Most rankings of payroll software treat every small business as the same customer. They are not. A coffee shop with tipped baristas, a three person design studio and a contractor crew working across two states will each find a different tool frustrating for completely different reasons.
So instead of crowning one winner, this guide starts with what you will actually pay, then matches each well known option to the type of business it genuinely suits.
Start with the bill, not the feature list
Pricing pages show a base fee and a per person fee. The total only becomes clear once you multiply. Here is what list pricing works out to for a team of 10 on each tool’s entry level full service plan. Prices were checked recently, and payroll companies adjust them often, so confirm before you sign.
| Software | Base per month | Per person | Approximate total at 10 people |
|---|---|---|---|
| Patriot Full Service | $37 | $5 | $87 |
| Square Payroll | $35 | $6 | $95 |
| Gusto Simple | $49 | $6 | $109 |
| OnPay | $49 | $6 | $109 |
| QuickBooks Workforce Payroll | $50 | $7 | $120, plus a QuickBooks Online plan |
| ADP RUN | Quote only | Quote only | Varies by package |
The gap between cheapest and priciest looks small at 10 people. It widens fast at 30 or 40, and it widens even faster once add ons enter the picture.
Restaurants, cafes and salons running on Square
If your register already runs on Square, Square Payroll is hard to argue against. Clocked hours and declared tips flow from the point of sale straight into payroll, so nobody retypes timesheets on Sunday night.
That matters more now than it did a year ago. Under the new federal rules on tips and overtime, employers report qualified tips and a tipped occupation code on each eligible worker’s W-2. A system that captures tips at the register has a natural head start. Square also offers a contractor only plan with no base fee, charged per contractor paid, which suits businesses leaning on freelancers.
Very small teams watching every dollar
For a business with a few employees and no complicated benefits, Patriot keeps costs lowest. The Full Service plan handles federal, state and local filing. There is also a Basic plan at $17 a month plus $4 per worker, where Patriot calculates pay but you make the deposits and file the forms yourself.
Basic is only worth it if you are comfortable with deposit schedules and quarterly returns. The money saved disappears quickly after one late deposit penalty.
Businesses already living inside QuickBooks
If your books sit in QuickBooks Online, QuickBooks Workforce, the new name for QuickBooks Online Payroll since this spring, posts payroll straight into the ledger. No syncing, no mismatched journal entries.
Two recent changes deserve attention before you commit. Per employee fees went up for new subscriptions on July 1. QuickBooks also now pays payroll taxes automatically at the moment you run payroll instead of on the due date, with no way to switch that off. Healthy for compliance, but it pulls cash earlier than you may be used to. Intuit has also introduced a payroll AI agent that texts hourly workers for their hours, flags anything unusual and drafts the run for you to approve.
Remote teams spread across several states
Multistate payroll is where a cheap plan can suddenly stop being cheap. Gusto Simple handles one state only. Hire a single person in a second state and you are pushed to Gusto Plus at $80 a month plus $12 per person, which roughly doubles the per head cost.
OnPay sells one plan, and it covers multiple states without an upgrade. For a 10 person team split between, say, Ohio and Texas, that difference alone can be worth well over a thousand dollars a year.
If you want payroll joined to HR tools like onboarding, performance reviews and an applicant tracker, Gusto Plus earns its price. If you only want clean payroll that files correctly everywhere, OnPay is the leaner choice.
Owners who want a phone number and a person
ADP RUN and Paychex Flex do not publish prices, and both lean on bundles and sales calls. What you get in return is depth. ADP has one of the most experienced tax compliance engines in the industry, and both companies can grow with you into retirement plans, insurance and PEO services.
Paychex has also been investing heavily in AI. Its WISE platform launched in May, and the company recently reported early results from more than 50,000 businesses showing fewer payroll errors. For owners who would rather call than click, these two still have the largest service teams.
Costs that rarely appear on the pricing page
The headline rate is rarely the full price. Look for these before signing:
- Faster deposits. Gusto charges Simple users $15 a month plus $3 per person for next day direct deposit, while Plus includes it.
- Same day and instant pay on lower tiers, which can carry a fee per payroll run.
- A required accounting subscription, as with QuickBooks.
- Time tracking sold separately on entry plans.
- Health insurance broker integration fees for each eligible employee.
- Annual price increases. Gusto moved its Simple base from $40 to $49 earlier this year.
Run a test payroll before you choose
Nearly every provider offers a free trial or a demo account. Use it properly. Set up one salaried employee, one hourly worker with a few overtime hours, and one tipped worker if your business has them. Then run a mock payroll.
Watch how the software separates the overtime premium from regular pay, since that premium is what now gets reported as qualified overtime. Check whether it asks for a tipped occupation code. See how many clicks it takes to fix a mistake after you have hit approve. Those few minutes reveal more than any review.
The short version for each kind of business
Square fits tipped and hourly teams already using its register. Patriot fits tiny teams that want the lowest bill. QuickBooks Workforce fits businesses whose accounting already lives in QuickBooks and who can handle taxes being pulled at run time. OnPay fits multistate teams that want one simple plan. Gusto fits growing companies that want payroll and HR in one place. ADP and Paychex fit owners who value a large support operation over a published price.
The best payroll software for your small business is the one that matches how you already work, files correctly in every state you hire, and still makes sense on the invoice once your headcount doubles.