Comparison
Looking for a Zoho People alternative? An honest comparison for small Indian teams that hire
We make HR-VEND, so read this knowing who wrote it. We have tried to keep it useful anyway: real prices from the vendors' own pages with the date we read them, the cases where Zoho is plainly the better pick, and the one structural difference — hiring sold separately versus hiring included — that decides most 10-to-50-person comparisons.
The short version
- On core HR alone, the two entry plans cost nearly the same per employee. The fork is hiring: Zoho sells Recruit separately per recruiter; HR-VEND includes the pipeline and careers page in every plan.
- For 10–25 staff with regular hiring, the monthly gap is roughly ₹1,200+ in HR-VEND's favour (prices read 5 October 2026).
- Pick Zoho if you want its ecosystem, a free tier for up to 3 users, iOS apps, or a 30-day trial.
- Pick HR-VEND if hiring is constant, you want one bill, monthly billing on a 10-employee minimum, and a separate database per company.
- HR-VEND does not claim guaranteed statutory compliance; its India pack is under professional review. We say so here because you would find out anyway.
What each product is
Zoho People is the HR module of the Zoho suite: employee records, leave, attendance, performance, with payroll (Zoho Payroll) and recruitment (Zoho Recruit) as separate products that integrate with it. It is mature, global, and backed by one of India's great software companies.
HR-VEND is a single workspace for Indian SMBs: hiring pipeline and careers page, employee records, leave, attendance and payroll in one product, one bill, at your company's own address (yourcompany.hrvend.com) with a separate database per company. It is newer and narrower, built for companies of 10 to 200 people that hire all the time.
The prices, as published
Everything in this table was read on the vendors' own public pages on 5 October 2026, excludes 18% GST, and will change. Entries marked "reported" come from third-party sources we could not confirm on the vendor's page that day. Always check the vendor's current page before deciding.
| Zoho | HR-VEND | |
|---|---|---|
| Core HR, entry plan | People Essential HR: ₹48/employee/month billed annually, ₹60 billed monthly, minimum 5 users; free edition up to 3 users | Starter: ₹49/employee/month, billed monthly, minimum 10 employees, up to 25 |
| Hiring / ATS | Zoho Recruit, separate: ₹1,250/recruiter/month billed annually (₹1,500 monthly) | Included in every plan: pipeline, careers page, offers, close-outs, cost per hire |
| Payroll | Zoho Payroll, separate: free up to 10 employees; Standard ₹1,000/org/month (annual) covering 25, plus ₹40/employee beyond | Included from Growth: ₹99/employee/month, up to 200 employees |
| Trial | 30 days | 7 days, no card, all modules on |
| Billing style | Cheapest rates need annual billing | Monthly, cancel anytime |
The arithmetic for a team that hires
Take a 15-person company with one person doing the recruiting, hiring most months:
| Monthly cost | Zoho People + Recruit | HR-VEND Starter |
|---|---|---|
| Core HR | 15 × ₹48 = ₹720 (annual billing) | 15 × ₹49 = ₹735 |
| Hiring | 1 recruiter × ₹1,250 = ₹1,250 | Included |
| Total | ₹1,970, part of it prepaid for the year | ₹735, monthly |
That is the whole argument in one table. The products' HR cores are priced nearly identically; the hiring module is where the models differ, and small teams that hire feel it every month. At 50 staff with payroll, the same structure holds: Zoho People Professional plus Payroll plus Recruit stacks three subscriptions, while HR-VEND Growth is 50 × ₹99 = ₹4,950 in one. (For the 50-person payroll-only case, other vendors undercut both — our pricing guide maps the whole market honestly.)
Where Zoho is the better choice
An alternative-to page you can trust has to be able to say this part. Choose Zoho People when:
- You already run on Zoho. If Mail, CRM or Books is your daily stack, People slots in with shared sign-on and admin. That integration advantage is real and HR-VEND does not match it.
- You are tiny. The free edition for up to 3 users is unbeatable at that size, and HR-VEND's 10-employee billing minimum makes it the wrong product below about 10 staff.
- You need iOS. Zoho's mobile apps cover Android and iOS; HR-VEND's employee app, Onduty, is Android-only today.
- You want a long evaluation. Zoho's 30-day trial is four times HR-VEND's 7 days.
- You rarely hire. If recruitment is one role a year, Recruit's per-recruiter fee never bites, and the hiring-included argument mostly evaporates.
Where HR-VEND is the better choice
- Hiring is constant. The pipeline, careers page, interview scheduling, offers, one-click close-outs and cost per hire by channel are in every plan, not a per-recruiter add-on. If three people screen candidates at your company, that is three Recruit licences you are not buying.
- One product, one bill. A candidate's details flow into their employee record, leave balance and first payslip without integration setup between separate products.
- Monthly billing, 10-employee minimum. No annual prepayment to get the advertised rate.
- A separate database per company. Most SaaS HR products keep all customers in shared multi-tenant tables; HR-VEND provisions each company its own database at its own address. If data isolation matters to you (it does to clinics and finance firms), this is a structural difference, not a feature toggle.
- India-first setup. State captured at signup drives professional tax, holiday lists and leave rules from day one.
What we won't claim
Two things, so you hear them from us first. HR-VEND's India statutory pack — the PF/ESI/labour-code depth of the payroll module — is under review by labour-law professionals and we do not advertise guaranteed compliance until it is signed off; Zoho Payroll publishes statutory-compliance claims we are not yet entitled to make. And HR-VEND is young: no logo wall, no testimonial carousel, because we will not invent one. What we offer instead is architecture you can verify in the trial: your own address, your own database, and every module switched on from minute one.
If you decide to switch
- Export your employee list and import it; set up departments, leave types and your State's holidays.
- Recreate open roles and point your careers page link at the new one; keep old applications wherever they are until closed.
- Run one payroll cycle in parallel before cutting over, comparing payslips line by line.
- Only then cancel the old subscriptions — and note Recruit/People annual terms for the renewal date.
Our buyer's checklist has the fuller evaluation list, including the questions to ask any vendor about data export and deletion.
Frequently asked questions
Is HR-VEND cheaper than Zoho People?
When is Zoho People the better choice?
Does HR-VEND include payroll, and can it guarantee statutory compliance?
Can I try HR-VEND before paying?
What does switching involve?
Zoho, Zoho People, Zoho Recruit and Zoho Payroll are trademarks of Zoho Corporation; HR-VEND is not affiliated with Zoho. All third-party prices and plan details were read on the vendors' public pages on 5 October 2026, exclude GST, and may have changed — confirm on the vendor's site. This comparison was written by the HR-VEND team.