Best Payroll Software for Small Business 2026

§1What to look for in small business payroll software

Gusto

Patriot

OnPay

Rippling

QuickBooks

ADP RUN

Paychex

Small business payroll needs differ from enterprise needs in three important ways: (1) the owner or a non-specialist often runs payroll, so the interface needs to be genuinely simple; (2) errors are more costly, a 5-person team cannot absorb a missed payroll the way a 500-person company can; (3) support quality matters more because you don't have an in-house payroll expert to diagnose issues.

The features that matter most for SMBs: automatic federal and state tax calculation and filing, direct deposit for employees, W-2 and 1099 generation at year-end, and basic time-off tracking. Everything beyond that, benefits administration, performance reviews, advanced reporting, can be added later as you scale. If Gusto turns out not to be the right fit, see our Gusto alternatives guide.

Pricing models vary significantly. Some use a flat base fee plus per-employee fee (Gusto, Patriot, OnPay). Others charge per-employee only (no base fee). A few use per-payroll-run pricing. For most small businesses, the base-plus-per-employee model is most predictable.

§2Gusto: best overall for SMBs

Gusto is the most widely used payroll software for US small businesses, and it earned that position with a genuinely smooth setup experience and a clean interface that non-HR people can navigate without training. The Simple plan covers everything most SMBs need: unlimited payroll runs, direct deposit, automatic tax filing, W-2s and 1099s, employee self-service, and basic onboarding.

The Simple plan runs $49/month plus $6/employee, up from $40/month before a 2026 price change. The Plus plan adds next-day direct deposit, time tracking, PTO policies, and performance reviews, and costs $80/month plus $12/employee.

It works best for US-only teams of 2 to 50 employees where the founder or an ops person runs payroll. Setup takes under an hour for most small businesses.

G2 reviews describe Gusto’s setup experience and customer support. For a current purchase, Simple includes basic PTO, while advanced time and people tools have plan-specific inclusions or paid options. Confirm the exact PTO workflow and approved funding speed instead of treating an older review’s upgrade requirement as current product scope.

Support quality has declined as Gusto has scaled. Phone support wait times can be long. If you are moving from another provider mid-year, budget time for data migration: it is not always smooth. The 2026 Simple plan price increase, a 23% jump with about a month's notice, also drew real frustration: a thread in r/Payroll from small business owners and accountants described switching clients to ADP or Paychex over it, and one commenter said flatly that "Gusto has definitely gotten too big for their britches" and is "losing a lot of the charm and advantages they once had over competitors" [r/Payroll, 2026]. A separate commenter in the same discussion cited a tax filing error as the reason they moved a client off Gusto entirely. Neither complaint means Gusto is unreliable for most small businesses, but budget for the possibility of another increase and check your filings each quarter, since autopilot is not error-free.

§3Patriot Payroll: best for tight budgets

Patriot Payroll offers the lowest price among full-service payroll tools: $17/month base plus $4/employee/month for the Basic plan (tax filing is on you), or $37/month plus $5/employee for Full Service, which adds automatic federal and state tax filing. For a 5-person team, that's $37/month on Basic or $62/month on Full Service, still well under Gusto Simple's $49 + $6/employee.

It works best for very small businesses (2 to 15 employees) with straightforward payroll: mostly salaried or hourly W-2 employees, single-state, no complex scenarios. If the owner runs payroll personally and wants the lowest possible cost, Patriot is the answer.

Patriot consistently earns the G2 "Best Value" badge in the small business payroll category. Users rate it highly for affordability and US-based support, while noting the dated interface and the 4-day direct deposit window on the basic plan as the two most common trade-offs. A small business owner comparing options in r/smallbusiness in late 2026 confirmed the current pricing directly, listing it as "$37 + $5 per month service" while weighing it against Gusto for a solo S-corp payroll setup, which matches Patriot's published Full Service rate [r/smallbusiness, 2026].

The interface is functional but dated, with no mobile admin app. The HR add-on is basic. Customer support is US-based and responsive, but the product has not kept pace with UX improvements at Gusto or Rippling.

§4OnPay: best for restaurants and nonprofits

OnPay charges $49/month + $6/employee and includes multi-state payroll, tip management, agricultural payroll, and nonprofit-specific tax forms at no extra cost. The support team is US-based and consistently rated as more responsive than Gusto's (see Gusto vs OnPay for a direct feature comparison), a meaningful advantage when you hit a payroll problem on Friday afternoon.

It fits restaurants, food service operations, nonprofits, farms, and businesses with complex pay structures like tips, piece-rate pay, or multiple pay rates. Ask OnPay to demonstrate the wage calculations and tax reports your business needs. That matters because tip allocation is a real gap in some scheduling-first tools: a two-location cafe owner posting in r/smallbusiness described using Homebase and still spending roughly an hour per store, per day, manually splitting credit-card tips by the minute whenever shifts overlapped, because the gratuity payout was not automatically linked to hours worked [r/smallbusiness, 2026]. Form 8846 concerns an employer tax credit; it does not establish that payroll software can split a tip pool by hours or overlapping shifts. Demonstrate that separate allocation workflow before choosing a replacement for Homebase.

The HR feature set is lighter than Gusto Plus: no performance review tools and limited onboarding automation. For a full HR platform, pair OnPay with BambooHR or step up to Gusto Plus.

§5Homebase vs Gusto: which wins for hourly, shift-based teams

For restaurants, retail, and hospitality businesses with shift workers, the real comparison is not Gusto vs. OnPay, it is Gusto vs. Homebase. Homebase started as scheduling software for hourly teams and later added payroll as an add-on at $39/month plus $6 per employee paid, on top of whichever Homebase base plan you are on. Gusto Simple is $49/month plus $6 per employee. Because both charge the same $6 per head, the per-employee side cancels out entirely and the comparison collapses to base fees, which is the opposite of the "flat rate that gets better as you grow" story Homebase is usually sold on.

The math turns on Homebase's free Basic plan, which covers 1 location and up to 10 employees. Under that ceiling a 10-person team pays $0 base plan + $39 + $60 = $99/month against Gusto Simple's $109. Cross it and you need Essentials at $30/month per location, so 25 employees is $30 + $39 + $150 = $219 against Gusto's $199. The crossover sits almost exactly at 10 employees and one location, and multi-location makes it worse because Essentials bills per location. If you are a 20-person two-location operation, Homebase is the more expensive option on payroll alone.

For an hourly workforce, demonstrate scheduling, clock-in, approval and payroll transfer using your actual shift rules. Gusto Plus includes time tracking and scheduling; Simple also has separately priced time tools. Compare that selected bundle with Homebase’s payroll and location-plan charges. Choose an additional scheduling application if its demonstrated workflow meets requirements the selected Gusto service does not cover.

Gusto wins back the decision for office-based or remote teams where HR depth matters more than scheduling: full benefits administration (health, dental, vision, 401k), digital onboarding with offer letters and I-9 collection, and multi-state compliance tooling that Homebase does not attempt to match. If your team is primarily salaried and does not clock in and out by shift, Gusto's HR features are the better fit despite the higher per-employee cost.

§6Rippling Payroll: best for scaling SMBs

Rippling earns its keep once a small business stops being purely a payroll problem and starts being an operations problem. The platform bolts payroll onto a unified employee system of record, so the same record that runs a paycheck also provisions a laptop, assigns a Google Workspace seat, and tracks PTO. For a 30-person company adding five hires a quarter, that single source of truth removes the double-entry that breaks payroll accuracy as headcount climbs.

Rippling publishes a US small-business entry rate of $8 per user per month plus $40/month. Its required platform and selected payroll, HR, benefits or IT products determine the complete quote. Ask for the modules, billing headcount and contract terms rather than treating an estimated $35–45 per-person stack as a universal current price.

Where Rippling pulls ahead of Gusto and OnPay is multi-state and approaching-enterprise complexity. It handles automatic tax registration in new states, syncs headcount-based benefits eligibility, and runs approval workflows that matter once you have managers approving their own teams' hours. For a business with employees in six states and a mix of salaried and hourly staff, that automation prevents the compliance gaps that manual systems create.

The tradeoff is cost and overhead. Rippling carries a G2 score of 4.8 out of 5 across more than 14,195 reviews, but the modular pricing and implementation effort make it overkill for a five-person shop. If you are under 10 employees in one state, Gusto or Patriot will serve you better and cheaper. Rippling is the answer when payroll is one node in a growing HR and IT stack, not the whole job.

§7QuickBooks Payroll: best for QuickBooks Online users

QuickBooks Payroll connects natively with QuickBooks Online. Check wage, tax and liability account mapping and reconcile a representative pay run before relying on the connection. Class allocation and accounting setup determine whether it reduces your manual work; a shared vendor does not guarantee correct entries without configuration.

QuickBooks US Workforce standard prices effective July 1, 2026 are $50/month plus $7 per employee for Payroll, $88 plus $13 for Premium and $134 plus $17 for Elite. Promotions and protected customers may have different terms. Additional-state fees apply to Payroll and Premium under the applicable offer, while Elite includes multi-state coverage. Verify deposit timing, timekeeping, HR support and the conditions of Elite tax-penalty protection in the chosen plan.

The honest limitation is that QuickBooks Payroll is best when you are already a QuickBooks shop. As a standalone payroll tool divorced from QBO, it is competent but unremarkable, and the per-employee math gets expensive fast for hourly-heavy teams compared to Patriot or OnPay. The benefits marketplace is also thinner than Gusto's, so businesses building a competitive benefits package may feel boxed in.

QuickBooks Online Payroll holds a G2 score near 4.0 out of 5, lower than Gusto or Rippling, with reviewers citing support wait times as the main complaint. But the rating undersells the practical value for the target user. If your accountant lives in QuickBooks and your priority is clean books over a slick HR portal, the integration alone justifies the choice.

§8ADP RUN and Paychex Flex: best full-service for hands-off owners

ADP RUN and Paychex Flex are the legacy heavyweights, and they win for owners who want to hand payroll off entirely and never think about a tax deadline again. Both pair software with a named human, a service model the newer SaaS tools largely automate away. For a business owner running a busy restaurant or contracting firm who treats payroll as a chore to delegate, not a system to operate, that white-glove handling is the selling point.

Neither vendor publishes transparent pricing, which is itself a signal. Real-world quotes for ADP RUN typically land around $50-$80 base per pay period plus $4-$6 per employee, and because ADP bills per pay run, weekly payroll multiplies the cost versus the monthly billing Gusto and OnPay use. Paychex Flex sits in a similar range, often $39-$60 base plus a per-employee fee, with setup and year-end W-2 fees that sometimes appear as add-ons. Always ask for the all-in annual number before signing.

The strength is depth of compliance and scale. Both handle complex multi-state filing, garnishments, certified payroll for government contractors, and dedicated retirement and benefits administration that smaller tools outsource or skip. For a 40-employee business spanning several states with union or prevailing-wage requirements, ADP and Paychex have the infrastructure that a leaner tool cannot match.

The drawbacks are cost opacity and contract friction. ADP RUN scores around 4.5 and Paychex Flex around 4.2 on G2, respectable but trailing Gusto and Rippling, with reviewers flagging surprise fees and aggressive upsells. For a sub-15-person team in one or two states, these two are expensive overkill. They earn their price when complexity and the value of a phone-a-human safety net outweigh the premium.

§9How to choose: a decision framework by employee count, states, and contractor mix

The fastest way to narrow six tools to one is to score your business on three axes: employee count, number of states, and your W-2 versus 1099 mix. These three variables drive both your compliance burden and your monthly cost more than any feature checklist, and they map cleanly onto the tools above.

Employee count is the first filter. Under 10 employees in a single state, lean toward Patriot (roughly $37/month base plus $5 per employee for full-service tax filing) or Gusto Simple at $49/month plus $6 per employee. Between 10 and 30 employees, Gusto and OnPay ($49/month plus $6 per employee) hit the sweet spot of price and capability. Above 30 and growing fast, Rippling or QuickBooks Premium start paying for themselves through automation, and at 40-plus with real complexity, ADP RUN or Paychex enter the conversation.

Number of states is the second filter. One state keeps every tool on the table. Two or three states means you need automated multi-state tax filing as standard, which Gusto, OnPay, and QuickBooks all handle well. Four or more states, especially with employees triggering new tax registrations, pushes you toward Rippling's automatic state registration or the full-service handling of ADP and Paychex, because manual registration across many states is where small businesses incur penalties.

Contractor mix is the third filter. Compare payment logistics, onboarding and year-end reporting for correctly classified contractors. Gusto closed its legacy $35-base Contractor-only plan to new customers on October 1, 2026; current US new-customer plans such as Simple start at $49 plus $6 per paid person. Existing accounts have their applicable terms, and international payments need a separate scope check. A mixed employee-and-contractor team should compare the full selected plan rather than assume a retired contractor offer is available.

§10How to choose by business type: restaurants, salaried offices, and multi-state teams

The employee-count-and-states framework above works, but most owners actually think in terms of what kind of business they run first. Here is the same decision mapped to three common small business shapes.

Restaurants, cafes, and hourly/tipped teams. The two things that break generic payroll for this group are gratuity allocation and shift-based pay rates. Have the proposed provider show separate wage-rate and tip-credit calculations, and how gratuities are assigned to each worker. Support for a credit or multiple pay rates does not establish automated tip-pool distribution, or that another setup always requires hand calculations. The cafe owner's reported "an hour per store, per day" describes that operator's Homebase workflow [r/smallbusiness, 2026]; test your own allocation rules and any connected tools before choosing. If you run one or two locations with hourly staff, start with OnPay ($49/month + $6/employee) for the payroll side and Homebase if you also need shift scheduling and time clocks.

Salaried office teams, single state. This is the easiest case and the one where price matters most, since there is no tip math, minimal overtime complexity, and usually one set of state tax rules. Patriot Full Service ($37/month + $5/employee) or Gusto Simple ($49/month + $6/employee) both cover this cleanly. Choose Patriot if the owner runs payroll personally and wants the lowest bill; choose Gusto if you want a nicer interface, a benefits marketplace for when you add insurance, and do not mind paying more for it.

Multi-state or distributed teams. Once a second employee works from a different state, you need automated multi-state withholding and, eventually, state registration help. Gusto Plus ($80/month + $12/employee) and OnPay (multi-state included at no extra charge) both handle the filing side well. Above roughly 30 employees or four-plus states, Rippling's automatic state tax registration starts to earn its higher price, but obtain the full payroll, benefits and HR proposal rather than use the $8 headline as the complete cost.

§11Real complaints from actual users: what review sites and Reddit threads say

Marketing pages describe these tools the way vendors want you to see them. The complaints below come from actual small business owners, bookkeepers, and accountants comparing options in public forums, which is a better signal for what breaks in practice.

Gusto's 2026 price increase caught long-time customers off guard. On 1 March 2026 Gusto raised the Simple plan from $40 + $6/employee to $49 + $6/employee, a roughly 23% jump on the base fee, and gave existing customers about a month's notice. A thread in r/Payroll filled up with accountants and owners saying they were moving clients to ADP or Paychex over it; one commenter summed up the sentiment bluntly: "Gusto has definitely gotten too big for their britches. They are losing a lot of the charm and advantages they once had over competitors" [r/Payroll, 2026]. A separate commenter in the same thread said a Gusto filing error, not the price, was what actually pushed them to switch a client to ADP. Neither complaint is universal, most Gusto users do not report filing errors, but it is worth confirming your own filings each quarter, because autopilot payroll is not hands-off forever.

Rippling's modular pricing can bill you for headcount you no longer have. The recurring theme across independent reviews of Rippling is that the advertised $8/employee rate is real but incomplete: payroll, benefits, and IT modules each carry their own per-employee fee, so a company that starts with core HR and adds payroll, benefits, and device management can see its bill triple. Some users have reported being billed for employee counts that did not reflect recent headcount reductions, which is a real budgeting risk for a small business that laid off or lost staff mid-contract. Confirm how Rippling handles seat reconciliation before signing, not after the first invoice.

Patriot Payroll's pricing checks out, and its support gets specific praise. Owners comparing options directly on r/smallbusiness confirm Patriot's current Full Service rate of $37/month plus $5/employee matches what Patriot actually charges [r/smallbusiness, 2026], which is reassuring given how often payroll pricing pages go stale. The tradeoffs mentioned most often are the dated interface and the standard 4-day direct deposit window on lower tiers, not billing surprises.

Homebase is strong for scheduling but weak for tip payroll math. A restaurant and cafe owner walking through their payroll process on r/smallbusiness described spending about an hour per location, per day, manually reconciling credit-card tips against shift times on Homebase, because gratuity was not automatically linked to hours worked when shifts overlapped [r/smallbusiness, 2026]. If allocating tips across shifts is your main headache, require a demonstration with your actual pooling rules. A feature that computes an employer tax credit does not by itself establish that shift-level gratuity distribution is automated.

OnPay and Patriot both get consistently praised for support responsiveness across G2, Capterra, and forum threads, in contrast to Gusto and ADP, where scaling has visibly slowed response times according to reviewers. If fast, US-based human support when payroll breaks on a Friday afternoon is your top priority, weight that over feature checklists.

§12Real pricing and G2 scores for all 6 tools

Pricing pages bury the numbers that actually decide your annual cost, so here is every tool side by side: published base price, per-employee add-on, who it fits, and the current G2 community score. For a 15-employee team, multiply the per-employee figure by 15 and add the base to get a realistic monthly estimate before benefits or add-on modules.

The Rippling chart figure is an entry-floor example: fifteen users at $8 plus the $40 US base total $160 before any additional products or contract charges. QuickBooks Payroll at its standard rate is $155 for fifteen employees before extras, subject to promotional or protected-customer terms. ADP remains a historical illustrative estimate, not a current offer. Obtain the complete proposal for selected modules, billing frequency, states and support before comparing annual totals.

Read the G2 scores as tiebreakers, not gospel. Patriot, OnPay, and Rippling all sit at 4.8, but they win that score for opposite reasons: Patriot for value, OnPay for service, Rippling for breadth. QuickBooks' 4.0 reflects support complaints, not a broken product, and it still wins outright for QBO users on integration alone. Match the tool to your employee count, state footprint, and contractor mix from the framework above, then use these numbers to confirm you are not overpaying for capability you will never use.

§13Best Payroll software for small business by use case

Not every small business has the same payroll needs, so a one-size-fits-all recommendation rarely helps. The picks below are organized by the situation that fits most small business owners, so you can skip straight to the option that matches your setup.

Best for the tightest budget: Patriot Payroll Basic starts at $17/month plus $4 per employee, the cheapest option on this list, though you file federal and state payroll taxes yourself at that tier. Step up to Full Service at $37/month plus $5 per employee and Patriot files everything in all 50 states for you; either way you get unlimited payroll runs and a 30-day free trial. Best for businesses already on QuickBooks: QuickBooks Workforce Payroll (formerly Payroll Core) at $50/month plus $7 per employee connects to existing books; confirm account mapping and reconciliation on a sample pay run. Best overall for growing teams: Gusto Simple at $49/month plus $6 per employee offers AutoPilot payroll, 180-plus integrations, and sits at 4.6/5 on G2 (G2 rates products, not individual plan tiers, so treat that as a score for Gusto overall, not for Simple specifically). It ranked number one on G2's Contractor Payments Index in Spring 2026.

Best for scaling businesses: ADP RUN uses custom pricing but earned the number one G2 Small Business rating in 2026. It adds AI-driven error detection and strong multi-state compliance tools as your headcount grows. Best for a published payroll essentials rate: OnPay charges $49/month plus $6 per paid worker; enhanced HR and time tracking are paid additions. Check the current trial terms. Best for multi-state payroll: Gusto Plus at $80/month plus $12 per employee adds next-day direct deposit and covers employees in multiple states without upgrading to an enterprise plan.

§14Pricing comparison: what small businesses actually pay in 2026

Payroll software pricing works on a base fee plus a per-employee fee every month. The base fee covers the platform access and tax filing infrastructure. The per-employee fee scales with your headcount. One detail that catches small business owners off guard is the difference between unlimited payroll runs and per-run pricing.

Gusto, OnPay, Patriot, and QuickBooks all let you run payroll as many times per month as you need for no extra charge. Paychex charges a fee each time you process payroll. If you pay employees weekly and not biweekly, per-run pricing can quietly double your monthly cost compared to what the base fee suggests.

Here is a current 2026 pricing snapshot for the most popular options: Patriot Basic runs $17/month plus $4 per employee (self-file taxes), or $37/month plus $5 per employee for Full Service with automatic filing. OnPay Payroll Essentials runs $49/month plus $6 per paid worker, with HR enhancements and timekeeping charged separately. Gusto Simple runs $49/month plus $6 per employee, up from $40 before its 2026 price increase. Gusto Plus runs $80/month plus $12 per employee and adds multi-state support and next-day direct deposit. QuickBooks Workforce Payroll (the plan formerly called Payroll Core) is $50/month plus $7 per employee, after Intuit raised per-employee rates on 1 July 2026. Wave Payroll is $40/month plus $6 per active employee or contractor paid, unified across all 50 states since April 2025. ADP RUN uses custom quotes. All plans listed above (except Paychex) include unlimited payroll runs.

Most providers offer free trials. Patriot gives 30 days free. OnPay gives your first month free. Wave also offers a trial period. If you are evaluating multiple options, running a trial with real pay data is the most reliable way to test the software before you commit.

§15How to pay both W-2 employees and 1099 contractors

Many small businesses pay a mix of salaried or hourly employees and independent contractors. These two worker types require different tax handling. Employees get W-2 forms, and you withhold payroll taxes on their behalf. Contractors get 1099-NEC forms, and they handle their own taxes. Managing both in separate systems creates extra work and increases the chance of filing errors.

Gusto, OnPay, and QuickBooks Payroll all support both W-2 and 1099 workers in the same account. Gusto ranked number one on G2's 2026 Contractor Payments Index, and it added expanded global contractor payment support, which matters if you hire internationally. OnPay handles contractor payments at the same per-employee rate, so there is no penalty for mixing worker types.

When choosing a payroll platform that covers contractors, confirm that it generates and files 1099-NEC forms at year end, not just pay stubs. Some lower-cost tools process contractor payments but leave the 1099 filing to you manually. That workaround works but adds time and introduces filing risk at tax season.

§16Direct deposit speed: same-day, next-day, and 2-day options

Direct deposit speed is a practical consideration that most buyers overlook until they miss a payroll deadline. Standard direct deposit with most payroll platforms takes two business days, meaning you submit payroll on Wednesday to pay employees on Friday. If you miss that window, you are looking at next week.

Gusto Plus includes eligible next-day payroll; Simple can add it for $15 monthly plus $3 per person. Gusto also lists same-day and instant options with separate charges or plan inclusions and eligibility requirements. QuickBooks funding terms depend on the selected Workforce offer. Confirm the approved speed, cutoff and extra fees before budgeting a plan upgrade.

For most small businesses with predictable payroll schedules, two-day direct deposit works fine as long as you build the submission deadline into your calendar. Where same-day and next-day options earn their cost is in businesses with variable schedules, last-minute hires, or owners who regularly cut payroll close to the deadline. Gusto's AutoPilot feature can automate recurring payroll runs entirely, which reduces the risk of missing a submission window.

§17State tax compliance: does your payroll software cover all 50 states?

Payroll tax rules vary significantly by state. Some states have no income tax. Others require local city-level withholding on top of state taxes. Multi-state employers face the most complexity, particularly when a remote employee lives in a different state than the company's home base.

All major payroll platforms, including Gusto, OnPay, QuickBooks, Patriot, and ADP RUN, file federal and state payroll taxes automatically. The distinction is in multi-state support. Gusto Simple covers single-state payroll. Gusto Plus adds multi-state filing starting at $80/month. ADP RUN includes multi-state capabilities in its custom plans. OnPay handles employees in all 50 states at no extra charge on its standard plan.

If you have remote employees in states where you do not already have a registered business presence, you may need to register as an employer in those states before you can legally run payroll there. Some payroll platforms, including Gusto and Rippling, now offer employer-of-record or state registration assistance as an add-on service. This matters most for businesses hiring their first remote employee outside their home state.

Before committing to a platform, confirm it covers every state where you have employees today and every state where you expect to hire in the next 12 months. Switching payroll platforms mid-year creates W-2 reconciliation work you want to avoid.

See also: best free payroll software, franchise payroll software for related options.

§18Frequently Asked Questions

What is the lowest-cost payroll tool for a tiny company? Patriot's Basic tier costs the least, at $17 a month plus $4 per person, and it includes unlimited runs and direct deposit. On that tier the tax filings are yours to do [Patriot Software, 2026]; automatic filing requires the $37/month Full Service plan. You can try it free for 30 days. With one to three employees, the Basic bill is typically under $30 a month.

Is there any free payroll option for small businesses? Distinguish payroll from accounting or scheduling. Wave has free accounting, while its payroll starts at $40 monthly plus $6 per person. Homebase Basic covers employee schedules and hours; payroll requires a paid add-on. Payroll4Free offers basic payroll within its payee and frequency conditions, with optional paid filing and bank services. Compare the full fees and the employer tasks that remain before choosing a free offer.

Can one payroll tool cover employees and contractors at once? Yes. OnPay, QuickBooks and Gusto each keep both worker types in one account, paying contractors and generating the year-end 1099-NEC alongside employee W-2s. Before you pick a tool, ask whether it files the 1099s for you or hands you a form to prepare on your own.

How long does direct deposit take with payroll software? Ask for the approval that applies to your bank account and pay run. Providers use different deadlines, risk checks and bank-holiday rules. Gusto offers a paid next-day option on Simple and eligible faster funding through other plan or fee arrangements; verify the actual charge and cutoff before relying on it.

Does the software file my payroll taxes without my help? Yes. Every major paid platform (Patriot, Gusto, ADP RUN, OnPay, QuickBooks) calculates what is owed to the IRS and your state, deposits it, and files the returns, including quarterly Form 941 and year-end W-2s. A few cheaper products only do the math and leave the filing to you, so confirm full-service filing is included before signing up.

How do unlimited runs compare with per-run pricing? With unlimited runs you can process payroll weekly, biweekly, or on demand for one flat fee. Per-run pricing bills you each time. Paychex is the best-known example. Pay weekly and per-run charges can push the real monthly cost well past the advertised base price. OnPay and Gusto include unlimited runs, and so do Patriot and QuickBooks.

Why did Gusto raise its prices in 2026? The Simple plan's base fee went from $40 to $49 a month while the $6 per-employee charge stayed, about 23% more, announced roughly a month ahead. Gusto has not offered much public explanation beyond standard platform-investment language. Payroll-forum posters, from business owners to accountants, voiced frustration, and several said they planned to shift their accounts toward ADP or Paychex [r/Payroll thread, 2026]. If price is your concern, Patriot's Full Service tier ($37 a month, $5 per employee) is the nearest full-service alternative at a lower cost.

Does Patriot charge $4 or $5 per employee? Both, depending on tier. Basic charges $17 a month, plus $4 for each employee, and puts the tax math and remittance on you. Full Service charges $37 a month, plus $5 for each employee, and Patriot then files federal, state, and local taxes for you. If you would rather not handle filings yourself, budget for Full Service.

Does payroll software handle restaurant tip payouts automatically? Ask each provider to show how the actual tips, hours and overlapping shifts reach individual payroll records, and how discrepancies are handled. Payroll reporting and the employer credit on Form 8846 are separate from distributing a pool by time worked. The attributed cafe complaint above illustrates one operator's experience; it cannot prove a universal failure or that another product automatically solves that workflow. Test the required allocation before committing.