What Is Rippling?
Rippling is a top-rated payroll management software that also offers an array of HR tools and opportunities to help you manage your business effectively. From its ATS to its payroll software and now its PEO service option, Rippling can help you take care of anything to do with the management of your employees.
One of the best things about Rippling is how its staff helps you get through every step of the setup process. A team member helps you get going and make sure that they can service your needs before you ever commit to using the product. Unfortunately, it also means you must get a custom quote to get exact pricing for your needs and you can’t get started until you work with the team.
Featured Partners
1
OnPay
Yes
Yes
$40 per month + $6 per user
2
SurePayroll
Yes
Yes
$29.99/mo plus $5 per employee
3
Gusto
Yes
Yes
$40 per month plus $6 per user
4
Rippling
Yes
Yes
$35/month plus $8 PEPM
5
Justworks
Yes
Yes
$50/month + $8/user
Is Rippling Right for Me?
Regardless of the size of your business, Rippling could be a solid solution. It’s best for businesses that are either medium-sized (75 or more employees) or that need a full solution in a single software to manage the entire HR function. Rippling might be one of the best overall solutions, but for the price, you can find other solutions that are better for single functionality if you’re just looking for something such as payroll management by itself.
This leads to another thing to be aware of, which is the fact that the product itself might be a bit complex to pick up for smaller teams because it is built to be a powerful solution.
Rippling Is Best For:
- Medium-sized businesses
- Companies that need a comprehensive solution in a single platform
- Enterprises that want a sleek, modern payroll platform
- Large startups that need payroll and benefits administration
Rippling Is Not Recommended For:
- Small businesses (75 or fewer employees)
- Companies that need a single functionality, such as payroll
What Sets Rippling Apart
Founded in 2016, Rippling is one of the newest players in the payroll processor market. Its sleek, modern design and user interface appeals to startup tech companies, but it’s not designed to play small. Unlike many newer platforms, Rippling offers a comprehensive suite of products to cover a range of HR, benefits and payroll needs. It combines the customization of legacy platforms with the user-friendly design of new tech companies—a strength worth considering for your employees’ sake.
Rippling Features
Here’s how Rippling stacks up:
Ease of Use
Rippling falls in the middle of the herd for usability. Its user-friendly design makes it easy to navigate compared with bogged-down legacy platforms such as ADP. But the sheer number of features it offers can make it challenging to get started and come with a steep learning curve.
Compliance
As a global services company, Rippling is licensed and compliant with global data protection and compliance regulations, and it has set up licensed subsidiaries to manage specialized services in the business: insurance, PEO and payments. They’re all overseen by the Rippling Insurance and Regulatory Committee.
Onboarding
Through its HR Cloud, Rippling offers applicant tracking for job postings, online onboarding and document storage and learning management for employee training materials.
Tax Filing
Payroll through Rippling includes local, federal and state tax calculation, deduction and filing.
Time Tracking
Through the Rippling app on a tablet kiosk, mobile app or on their browsers, employees can clock in and out, and you can review and approve hours to have them synced with payroll. If you run payroll manually, you can approve time cards from within your pay run.
Benefits Administration
Rippling offers locally relevant benefits for global employees, including 401(k), medical, dental and HSA/FSA administration in the U.S. You can administer existing coverage through the platform, or shop through Rippling for new coverage.
Analytics and Reporting
Rippling offers robust analytics and reporting, but there can be quite a steep learning curve to the reporting. It isn’t natural or easy to learn but once you do, you’ll unlock a lot of power in your dashboard.
Accessibility
The downside to Rippling compared to similar platforms is that you can’t try it out beforehand. They make you sit through a demo if you want to learn more about the functionality while the other two solutions just let you sign up online without even talking to their team. This approach is a bit dated in the SaaS market and might be a deal-breaker for a lot of smaller businesses.
Rippling Pricing
Rippling offers plans as low as $8 per user per month. However, Rippling does not offer fixed plans, so all users must get a custom quote. Depending on your needs and business size, Rippling can get expensive as pricing.
| Details | |
|---|---|
| Starting Price | $8 per month per user |
| U.S. Payroll | Direct deposit or paper check |
| Global Payroll | Yes; global employer of record available |
| Onboarding | Applicant tracking, onboarding and learning management |
| Tax Filing | Federal, state and local tax filing for employees and 1099 workers |
| Benefits Administration | Locally relevant global benefits, online enrollment, payroll deductions |
| Time Tracking | Integrated with payroll |
| Expense Management | Expense tracking, employee reimbursement and automatic receipt matching |
| Workflow Automations | Automatically send and analyze employee surveys |
| Mobile Apps | Available for employees and employer |
| Reporting and Analytics | Custom reporting, including employee app management |
| Third-Party Integrations | Set up and manage employee apps such as Google Workspace and Slack |
| Error-Free Guarantee | 100% error-free guarantee |
| Customer Support | Call or email certified HR pros, and get real-time compliance updates |
Rippling Pricing
Rippling starts at $8 per month per user to pay workers, but additional features might quickly boost your monthly base rate. To get accurate pricing for your company, you have to contact the company for a quote based on the features you want to use.
Customer Service and Support
Rippling offers customer support for administrators via online chat in your account, as well as a thorough FAQ help center for logged-in customers. But it doesn’t offer any direct support for employees; employees with questions about using Rippling are encouraged to contact their account administrators, which can add a barrier to resolving issues on the platform.
Additional Features Worth Noting
Rippling is extremely customizable. From its employee management and profile inputs to the reporting that you’ll want to set up, the whole product is one of the easiest and most productive to customize. This gives businesses that need this type of solution a terrific option as it can meet the needs of just about any business, regardless of size, that can afford it. The product is very scalable and will help you as you continue to grow and bring on new team members.
Rippling, as most Y Combinator companies are, is very integrated with other tools. Plenty of industry-leading solutions already have integrations that exist and Rippling is even willing to work with you if you need an integration that its product isn’t currently compatible with.
Rippling Alternatives and How They Compare
| Rippling | Gusto | Paychex Flex | ADP RUN | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rating |  | | | |
| Starting Price | $8 per user, per month | $40 per month plus per-person rate based on plan | $39 per month plus per-person rate based on company needs | $59 per month plus per-person rate and fees for add-on features |
| U.S. Payroll | Direct deposit | Automated payroll, direct deposit for employees and contractors, and online pay stubs | Payroll with direct deposit or in-house printed checks for employees and contractors, self-service portal. Option to add on filing and reporting for payroll taxes. | Direct deposit or check delivery for employees, automatic filing and reporting for payroll taxes |
| Global Payroll | Pay global employees and contractors in their local currency | No payroll for global employees; support for international contractors | Managed through partner IRIS FMP | International payments through ADP Global Payroll |
| Onboarding | New hire onboarding included in all plans | Customizable hiring and onboarding templates available | Paperless, digital onboarding experience; job posting integration; employee handbook builder | New hire onboarding included in all plans |
| Tax Filing | Automatic filing and reporting for payroll taxes | Automatic filing and reporting for payroll taxes | Automatically calculate, file and pay payroll taxes | Automatic filing and reporting for payroll taxes |
| Benefits Administration | Online enrollment for health insurance, retirement benefits and more | Administer health, wellness, retirement, transportation, housing and custom benefits | Add-on | Add-on features for retirement, health insurance and workers’ comp |
| Time Tracking | Automatically record employee work hours with online check-in | Integrations available with beginner plan; time tracking included with higher-cost plans | Add-on | Add-on |
| Expense Management | Available through employee self-service platform | Available through employee self-service platform | Add-on | Available through Expensify for RUN add-on |
| Workflow Automations | Included | Integrations available | Integrations available | Integrations available |
| Mobile Apps | Employee time tracking through mobile; other features available through mobile browser only | Gusto Wallet app for employee online banking; other features available through mobile browser only | Employees can register for a Paychex Flex account to view pay and tax information via mobile app | Employer and employee functions available on app for iOS and Android |
| Reporting and Analytics | PTO and time reporting, compliance reports | Customized reports; integrations available | Add-on | Available through Workforce Now add-on |
| Third-party Integrations | Slack, Google Workspace, integrations among Rippling apps | Workflow automation, reporting and insights, benefits administration and more | Voice assistant and accounting software integrations and Paychex add-ons | Integrations with automation and accounting software, add-ons for other ADP products |
| Error-free Guarantee | 100% error-free guarantee | X | X | X |
| Customer Support | 24/7 support via email or online chat | 24/7 support via email or online chat | 24/7 support via app or online chat | Automated phone support or online FAQs; localized phone support centers |
| Learn More | ||||
| Read Reviews | – |
Rippling vs. Gusto
Gusto is an online payroll and HR administration platform designed with dynamic startups in mind. It facilitates payroll for both employees and contractors under a single plan, plus employee benefits including health, retirement and custom benefits such as wellness programs. The platform also includes automated charitable donations (as an option) and a wallet that helps employees access their money when they need it. Along with Rippling, it has straightforward and transparent pricing that’s attractive to small businesses. Learn more about Rippling vs Gusto.
Rippling vs. Paychex Flex
Paychex Flex is the small-business version of Paychex’s payroll platform. It serves small businesses with less than 50 employees and provides simplified payroll processing. Unlike Rippling, Paychex Flex doesn’t offer packages or add-ons for benefits administration.
Rippling vs. ADP RUN
ADP is a traditional payroll and HR services platform for organizations of all sizes. Its small-business solution, RUN, serves companies with less than 50 employees. It facilitates payroll for U.S.-based employees, plus automatic tax filing and reporting, and optional benefits administration in a self-service platform for your employees, with a pricing structure and add-on fees that are more complex than Rippling’s.
Learn more: Read our full Rippling vs. ADP comparison.
Our Expert Opinion
Rippling is a robust payroll and HR platform that combines the smooth user experience of a new tech company with the comprehensive services available on legacy platforms such as ADP and Paychex. Along with the legacy platforms, it offers a suite of apps you can mix and match to customize the platform to meet your company’s needs. But the integrations are more seamless and easier to navigate than the hodgepodge of apps on older platforms because they were designed in tandem to work together.
Rippling’s pricing structure puts it at a slightly higher price point than some competitors, and that could add up if you have a lot of employees. But it’s worth doing a side-by-side comparison once you know all the features you’ll use on any platform because the add-ons required on many platforms can bloat the price in a way you won’t realize until you’ve gone through the sales process.
Payroll Solutions Tailored To Your Business Goals
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
What type of HR features should a payroll system have?
Payroll systems should be able to make the onboarding and termination of employees, monthly payments, off-cycle disbursement and taxation compliance easier. This includes factors like employees being able to fill out W-4 forms electronically and having access to a self-service portal that allows them to access all necessary forms, make any changes that they need and view documents like pay stubs. The best payroll platforms also offer HR support around health insurance plans and other benefits and provide new hire reports when needed.
What is a PEO?
A PEO is a professional employer organization. A PEO is a company that provides HR outsourcing services to small businesses. A PEO can provide a variety of services, including payroll, employee benefits, compliance assistance and employee training.
Why is HR software so important?
HR software is important because it helps management perform key actions on time while empowering employees to take charge of their own accounts.
Is Rippling an HRIS system?
Rippling was founded as a payroll management solution but now offers a full suite of HR products and services. It provides everything from an ATS to software that manages your payroll and benefits. You can even use its PEO service if you want to outsource your employees to a third party. It is now considered a full HRIS solution.
What is Rippling used for?
Rippling is used to manage the HR function of an entire organization. The product is a software-as-a-service (SaaS) solution that offers management of payroll, benefits, applicant tracking, IT device management and time tracking. Both small businesses and large organizations use it to manage the internal employee team from new hires to separation.
Is Rippling secure?
Rippling uses Amazon Web Services (AWS) to secure all of its data. These facilities are based in the United States and include 24/7 on-site security, camera surveillance and top-notch maintenance. All data that goes back and forth from the AWS servers to the Rippling product is encrypted using transport layer security (TLS) encryption and customer data is encrypted using AES-256.
