategic hiring function outside of budget controls, People Search mimics the functionality of job aggregator sites like Indeed to find and engage with passive candidates.
People Search enables Boolean search functionality to combine candidate attributes, such as particular skills and locations, for more targeted results. You can then add any profiles you find directly into your hiring pipeline to start the engagement process.
The one drawback of this feature is that, depending on your subscription plan, you can only source a certain number of candidate profiles per month. So, you may use this feature only to supplement traditional sourcing avenues or find candidates quickly for urgent hires.
Interview management
Workable lets you schedule in-person, phone, and video interviews with job seekers on all plans. While this is typical of most ATS platforms, Workable stands out for its depth of interview management controls on every subscription plan. Besides the ability to integrate Zoom to support virtual interviews — an add-on feature for JazzHR — candidates can also self-schedule their interviews based on your calendar’s availability.
Another nifty feature is Workable’s AI-generated video interview assessments. Instead of a face-to-face interview, you can require candidates to respond to a series of questions and set the time they have to think and respond. You can craft the questions yourself or use generative AI to develop them based on your job description. This decreases the time it takes to prepare screening assessments, keeping the process moving.
Workable has three pricing tiers: Starter, Standard, and Premier. Like Greenhouse, costs change based on your employee headcount. It starts at $149 per month for companies with up to 50 employees. This means annual subscriptions can be thousands of dollars, equivalent to HR platforms with payroll capabilities.
Even so, Workable scored modestly for pricing at 3.5 out of 5. This is because Workable gives you access to most of its ATS features, such as its full reporting suite, on its lowest subscription plan. If you have fewer than 50 employees, Workable can be a bargain compared to Breezy HR, which doesn’t include anonymized screening or offer management functions in its Startup subscription tier. However, you should still expect to pay significantly more with Workable if you have more than 250 employees.
Starter
- $149 per month.
- Monthly billing only.
- All ATS features.
- Up to 50 employees.
- Up to 2 active jobs.
- 200 People Search profile views per month.
- Add ons:
- Video interviews: $49 per month.
- Texting: $39 per month.
- Assessments: $29 per month.
Standard
- Pricing:
- 1–20 employees: $299 per month.
- 21–50 employees: $409 per month.
- 51–100 employees: $639 per month.
- 101–250 employees: $999 per month.
- 251–500 employees: $1,339 per month.
- More than 500 employees: Call for a quote.
- Monthly or annual billing.
- All ATS features.
- Unlimited active jobs.
- 1,000 People Search profile views per month.
- Assisted account implementation.
- Add ons:
- Video interviews: $99/ $149/ $269/ $389/ $529/ quote.*
- Texting: $79/ $119/ $179/ $389/ $249/ $329/ quote.*
- Assessments: $59/ $99/ $159 /$209/ $279/ quote.*
Premier
- Pricing:
- 1–20 employees: $599 per month.
- 21–50 employees: $809 per month.
- 51–100 employees: $1,169 per month.
- 101–250 employees: $1,529 per month.
- 251–500 employees: $2,099 per month.
- More than 500 employees: Call for a quote.
- Annual billing only.
- All ATS features.
- Unlimited active jobs.
- 20,000 People Search profiles per year.
- Hiring plan and requisition approvals.
- Five language options.
- Dedicated account manager.
- Single sign-on support.
- Custom account implementation.
- Video, texting, and assessment add-ons included.
* Prices for add-ons are per month and change depending on your employee count, between 1–20, 21–50, 51–100, 101–250, 251–500, and more than 500 employees, respectively.
Note: All prices are based on annual billing subscriptions.
Workable earned a score of 3.72 overall and is an excellent choice if you have fewer than 50 employees and want all the functions of top-tier ATS platforms without the associated cost. You get access to all the features you need to manage your pipeline for maximum efficiency, including automatic candidate communications, native pre-employment tests, and video assessments.
Your recruiters can even offload time-consuming tasks like job descriptions, interview questions, and candidate sourcing to Workable’s various AI features. Interview self-scheduling also reduces some of the back and forth between your team and job seekers, allowing them to concentrate on carefully evaluating candidates instead.
Although Workable’s Premier subscription includes hiring planning and advanced approval workflows to control recruitment budgets and open requisitions, it’s relatively light on strategic recruitment features. For instance, you can’t initiate email recruitment campaigns in your talent pools to automate passive candidate engagement. If these are critical to your recruitment strategies, look to alternatives like Greenhouse or Teamtailor.
Honorable mentions
Not all of my choices may be right for you. Check out my runners-up below for more options to fit your budget and business goals.
Rippling: Best for reporting and analytics
Alternative for: BambooHR
When to choose Rippling: Arguably, Rippling has a stronger ATS than its competitor BambooHR. Unlike BambooHR, you can customize pipeline stages (milestones), facilitate interview arrangements, and disqualify candidates with knockout questions with Rippling.
In particular, it has the most detailed reporting and analytics of any platform here since you can combine recruitment information with any data point in its system. As a result, Rippling is a great tool for understanding the impact of your hiring process at every stage of the employee life cycle.
Why it didn’t make the list: Despite Rippling’s sleek interface, its ATS is confusing to navigate, especially if you are used to visual pipelines that let you drag and drop candidates between stages like Teamtailor and Breezy HR. It’s also an expensive choice if you only need an ATS since you must purchase Rippling Unity and the recruiting module to access it.
Our Rating: 3.83/5
JazzHR: Best for SMBs
Alternative for: Teamtailor and Breezy HR
When to choose JazzHR: JazzHR offers a great balance of ATS features for small and medium businesses (SMBs) with moderate hiring needs. Features like its job post meta descriptions increase search visibility, while its résumé parsing capabilities make it easier to search your candidate database for the skills you need.
If you have a large number of frontline workers, JazzHR allows you to scan résumés on your career site so candidates can apply in person with physical applications.
Why it didn’t make the list: JazzHR does not offer a mobile application, preventing you from managing hiring needs on the go. Also, most of its reporting capabilities are reserved for its highest subscription plan, Pro. Even necessary compliance reporting for EEO and the OFCCP is unavailable until its Pro plan subscription. As a result, JazzHR is not the best option if you’re a federal contractor and required to report on your affirmative action plans.
Our Rating: 3.59/5
Zoho Recruit: Best for automated workflows
Alternative for: Workable
When to choose Zoho Recruit: Zoho Recruit’s Blueprint feature lets you create complex recruitment automations that rival most of the top contenders in my roundup. This unique feature represents your automations visually and allows you to customize your hiring process workflows based on various dependencies, such as the number of days a candidate is in a stage or candidate responses to questions.
Why it didn’t make the list: Zoho Recruit uses a complicated interface for evaluating candidates and moving them between stages. Its pricing plans are also a la carte, meaning you must pay extra fees or move to higher subscription tiers for features like extra cloud storage space and security backups. No other ATS in my roundup requires you to pay extra for these essential functions.
Our Rating: 3.21/5
Find your new ATS software
What are the benefits of ATS software?
ATS platforms can increase recruiting efficiency, improve candidate sourcing and engagement, boost quality of hire metrics, and optimize overall recruitment strategies.
Increases efficiency
Saving time and increasing efficiency are some of the best advantages of using ATS solutions compared to traditional application and recruitment procedures. With ATS software, recruiters can automate different tasks in hiring processes, including posting job ads, sending emails and reminders, interview scheduling, and onboarding new hires.
Improves candidate sourcing
The software can help address mission-critical challenges, such as attracting and sourcing top candidates. Many ATS solutions are now enriched with artificial intelligence and machine learning capabilities to develop a profile of an ideal candidate, assess and identify skills, and predict success factors. As a result, employers can better understand candidate behavior and target specific applicants across various platforms and channels.
Better candidate engagement
ATS software ensures better candidate engagement by promoting greater visibility across the candidate journey. It helps organizations prevent negative experiences — like lack of visibility and inconsistent communication — that can cause candidate frustration and disinterest. An ATS allows reliable communication and faster response times via automation.
Refines hire quality
Screening candidates standardizes applicant scoring and can help guarantee that hiring managers will only see qualified applicants. Moreover, ATS software maintains a database of people who may be prospects for future job openings.
Optimizes recruitment strategies
Hiring professionals can clearly and quickly communicate with other team members and candidates through ATS. Hiring teams can collaborate and share résumés securely within the platform, enabling an organized approach to decision-making.
ATS solutions also come with analytic tools to gauge the success of recruiting and hiring strategies. Recruiters can use real-time data to predict staffing needs and build recruiting pipelines. Analytics equips organizations with critical metrics around costs, quality, and time spent on recruiting activities.
When should you upgrade your ATS software?
Upgrading your applicant tracking system is not to be taken lightly, and you don’t want to rush into it. Instead, you need to make a deliberate survey of your current ATS capabilities to figure out where it succeeds and where it falls short. If you experience any of the indicators below, then you may want to consider switching platforms.
5 signs you should upgrade your ATS
What to look for in a replacement ATS
If you’ve determined that your ATS needs an upgrade, we recommend including these five key features on the checklist for your next platform.
The right ATS software will offer all of the metrics you need to assess candidate data and determine whether your recruiting processes are working. An ATS dashboard should also be easy to read and customize as necessary, so you can easily access the information you need and make decisions quickly.
For example, PCRecruiter’s job board analytics feature connects the ATS data with Google Analytics to help recruiters track candidate sources, conversions, and falloff rates.
Proper application management is essential to finding the most qualified candidates and filling job openings efficiently.
Within the ATS platform, hiring teams should be able to sort applications in the ATS database according to specific criteria, like certain education requirements, work experience, or relevant keywords. They should also be able to search for applicants by name to locate the right information.
Some platforms like Pinpoint offer candidate profiles that help recruiters keep all of the information for a candidate in one place. This includes their application, résumé, pipeline stage, ratings, and conversation history.
It’s not enough to be able to manage application materials smoothly: You also need to be able to move candidates through the job search and interview process quickly and efficiently.
A good ATS should make it easy to schedule interviews via phone, video, and in person. It should also automate interview reminders and scheduling, so you don’t have to.
Alternatively, some ATS platforms like Breezy HR allow candidates to schedule their own interviews from an outward-facing portal. The software synchronizes with the Google or Outlook calendars for everyone on the hiring team, so their interview availability is always up-to-date.
Automation is another must-have feature. Your next ATS should automate repetitive tasks to eliminate redundancies and allow your recruitment team to focus on more valuable tasks, like sourcing and evaluating candidates.
Some advanced automations can also help keep candidates moving through the hiring pipeline. For example, Zoho Recruit offers a drag-and-drop interface for creating custom workflows depending on specific conditions or actions. This helps ensure no candidate slips through the cracks because someone forgot to follow up.
If your team relies on multiple platforms to maintain recruiting efficiency, then integrations can make or break your ATS. At a minimum, your new system should integrate with your current HR software stack; however, it might also be valuable to consider your team’s long-term goals and what integrations might be useful in the future.
Also, double-check to see if the integrations are built-in or if your recruiting team will need to create them using a third-party tool like Zapier. If it’s the latter case, be prepared for the extra time and resources it will take to manually configure and maintain these integrations.
A robust platform like Greenhouse offers hundreds of native integrations to support current and future needs without needing to leverage any additional tools.
Is It time to upgrade?
In some cases, your current applicant tracking system isn’t quite adequate, but you can’t replace it wholesale due to budgetary or IT reasons. Fortunately, there are several steps you can take to make the most of your existing ATS without breaking the bank or overwhelming your IT team.
One option is to seek out training resources offered by your current ATS provider to make sure you fully understand the tool and are taking advantage of any recent updates or feature additions. Most cloud-based ATS vendors release updates regularly — sometimes monthly or even weekly — so you might have missed out on some helpful features that recently launched.
Configuring new integrations is also a fantastic way to supercharge the functionality of your current ATS without having to completely replace it. Some key integrations to consider are job boards, HR tools, social media platforms, email, and your content management system (CMS). Check out our roundup of must-have integrations for your ATS if you need some inspiration for how to boost your existing ATS.
What is the business impact of ATS software?
The recruitment process can be challenging for hiring teams and job seekers alike. Manual applicant screening delays hiring procedures, increasing cost-to-hire and prolonging time-to-hire. Additionally, manual online job postings can prompt tons of applications from under-qualified job seekers.
The best applicant tracking systems automate and streamline the hiring process from source to hire. It amplifies the capabilities of recruiters, hiring managers, and HR teams with a range of features to boost efficiency while attracting and retaining top talent.
First and foremost, ATS can screen job applications, scan résumés for the right qualifications, and select the qualified candidates to consider for an interview. This can lighten the load for hiring teams and cut down a significant amount of time.
On top of that, ATS platforms can assist recruiters in tracking interview processes, evaluating, making offers to, hiring, and ultimately onboarding new talent. The software promotes a smooth hiring process, enhancing the candidate experience and encouraging more skilled talent to join the organization.
ATS solutions allow organizations to recruit the best people, which is essential to any company’s success.
More applicant tracking resources
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