Veritas HR
Guide

Best HR Software for Startups in India

Eleven HR and payroll tools an Indian startup can actually afford, including the ones with genuine free tiers, with published prices and the statutory thresholds that decide when you need them.

By

Priya Nair

· Updated

· Editorial, independently researched

A startup’s first HR software purchase is usually forced by compliance rather than ambition. The thresholds are worth knowing before you buy anything: ESIC registration applies once you employ 10 people, with a wage ceiling of ₹21,000 a month; provident fund registration is triggered at 20 employees; and a POSH internal committee is legally required at 10 employees, whether or not you have an HR person. Below ten staff a spreadsheet and a bank transfer are defensible. Between ten and thirty, the argument for software is that PF, ESI, professional tax and TDS are calculated and filed consistently and Form 16 arrives without a scramble in June. Buy for that first. Engagement surveys, OKR dashboards and learning modules are things you will grow into, and paying per employee for them while you are twelve people is a poor trade. Watch for seat minimums: several vendors quote an attractive per-employee rate but bill a floor of 25 or 50 users.

How we picked

We started from the 51 products on Veritas tagged as suiting startups, then kept only those whose vendor publishes a rupee or dollar price, a free tier or a free trial — because a quote-only product is not a realistic first purchase for a ten-person company. Every fact below comes from the vendor’s own website. Products are normally ordered by the Veritas score, which counts upvotes, moderated reviews and a Bayesian rating, and sponsors never affect it; at launch no product has an upvote or a review, so scores are tied and we group by job to be done rather than publishing a ranking. Three products in the wider catalogue are seeded sample records rather than researched entries and are excluded here. Last updated 2 September 2026.

Genuinely free to start

  • Kredily (Bengaluru, founded 2017) — the only product here with a free plan and no headcount cap. Covers an employee database, web attendance, leave rules, a self-service mobile app and automatic PF, ESI, professional tax and TDS calculation. Payroll OS from ₹1,249 a month for 25 employees adds ICICI Bank salary payouts, PF and ESI challans and Forms 12BB and 16. Explicitly aimed at companies still on spreadsheets.
  • Zoho Payroll (Chennai, founded 2018) — free up to 10 employees, then ₹1,000 a month on annual billing for 25. EPF, ESI, professional tax, LWF and income tax are included on every plan, including the free one, with TDS worksheets, Form 12BB and digitally signed tax forms. Pair it with Zoho People, free up to 5 users, if you also want leave, attendance and appraisals.
  • factoHR (Rajkot, founded 2016) — free up to 20 employees, which covers most seed-stage teams outright. Core HR, payroll and compliance, attendance with face recognition and geo-fencing, recruitment and onboarding, OKR performance, travel and expense and an LMS, plus a long integration list including Tally, QuickBooks, Xero, Google Workspace and Okta.
  • uKnowva (Mumbai, founded 2016) — free up to 20 users. The paid Lite edition is sold to startups, consultants and NGOs, but note the 50-user billing minimum once you move off the free tier. Biometric, QR and geo-fenced attendance, AI-assisted CV parsing and a no-code workflow builder.
  • Jibble (Kuala Lumpur, founded 2017) — free forever for unlimited users if all you need is attendance. Mobile, web, desktop and shared-tablet kiosk clock-ins with selfie capture, AI face matching, GPS stamps, geofences and offline punches. No India-specific rupee pricing and no Indian statutory payroll, so treat it as a point solution, not an HRMS.

When payroll has to be filed, not just calculated

  • RazorpayX Payroll (Bengaluru, founded 2019) — ₹2,499 a month for up to 20 employees on the Prime plan, Elite up to 50. It calculates, pays and files TDS, PF, professional tax and ESIC, generates challans automatically and issues Form 16 with a digital signature. For a founder without an HR hire, that is the difference between owning a compliance calendar and not.
  • TeamNest (Mumbai) — ₹2 per employee per day with a ₹1,000 monthly minimum, so a fifteen-person team pays about ₹900 and hits the floor. One subscription covers attendance, leave, expenses, payroll, central and state statutory compliance, timesheets, onboarding and exit. Interface in eight languages including Hindi and Gujarati.
  • sumHR — ₹1,428 per employee per year, or free if you take it alongside Jupiter Money zero-balance salary accounts and salary advances. Payroll with unlimited salary structures and IT declarations, PF, ESI, PT and TDS, plus HRIS, GPS attendance, OKRs and HR letter generation. Recruitment is listed as coming soon.

When you outgrow the free tier

  • Qandle (Gurugram, founded 2016) — ₹79 per employee a month billed yearly, but with a ₹3,000 monthly minimum, so it makes sense from roughly forty staff upwards. More than forty modules, applicant tracking, biometric, GPS and face-recognition attendance, eTDS filing and digitally signed Form 16. Vendor states it serves teams from 10 to 10,000.
  • peopleHum (Bengaluru) — $2 per employee a month with a seven-day trial and no credit card required. Strongest on the analytics layer: recruitment insights, performance and engagement dashboards and custom reports over applicant tracking, leave, goals, 360 feedback and surveys. Integrates with greytHR for Indian payroll, so plan for two subscriptions.
  • HROne (Noida, founded 2016) — ₹4,950 a month for 50 users on the standard plan, with a separate startup plan for smaller teams and a free trial. Worth a look if your staff are field-based: the mobile app does geo-tagged selfie attendance and works offline.

If your team is on shop floors or in the field

  • PagarBook (Bengaluru) — ₹499 per staff member a year for the app-only plan. Selfie, GPS and face-match attendance, offline entry, overtime and fine rules, muster rolls, and salary handling for regular, contractual and piece-rate staff with advances, PF and ESI. Built for shops, clinics and small factories rather than desk teams. No free trial.
  • SalaryBox (Gurugram) — ₹30 per user a month plus a ₹1,500 monthly base on the Starter plan, cheaper on quarterly or annual terms. AI-checked selfie attendance inside a geofence, rosters, live location tracking and a field-force CRM, with automated salary runs and statutory compliance on the Business tier.

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