What is the best payroll software for a small business in 2026?

OnPay wins because it refuses to play the tier game. There is one payroll plan, Payroll Essentials, at $49 a month plus $6 per worker. Tax filing, W-2s and 1099s are part of it. You don't discover in month six that the feature you need lives in a plan twice as expensive.

For three employees that is $67 a month. For ten, $109. HR tools come as add-ons: $15 a month plus $2 per worker for HR, more if you add time tracking. You only pay for them if you actually want them.

Owners who left Gusto after its price increase mention OnPay more than any other name in small business forums. The common praise is support: real people who know payroll, rather than a ticket queue. The limit is breadth. OnPay does payroll and basic HR very well, but it won't manage laptops or app access like Rippling, and its scheduling is nowhere near Homebase.

Tip: if you pay contractors only some months, check how your worker count is calculated before you add them all. A worker you don't pay doesn't need to sit on the active list.

Patriot is the price leader here, and owners in Reddit's small business communities describe it the same way: very affordable, nothing fancy. Basic Payroll costs $17 a month plus $4 per worker paid. Full Service Payroll, where Patriot files and deposits your payroll taxes for you, costs $37 a month plus $5 per worker. Contractors count as workers too.

That puts Full Service at $52 a month for three people and $87 for ten. New customers can also get 50% off for the first three months.

The catch sits in the Basic plan. It calculates paychecks, but you file and pay the taxes yourself. Owners who pick Basic to save $20 a month sometimes end up paying more in late-filing penalties. The interface is also more dated than OnPay or Homebase, and integrations are limited.

Tip: start on Full Service. The $20 gap with Basic is cheaper than one missed quarterly deposit.

Homebase started as a scheduling and time clock app, and that is still its edge. Hours clocked by your staff flow straight into payroll, with breaks and overtime already counted. For a café with eight part-timers, that removes the worst part of payroll: rebuilding timesheets by hand.

Payroll costs $49 a month plus $6 per employee paid, the same structure as OnPay. Homebase also lists a lower price for teams of up to five, and runs promotions for new sign-ups. Read the terms of any free period before you count on it.

The limit is everything beyond hourly work. Salaried teams get little from the scheduling side, and Homebase's HR and compliance features are lighter than OnPay's. If nobody on your team clocks in, you are paying for a tool built for someone else.

Tip: set your overtime and break rules in the scheduling side first. When they're right there, payroll is mostly a review.

Intuit now sells payroll as bundles with QuickBooks Online accounting. The entry bundle, Payroll with Simple Start, costs $88 a month plus $6.50 per employee. Payroll with Essentials costs $125 plus $6.50. The Premium bundle with Plus accounting costs $203 plus $10. New customers can get 50% off for three months.

The appeal is obvious: every pay run lands in your books with the right accounts, and your bookkeeper sees it the same day. If you already pay for QuickBooks accounting, part of that bundle price is money you were spending anyway.

The limit is price for anyone who doesn't need the accounting. Three employees on the entry bundle cost $107.50 a month, twice Patriot Full Service. Owners also complain about frequent price changes and upsell prompts inside the product.

Tip: compare the bundle against your current QuickBooks plan plus a separate payroll service. For some plans, the gap is small; for others, keeping payroll outside costs less.

Rippling treats the employee record as the center of everything. Hire someone, and payroll, benefits, their laptop and their software accounts can all be set up from that one record. When they leave, access is cut in the same place. For a company going from 5 to 40 people in a year, that saves real admin time.

The pricing page says plans start at $8 per employee per month plus a monthly base fee. Payroll itself is priced on quote, depending on headcount and the modules you pick. That makes Rippling impossible to compare line by line with OnPay or Patriot until you talk to sales.

The limit is fit. For a shop with three employees and no plans to grow, Rippling is more system than you need, and the modules add up. Read the contract length before signing.

Tip: list the modules you will use in the next twelve months, and ask for a quote on those only. Everything else can be added later.

RUN Powered by ADP is the small business product of the biggest payroll company in the US. It covers tax filing, new-hire reporting and HR packages that go up to an HR Pro tier with more compliance help. It ranks highly on software review grids for small businesses.

ADP publishes no price. Every package has a "get pricing" button, and the current offer for new clients is up to six months of free payroll, with terms. Owners report setup fees, year-end processing fees and per-state charges that only show up on the first invoices.

The other recurring complaint is the relationship after the sale: long waits on support, frequent upsell calls. Some owners love having a dedicated rep; others feel the price creeps every year.

Tip: before you sign, ask for the full fee schedule in writing, including year-end forms, additional states and termination terms. Compare that total with OnPay over twelve months.