Workable and Greenhouse are two of the most respected applicant tracking systems on the market. They're used by thousands of companies and for good reason: they're genuinely excellent products with deep feature sets, strong integrations, and professional workflows.
They're also built for companies hiring at scale — typically 20+ roles per year with dedicated HR and recruiting teams. For a small business or startup hiring 2–5 people per year with a founder doing their own recruiting, both platforms are expensive and overcomplicated.
This is an honest comparison of what you get, what you pay, and whether a simpler, cheaper alternative makes more sense for your team size.
Workable: Full-Featured, Premium Price
Starting price: $299/month (Starter plan, up to 2 active jobs)
Workable's strongest feature is job distribution: it auto-posts to 200+ job boards including Indeed, LinkedIn, Glassdoor, and ZipRecruiter with one click. For companies that rely on job board traffic for a large volume of applicants, this is a significant time saver.
Beyond that, Workable offers AI-powered candidate sourcing (searches resumes across LinkedIn, GitHub, and other platforms), structured interview kits with scorecards, video interviewing, HRIS integrations, and detailed hiring analytics. It's a complete recruiting stack.
The Starter plan at $299/month allows only 2 active jobs and limits some features. Most growing companies need the Standard or Pro plan, which can run $400–$600+/month. Annual contracts are available at a discount.
Verdict for small teams: Overkill and overpriced for 1–5 hires per year. The job board distribution feature is valuable if you rely on paid job boards — but if you're sourcing from your network and LinkedIn, you're paying for something you won't use.
Greenhouse: Enterprise-Grade, Enterprise Price
Starting price: $6,000+/year (pricing not publicly listed; requires a sales demo)
Greenhouse is the gold standard for enterprise recruiting. It has the most sophisticated structured hiring workflows on the market: interview scorecards, approval workflows, custom pipelines, detailed compliance tracking (GDPR, OFCCP), executive hiring dashboards, and hundreds of integrations. Companies like Airbnb, Squarespace, and HubSpot use Greenhouse.
The pricing reflects the target market. Greenhouse doesn't publish prices publicly — they require a demo and quote based on company size. Estimates from publicly available data put the entry-level plan around $6,000–$8,000/year, with larger companies paying $15,000–$50,000+/year.
Verdict for small teams: Not for small businesses. The product is excellent, but the price and complexity assume an HR team that spends significant time on recruiting operations. For a founder hiring their second or third employee, this is the wrong tool entirely.
ApplyHere: Built for Small Teams That Just Need the Basics
Starting price: $9 per job post
ApplyHere doesn't try to compete with Workable or Greenhouse on features. Instead, it covers the core workflow small businesses actually need:
- Create a job post in minutes
- Get a shareable application link to post anywhere
- Collect full applications with resumes, cover letters, and LinkedIn profiles
- Review candidates in an organized dashboard
- Email candidates directly from their application page
- Download resumes individually or in bulk
What it doesn't have: job board auto-distribution, AI candidate sourcing, interview scorecards, HRIS integrations, or approval workflows. For a team of 2–10 people hiring 1–5 roles per year, you don't need those things.
Verdict for small teams: The right tool for businesses that need a structured, professional hiring workflow without enterprise complexity or pricing.
When Does It Make Sense to Pay More?
The honest answer: when you're hiring enough that the time savings from automation and integrations outweigh the cost.
- Hiring 15+ people per year → Workable's job board distribution and pipeline automation start paying off
- Hiring 30+ people per year with an HR team → Greenhouse's structured workflows and compliance features become genuinely valuable
- Hiring 1–10 people per year → A simple tool at $10–$50/month covers what you need
| Platform | Price | Best for | Not for |
|---|---|---|---|
| ApplyHere | $9 per job post | Small businesses, 1–10 hires/year | Teams needing job board distribution at scale |
| Workable | $299+/month | Growing companies, 15–50 hires/year | Small businesses with occasional hiring |
| Greenhouse | $6,000+/year | Enterprise, 50+ hires/year, dedicated HR | Any team without a full HR function |
The Bottom Line
For small teams, the choice isn't really Workable vs. Greenhouse. Both are built for organizations that are larger than you. The question is whether you need a structured hiring tool at all — and if you do, whether something simple and affordable covers your actual needs.
Most small businesses hiring 1–5 people per year do better with a simple, affordable tool than by overpaying for enterprise features they'll never use. Start simple. Upgrade when the complexity and hiring volume justify it.