HR Software for India Payroll 2026
Compare 30 HR platforms on Indian statutory compliance: PF, ESI, PT, TDS and gratuity. Verified July 2026 pricing, plus when an EOR beats software.
- July 24, 2026
What this guide concludes
Fifteen of the thirty platforms here run Indian statutory payroll. Fifteen do not, and the second group holds most of the famous names.
Indian payroll can start free. greytHR costs nothing for up to 25 employees and still files PF, ESI, PT and TDS. Zoho Payroll is free for 10 employees, then Rs 40 per head. Keka starts at Rs 6,999 a month for up to 100 people.
Famous HR platforms may still need a second system. BambooHR, Workday, Gusto, HiBob, Personio, Lattice and 15Five do not process Indian payroll.
The 50% wage rule changes employer costs. The four Labour Codes landed on 21 November 2025. Basic pay now has to reach half of CTC, pushing statutory employer costs up by 5% to 15%.
Payroll software does not make you an employer. A company without an Indian entity still needs an EOR. Deel publishes $599 per person per month, Multiplier sits near $400, and India specialists start around $99.
Does your HR software file EPF, ESI, professional tax and TDS, or does a spreadsheet sit somewhere in the middle of month end? Fifteen of the thirty platforms below clear that bar. The other fifteen include most of the names you already recognise.
greytHR handles the full Indian statutory set free up to 25 employees. Zoho Payroll is free to 10 and Rs 40 a head per month after that. Keka opens at Rs 6,999 a month for up to 100 people and adds a 2 percent setup fee on annual contracts. RazorpayX Payroll covers 20 employees free and settles salaries same day over NEFT, IMPS or RTGS. Between them those four cover most Indian companies under 500 people.
BambooHR, Workday, Gusto, HiBob and Personio are all good products. None of them runs Indian payroll. Pick one and you are buying a second system underneath it, so price both together before you sign anything.
There is a case none of this touches. No Indian entity, no PAN, no TAN, no EPFO registration, and an HRMS licence changes nothing about who legally employs the person. That is an employer of record question. Section 9 works through where the line sits.
How we selected and verified these platforms
How we picked them. We started from the platforms that come up most in Indian HR buying conversations and on global hiring shortlists, then cut anything we could not confirm was still sold to new customers in July 2026. Freshteam went. Freshworks stopped renewals on 7 March 2026 and existing customers have to be off the product by April 2027. Zenefits went too, absorbed into TriNet and now sold as HR Plus.
What we verified. Three things per platform, checked against the vendor’s own material or a dated third-party source. Whether it is still sold to new customers. The entry price as published in July 2026. And whether the vendor documents how it handles EPF, ESI, professional tax and TDS in India. Where pricing sits behind a sales call we say so instead of guessing a number.
What we did not do. We have not run all thirty through a live payroll cycle, and neither has anyone else publishing a thirty-tool list. Where a judgement comes from user reports rather than our own use, the sentence says so. Prices move, so every figure carries the month it was checked and the full source list sits at the foot of this page.
Where we sit. Peorient advises companies choosing between building an Indian entity, using a PEO and using an employer of record. We do not sell HR software.
What changed for Indian payroll on 21 November 2025
India’s four Labour Codes came into force on 21 November 2025, folding twenty-nine older laws into four. For payroll, the change that bites is the wage definition in Section 2(y) of the Code on Wages.
House rent allowance, conveyance, special allowance and the rest of the excluded components can no longer add up to more than half of total remuneration. Anything above that gets deemed wages. Which means basic plus dearness allowance plus retaining allowance has to reach at least 50 percent of CTC.
For twenty years Indian salary structures were built to do the opposite. Basic sat at 30 to 40 percent of CTC precisely because provident fund, gratuity and bonus all key off it, and the Codes closed that door. Published modelling puts the effect at 5 to 15 percent on annual employer statutory cost, and the harder the old structure was optimised the harder this lands.
The statutory heads your software has to handle
| Head | Rate in 2026 | Threshold | Filing |
|---|---|---|---|
| Provident Fund (EPF) | 12% employee, 12% employer | Statutory wage ceiling Rs 15,000 per month unless the employee opts higher | Monthly ECR upload to EPFO |
| ESI | 0.75% employee, 3.25% employer | Gross up to Rs 21,000 per month, or Rs 25,000 where the employee has a disability | Monthly challan to ESIC by the 15th |
| Professional Tax | State-set, capped at Rs 2,500 per year | Levied by state. Delhi does not levy it. | State portal, frequency varies |
| TDS on Salary | Per slab | Applies from the first rupee of taxable salary | Form 24Q quarterly, Form 16 annually |
| Gratuity | 15 days of wages per completed year | Payable after 5 years of continuous service | Provisioned monthly and paid at exit |
ESI contribution periods run April to September and October to March, and crossing Rs 21,000 does not end coverage on the spot. Someone who crosses in January stays covered to 31 March. Rates and ceilings come from EPFO, ESIC and the Income Tax Department directly.
One more line for anyone modelling headcount cost rather than software cost. Factory coverage thresholds moved from 10 workers to 20 where power is used, and from 20 to 40 where it is not. Our guide to minimum wage and average salary in India covers the salary side. The employee versus contractor guide covers the misclassification exposure the Social Security Code has just widened.
The comparison tables
Group 1: India-native HR and payroll platforms
| Platform | India statutory (PF, ESI, PT, TDS) |
Entry price, verified July 2026 | Best for | Watch for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| greytHR | Full, including ECR and challan generation | Free to 25 employees. Essential from Rs 3,495 per month at 50. | Indian SMBs that want compliance first | Modules priced separately above the core licence |
| Keka | Full, with investment declaration workflow | Foundation from Rs 6,999 per month to 100 employees, plus 2% setup | Mid-market, 100 to 2,000 people | No plan below 100 employees |
| Zoho Payroll | Full | Free to 10 employees. Rs 40 per employee per month on Basic. | Teams already inside the Zoho stack | Pairs with Zoho People, which is priced separately |
| Zoho People | Core HR only, payroll is a separate product | Essential HR from Rs 48 per employee per month | HR admin alongside Zoho Payroll | Not a payroll product on its own |
| RazorpayX Payroll | Full, with automated e-filing | Free to 20 employees. Roughly Rs 100 per employee per month after. | Startups that want same-day salary payouts | Larger plans are quote-only |
| Darwinbox | Full, enterprise grade | Custom annual contract, not published | Large Indian and APAC enterprises | Implementation is a project, not a signup |
| Kredily | Core payroll and compliance | Free plan available | Very small Indian teams on zero budget | Depth drops off as headcount grows |
| Pocket HRMS | Full | Flat-fee tiers, published on request | Indian SMBs wanting flat rather than per-seat pricing | Pricing not public |
| factoHR | Full, multi-state | Published on request | Multi-state Indian operations, manufacturing | Pricing not public |
| HROne | Full | Published on request, go-live billing model | Multi-entity Indian groups | Pricing not public |
Group 2: Global platforms that can run or arrange Indian payroll
| Platform | How India works | Entry price, verified July 2026 | Best for | Watch for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rippling | Global payroll plus EOR through a partner network | HR from $8 per user per month. EOR is quote-only. | Companies consolidating HR, IT and finance | EOR sits on top of a mandatory platform fee |
| Deel | Owned entities in most markets, EOR and payroll-only | $599 EOR standard, $899 enterprise, $29 payroll-only | Multi-country hiring with a plannable price | One month salary deposit is typical |
| Remote | EOR and contractor management | $599 per employee per month annually, $699 monthly | Companies in 5 to 15 countries | Coverage thins above that scale |
| Multiplier | EOR across APAC and beyond | Around $400 per employee per month | Budget-conscious APAC hiring | Lighter HRIS and contractor depth |
| Papaya Global | Global payroll and payments | Premium tier, roughly $699 to $770 | Large distributed payroll operations | Overkill below about 50 people |
| Oyster HR | EOR in 180+ markets | Roughly $699 per employee per month | Remote-first teams | No free tier |
| Velocity Global | EOR and global payroll | Custom pricing | Enterprise multi-country expansion | Not built for small teams |
| ADP | ADP has a genuine India payroll operation | Custom pricing | Enterprises already standardised on ADP | Quote-only, long sales cycle |
Group 3: Strong platforms that do not run Indian statutory payroll
| Platform | What it is genuinely good at | Entry price, verified July 2026 | India position |
|---|---|---|---|
| BambooHR | Core HR, ATS, employee experience | Quote-based, historically from about $6 per employee per month | No Indian payroll. Pair with an Indian payroll engine. |
| Workday | Enterprise HCM and finance in one | Custom | Global payroll partner model, not native Indian statutory filing |
| SAP SuccessFactors | Enterprise talent and HCM | Custom | India via partner or SAP Payroll implementation |
| UKG Pro | Workforce management, shifts, time | Custom | US and select markets, not Indian statutory |
| HiBob | Culture, engagement, modern core HR | Quote-based | No Indian payroll |
| Personio | All-in-one HR for European SMBs | Custom | Built for EU compliance, not India |
| Gusto | US payroll and benefits for small business | From about $49 per month plus per person | US only |
| Paycor | US payroll, compliance and talent | Custom | US only |
| TriNet HR Plus | US ASO and PEO services, formerly Zenefits | Custom, service-tier based | US only |
| Justworks | US PEO for startups | From about $59 per employee per month | US focused, limited international |
| Lattice | Performance, goals, engagement | From about $11 per user per month | Not a payroll product anywhere |
| 15Five | Continuous performance and engagement | From about $7 per user per month | Not a payroll product anywhere |
Considered and not shortlisted
| Platform | Why it is not in the thirty |
|---|---|
| Freshteam | Freshworks stopped renewals on 7 March 2026. Existing customers have to migrate to Freshservice for Business Teams by April 2027. It should not appear on any 2026 buying list. |
| Zenefits | No longer sold as a standalone product. Folded into TriNet HR Plus, which is listed above under its current name. |
| Greenhouse | Applicant tracking, not HR software. Worth buying, but it belongs to a different category. |
| ClearCompany, Eddy, HR Cloud, Namely, Sage HR, Factorial, GoCo | Competent products with no Indian statutory payroll and no India angle. Group 3 covers the same buying case with better-known names. |
| Oracle PeopleSoft | Legacy on-premise HCM. Oracle is steering new buyers towards Fusion Cloud HCM. |
| Bitrix24 | Collaboration suite with light HR features, not an HRMS. |
Group 1 in detail: India-native platforms
1. greytHR
greytHR is what most Indian companies land on, and it has been that way for years. The free Starter tier runs core HR, payroll, leave and attendance up to 25 employees, which is hard to argue with at seed stage. Paid tiers open around Rs 3,495 a month for 50 people on Essential, roughly Rs 5,495 on Growth and around Rs 7,495 on Enterprise, with per-head charges once you pass the bundled count.
PF, ESI and state professional tax rates come pre-configured. You will care about that the first time you run payroll across Karnataka, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Delhi in one month and hit four different rule sets. Watch the module pricing, though. Recruitment, performance and expense all sit outside the base licence, so the invoice drifts away from the sticker as you grow. One buyer analysis put five-year total cost for a 250-person firm at roughly 2.3 times the headline number.
2. Keka
Keka owns the Indian mid-market. Payroll, performance and recruitment live in one product, and Indian HR teams rate the interface well above the category average. Pricing starts at Rs 6,999 a month for up to 100 employees on Foundation, then Rs 60 to Rs 180 per additional head depending on tier, plus a 2 percent platform setup fee on annual subscriptions.
Below 100 people the maths stops working. There is no smaller plan, so a 40-person startup pays for 100 seats anyway. At that size greytHR or Zoho Payroll will cost a fraction of it.
3. Zoho Payroll and Zoho People
Zoho Payroll is the cheapest credible route to compliant Indian payroll. Free to 10 employees, Rs 40 a head per month on Basic, Rs 60 on Standard once you want direct deposit and department reporting. Zoho People is the HR layer and bills separately, from Rs 48 a head on Essential HR up to Rs 192 on Enterprise.
Read those two prices together before comparing Zoho to anything else. Switch both on and you land somewhere between Rs 85 and Rs 180 per employee per month, which puts Zoho above Keka in some headcount bands rather than under it. Already running Zoho Books or Zoho One? Then the integration argument probably decides it and price is the secondary question. Coming in cold, the advantage is thinner than the headline suggests.
4. RazorpayX Payroll
RazorpayX Payroll arrives from banking rather than HR. Salaries settle same day out of the RazorpayX wallet over NEFT, IMPS or RTGS, and the TDS, PF and ESI calculations feed straight into automated e-filing. Free up to 20 employees. Paid usage runs near Rs 100 a head per month, with anything larger quoted rather than published.
It fits companies where finance owns payroll and wants the payout and the filing sitting in one place. On the HR side it is thinner than greytHR or Keka, so leave, attendance and performance usually need something beside it.
5. Darwinbox
Darwinbox competes with Workday and SuccessFactors across Asia, not with greytHR. Contracts are negotiated annually or over several years and nothing is published. Budget for an implementation measured in months. It belongs on the shortlist above roughly 1,000 employees, or wherever you are pulling several APAC countries onto one system.
6 to 10. Kredily, Pocket HRMS, factoHR, HROne, Zimyo
These five fill the gaps around the big four. Kredily has a genuinely free plan, which suits five to fifteen people with no budget at all. Pocket HRMS prices in flat tiers rather than per seat. That helps when headcount is lumpy. factoHR is built for multi-state and manufacturing setups, the kind where shift attendance drives the whole payroll run, and HROne bills from go-live rather than contract signature, which changes the first-year maths when implementation drags on for months. Zimyo sits in greytHR’s band, lighter.
None of the five publishes full pricing. Before signing, ask for a written breakdown covering per-head charges, GST, setup fees, add-on modules, data migration, exit terms and renewal pricing, which is the item buyers skip and the one that costs them in year two.
Group 2 in detail: global platforms with an India route
11. Rippling
Rippling bundles HR, IT and finance, and the device management piece genuinely helps when you are onboarding engineers in Bengaluru from an office in London. Core HR runs about $8 per user per month. EOR is quote-only and cannot be bought without the core platform under it, so the real number is always two lines on the invoice. Our full Rippling review goes through the module structure.
Rippling sued Deel in March 2025 alleging corporate espionage. A federal court denied Deel’s motion to dismiss in February 2026 and Deel countersued. Nothing has produced a finding against either company, and procurement will ask about it, so know the position going in.
12. Deel
Deel prints its prices, which in this category is unusual. EOR runs $599 per employee per month on standard and $899 on enterprise. Contractor management is $49 per contractor per month, contractor of record $325, and payroll-only for companies that already have an entity $29 a head. Deel owns entities across most of its 130-plus countries rather than renting partners, and that shows up in emerging markets. Our Deel competitors and alternatives review has the head-to-head.
Two costs the headline misses. A deposit of one month of salary per employee is standard. And FX markup of 2 to 5 percent on payroll can run larger than the platform fee itself when you are paying Indian salaries out of a USD account.
13 and 14. Remote and Multiplier
Remote matches Deel at $599 per employee per month on annual billing and charges $699 if you pay monthly. Same product, 14 percent apart depending on billing cycle. It works well for companies operating across five to fifteen countries. Multiplier sits at the bottom of published EOR pricing at roughly $400 a head per month and is strongest across APAC, which makes it worth a quote for India-heavy hiring. Our Remote review covers the pricing detail.
15 to 18. Papaya Global, Oyster HR, Velocity Global, ADP
Papaya Global and Oyster HR sit at the premium end, roughly $699 to $770 per employee per month, earning it on payments infrastructure and market breadth respectively. Velocity Global is quote-only and built for enterprise expansion programmes rather than a first hire. ADP is the one global name with a real, long-running India payroll operation instead of a partner arrangement, which makes it the institutionally safe answer for enterprises already standardised on ADP elsewhere.
Group 3 in detail: what these do instead
BambooHR is still the benchmark for core HR usability and applicant tracking. It does not run Indian payroll, so the working pattern is BambooHR as system of record with greytHR or Zoho Payroll doing the statutory work underneath. Our BambooHR pricing breakdown covers what a quote actually includes.
Workday and SAP SuccessFactors are enterprise HCM platforms. India payroll arrives through a partner or a separate payroll implementation, never out of the box. UKG Pro is a workforce management product first and earns its place where shift scheduling drives the cost base.
HiBob and Personio are the modern answers for the European mid-market. Personio is built around EU compliance and GDPR-native document handling, which is precisely the wrong optimisation when your burden is EPFO and ESIC.
Gusto, Paycor, TriNet HR Plus and Justworks are US products. Gusto and Paycor run payroll, TriNet HR Plus is an administrative services organisation and Justworks is a PEO. Four good answers to a US question, none of which touches Indian statutory filing. If the PEO model is on your list, our PEO versus HRIS comparison sets out where each one fits.
Lattice and 15Five measure performance and engagement. They are here because they appear on nearly every HR software roundup and should not be compared to a payroll system at all. Buy them for goal setting and review cycles, running alongside whatever handles payroll.
Choosing by scenario
| Your situation | Start here | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Indian company, under 25 employees | greytHR Starter, or Kredily | Free, and full statutory compliance from day one |
| Indian company, 25 to 100 employees | Zoho Payroll plus Zoho People, or greytHR Essential | Rs 40 to Rs 100 per employee per month with real filing support |
| Indian company, 100 to 2,000 employees | Keka, or greytHR Growth | Payroll, performance and recruitment in one place |
| Indian enterprise, 2,000 plus | Darwinbox, or ADP | Multi-entity, multi-country, negotiated contract |
| Foreign company with an Indian entity | greytHR or Keka for India, plus your global HRIS | Statutory filing has to be local, while the HR record can be global |
| Foreign company, no Indian entity, 1 to 5 hires | An employer of record | Software cannot make you a legal employer. See section 9. |
| Foreign company, no Indian entity, 15 plus hires | Model both routes before deciding | The entity route usually wins on cost and loses on speed and risk |
| Hiring contractors, not employees | Contractor of record or direct contracts | Misclassification is the exposure. See our guide below. |
Where HR software stops and an employer of record starts
Everything above assumes you are already a legal employer in India.
To employ someone directly you need a registered entity, a PAN, a TAN for deducting tax at source, EPFO registration once you cross the coverage threshold, ESIC registration where it applies, professional tax registration in every state where you have staff, and a shops and establishments registration for the office. Payroll software automates the filing against all of that, and produces none of it.
An employer of record becomes the legal employer instead. The person works for you day to day. The EOR holds the contract, runs payroll, makes the statutory contributions and carries the compliance liability. Our ranked comparison of the best employer of record providers in India covers who does this well here, and EOR versus PEO explains why the two models get used as synonyms almost everywhere and should not be.
The four questions that decide it
- Do you have an Indian entity today? If not, and you need someone working inside eight weeks, an EOR is the only compliant route. Incorporation plus registrations rarely finishes faster than that.
- How many people, and for how long? Under roughly eight to twelve employees, EOR fees usually come in below the cost of running an entity once you add the CA retainer, statutory audit and ROC filings. Past that the maths flips.
- Are you creating a permanent establishment? An entity can bring corporate tax exposure and transfer pricing obligations that the EOR fee was quietly buying away. Ask your tax adviser, not your HR team.
- Who carries the liability when a classification is wrong? Under an EOR, the EOR does. Under your own entity with software, you do, and directors are personally exposed for certain statutory defaults.
Example
Five engineers in Bengaluru, Rs 18,00,000 CTC each.
| Line | Own entity plus software | Employer of record |
|---|---|---|
| Software or platform fee | greytHR Essential, about Rs 41,940 per year | 5 × $599 × 12 = $35,940 per year at Deel Standard |
| Same, budget option | Zoho Payroll at Rs 40 per head, about Rs 2,400 per year | 5 × $149 × 12 = $8,940 with an India specialist |
| Entity setup | Incorporation and registrations, one-off professional fees | None |
| Ongoing compliance | CA retainer, statutory audit, ROC and TDS filings | Included in the fee |
| Employer PF | 12% of PF wages, ceiling Rs 15,000 per month | Same cost, administered by the EOR |
| Gratuity provision | Accrues from day one, payable at 5 years | Same cost, administered by the EOR |
| FX exposure | Pay in INR from an INR account | 2 to 5 percent markup, often larger than the platform fee |
| Liability for a compliance failure | You, and in some cases your directors personally | The EOR |
| Time to first hire | Typically 8 to 12 weeks | Typically 1 to 2 weeks |
The software route wins on invoice cost. It loses on liability, and the crossover depends far more on how long you plan to stay in India than on how many people you hire. If you want that modelled against your own numbers, Peorient advisory does it independently, or you can talk to us directly. Related reading: what global payroll actually covers, how EOR payroll works, PEO services in India, top international PEO providers in India, international PEO explained, HRIS for small business, employee benefits administration and HR outsourcing services.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Does BambooHR handle Indian payroll?
No. BambooHR is core HR and applicant tracking. It does not calculate or file EPF, ESI, professional tax or TDS. Companies running BambooHR in India usually keep it as the system of record and put an Indian payroll engine underneath, most often greytHR or Zoho Payroll.
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What is the cheapest HR software with full Indian statutory compliance?
greytHR Starter, at zero, up to 25 employees, covering PF, ESI, professional tax and TDS. Past 25 people, Zoho Payroll at Rs 40 a head per month on Basic is the cheapest paid option, and it is free up to 10. RazorpayX Payroll is free up to 20.
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Do I need an Indian entity to use Indian payroll software?
Yes. Payroll software files on behalf of a registered employer. It does not create one. With no Indian entity, no PAN, no TAN and no EPFO or ESIC registration, there is nothing for the software to file against. That situation calls for an employer of record.
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What changed for Indian payroll on 21 November 2025?
The four Labour Codes took effect, consolidating twenty-nine earlier laws. The payroll consequence is the wage definition. Excluded allowances can no longer exceed half of total remuneration, so basic plus dearness allowance has to reach at least 50 percent of CTC. That lifts the base for PF, gratuity and bonus. Published modelling puts the effect at 5 to 15 percent on annual employer statutory cost.
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What are the PF and ESI contribution rates in 2026?
Provident fund is 12 percent from the employee and 12 percent from the employer, calculated on PF wages against a statutory ceiling of Rs 15,000 a month unless the employee opts to contribute on more. ESI is 0.75 percent employee and 3.25 percent employer, applying where gross wages run up to Rs 21,000 a month, or Rs 25,000 where the employee has a disability. The ESI rates have not moved since 1 July 2019.
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Can Deel or Rippling replace an Indian HRMS?
They replace the employer relationship. The local HR workflow stays your problem. Both will employ the person for you and handle statutory contributions through their EOR product. Where they run thin is the Indian day to day: shift attendance, biometric device integration, investment declaration workflows, state-specific leave rules. Larger India teams tend to end up running both.
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Which platforms generate Form 16 and Form 24Q?
greytHR, Keka, Zoho Payroll, RazorpayX Payroll, Darwinbox, Pocket HRMS, factoHR and HROne all generate the upload files for EPFO ECR, ESIC challans, quarterly Form 24Q and annual Form 16. The global platforms in group two handle this through their India payroll operation or a local partner rather than natively.
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At what headcount does an employer of record stop being cheaper than an entity?
For most companies it sits somewhere between eight and twelve employees in India, once incorporation, a chartered accountant retainer, statutory audit and ROC filings are set against the per-head EOR fee. That is cost only. It prices nothing for permanent establishment exposure, transfer pricing obligations or director liability, which is why some companies stay on an EOR well past the point the spreadsheet says to leave.
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