C · Best HR platform / ATS
How Much Does an Applicant Tracking System Cost in 2026?
Published ATS list prices in September 2026 run from free to $719 a month, or $10 to $25 per employee. Here is what each vendor prints, what the sticker leaves out, and how per-hire pricing compares.
- Published applicant tracking prices in September 2026 run from free to $719 a month for a flat plan, or $10 to $25 per employee per month where tracking comes inside an HR suite. Per-hire models add a fee on placement, from $250 to $1,500 depending on tier. Several vendors publish nothing and price by quote.
- Every figure here was read on the vendor's own pricing page in September 2026. Check the page before you put any of it in a budget.
What the vendors print
| Vendor | Published price, September 2026 | Basis |
|---|---|---|
| Breezy HR | Bootstrap free. Startup $189/mo, Growth $329/mo, Business $529/mo paid monthly, lower on annual | Flat plan, custom Pro tier by quote |
| Workable | Standard $299/mo, Premier $599/mo, Enterprise $719/mo. Annual $3,588, $7,188, $8,628 with a 20% saving | Flat plan behind an employee band selector starting at 1 to 20 |
| Ashby | Foundations $400/mo for up to 100 employees | Plus and Enterprise by quote, based on "company size, usage, and commitment" |
| JazzHR | Hero $1,000/yr, Plus $3,480/yr, Pro $5,508/yr | Billed annually. Hero starts at 3 job postings a month, Plus allows up to 200 active jobs |
| BambooHR | Core $10, Pro $17, Elite $25 per employee per month. Flat rate from $250/mo at 25 employees or fewer | HR suite with tracking included. Open jobs capped at 5, 25 and 50 by plan |
| Greenhouse | Not published | Core, Plus and Pro, priced by quote |
| Unframed | Small $299/mo plus $750 per hire. Medium $699/mo plus $500. Enterprise Standard from $2,500/mo plus $250. Concierge $10,000/mo plus $1,500 | Subscription plus per-hire, published at every tier |
Four pricing models, four different curves
- A flat plan charges the same whether you hire two people or forty. Budgeting is simple and the cost per hire falls as volume rises, which is why the model suits teams with steady, predictable hiring.
- Per-employee pricing tracks your headcount rather than your hiring. BambooHR's Core plan at $10 per employee per month costs $600 a month at 60 employees and $3,000 a month at 300, and the growth that drives that increase is unrelated to how many roles you are filling.
- Capped plans attach a limit to the cheap tier. Breezy publishes a free Bootstrap plan, BambooHR caps open jobs at 5 on Core, and JazzHR's Hero plan starts at 3 job postings a month. A cap is fine until the month you open one more role than it allows, at which point your real price is the tier above.
- Per-hire pricing charges on the outcome. Our own tiers pair a subscription with a fee on placement, from $250 at Enterprise Standard to $1,500 on the managed Concierge tier described in [what managed recruitment costs](/spaces/managed-recruitment-concierge-cost).
What the sticker leaves out
- Three costs arrive after the signature.
- Migration is the first. Workable's help center documents its inbound migrations as free on Premier and Enterprise and "available at a cost" on Standard annual. Fourteen source systems are supported there, with custom work requested for anything else. Other vendors handle this differently, so ask before you assume it is free, and read [how to switch ATS without losing your candidate data](/spaces/how-to-switch-ats) before you plan the date.
- Metered add-ons are the second. Workable's page includes 3,000 automation credits with a plan and then sells packages from $0.12 a credit (5,000 for $600) down to $0.095 a credit at 50,000, with credits expiring one year from purchase and non-refundable. Usage-based lines like that do not sit still, and they are not in the monthly figure you compared.
- The annual commitment is the third. JazzHR publishes only annual figures. Workable and Breezy both show a discount for paying yearly. Ashby offers 10% off for an annual commitment on Foundations. A cheaper unit price in exchange for twelve months of lock-in is a fair trade, as long as you priced the lock-in.
Doing the arithmetic on your own numbers
- Take a 60-person company hiring 12 people in a year and apply the published rates.
| Option | Subscription for the year | Per-hire | Total at 12 hires |
|---|---|---|---|
| BambooHR Core at $10 per employee | $7,200 | None | $7,200, with open jobs capped at 5 |
| Workable Standard on annual billing | $3,588 | None | $3,588, subject to the employee band |
| Breezy Growth paid monthly | $3,948 | None | $3,948 |
| Unframed Small | $3,588 | $750 | $12,588 |
- Those totals come from the published unit prices, multiplied out. Treat them as a starting point, because the columns are measuring different things. The subscription-only rows buy software. The per-hire row buys software plus the ranking work that produces the shortlist, and it charges on placements you actually made.
The cost that never reaches an invoice
- SHRM's benchmarking report for fiscal year 2015, drawn from a random sample of 2,048 members, put average cost per hire at $4,129. At 12 hires, that is roughly $49,500 of hiring cost sitting behind a software line of a few thousand dollars.
- Which is why the screening method belongs in the pricing conversation. A system that scores resumes on keyword overlap will discard people who can do the work and describe it in different words, and each of those rejections buys you another cycle of sourcing, advertising and interviewing. [The cost of ATS false rejections](/spaces/cost-of-ats-false-rejections) works through where that money goes.
- Before you sign, price the software, the migration, the add-on meter and the hires. Then run the evaluation in [our ATS buying guide](/spaces/ats-buying-guide-2026) on the two finalists.
Frequently asked questions
- How much does an applicant tracking system cost in 2026?
- Published list prices read in September 2026 run from a free tier at Breezy HR up to $719 a month for Workable Enterprise, with Ashby's entry plan at $400 a month for up to 100 employees. HR suites that include applicant tracking are priced per employee instead, at $10 to $25 a month per person on BambooHR's three plans. Several vendors, including Greenhouse, publish no price at all.
- Why do some ATS vendors not publish pricing?
- Because the price depends on inputs a website cannot see. Greenhouse's pricing page in September 2026 says pricing "is customized based on your company's hiring needs", driven by the plan, hiring volume, organizational complexity and the features required. Ashby's page gives the same basis for its higher plans: "company size, usage, and commitment".
- Is per-hire pricing cheaper than a flat subscription?
- It depends on how many people you hire. A per-hire fee costs nothing in a quiet quarter and scales directly with volume, while a flat plan costs the same either way. Work out your annual hire count first, then price both models against it before you sign anything.
- What costs are not on the ATS price list?
- Data migration, add-on metering and job caps. Workable's help center says inbound migrations are free on Premier and Enterprise and "available at a cost" on Standard annual. Metered add-ons carry their own consumption curve, and plans with caps on open jobs force an upgrade at a headcount the price list does not mention.
Sources
Next step
Stop filtering. Start ranking.
XUnframed builds shortlists by ranking people on proof of fit — not keyword density. See it on your next role.