How we rank payroll services
Our reviews are research-based. We read each company's pricing pages, terms and help docs, check verified customer reviews and public data, and record where every fact came from and when we checked it. We never claim hands-on testing we didn't do.
What we score
| Criterion | Weight | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Total cost | 30% | Base fee plus per-person fees plus the add-ons most small businesses end up paying (extra states, faster deposit, year-end forms), at the regular price after any promo ends. |
| Tax filing coverage | 25% | Whether the plan files and pays federal, state and local payroll taxes and year-end forms for you, per the vendor's own pages. A missed local filing is your penalty, not theirs. |
| Pricing transparency and terms | 15% | A published price, month-to-month terms and no promo that doubles after three months. Quote-only pricing scores lower because you can't compare it. |
| Features for small teams | 15% | Contractor payments, multi-state payroll, deposit speed, time tracking and basic HR, and what each one costs. |
| Support and customer ratings | 15% | Support channels and hours from the vendor's site, plus public customer ratings (Trustpilot) as a check on how billing and support work out in practice. |
What doesn't affect rankings
Commissions. Some companies pay us when you sign up through our links; that never changes a score or a position.
Where the facts come from
Prices, fees, plan limits and tax-filing coverage come from each company's own pricing page, plan pages, help center and terms of service. Each fact on a review lists the page it came from and the date we checked it. We recheck facts at least every 90 days, and our build fails if any fact goes longer than that without a recheck.
Customer ratings come from Trustpilot. Several Trustpilot profiles cover a whole company (QuickBooks, Square) rather than its payroll product, and we say so where that applies.
When a company's site blocked us from reading a page, we left that fact out rather than fill it from a third-party blog. That is why some providers show fewer facts than others, and why Paychex isn't ranked yet. ADP RUN publishes no prices; we'll add it once we can show its quote-only pricing honestly.
How prices are compared
We compare regular prices, not promo prices, because the promo ends and the regular price is what you pay for years. Our cost examples use the cheapest plan that files payroll taxes for you, in one state, at 5, 20 and 50 employees. Where a company publishes no price, we say "quote only" and score it lower on pricing transparency.
What we don't do
We don't claim to have run payroll on every service. We don't publish coupon or promo-code pages. And we don't move a company up because it pays a commission: our top pick, OnPay, pays us nothing.