DarwinBox vs Workday comparison

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DarwinBox

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 3, 2024

Workday and DarwinBox are competing in the HR technology space. Workday has the upper hand in market recognition and offers a comprehensive platform, while DarwinBox provides an innovative and adaptable alternative.

Features: Workday offers robust analytics, comprehensive payroll management, and global compliance features. DarwinBox stands out with customizable modules, effective performance management tools, and a mobile-first approach.

Room for Improvement: Workday could improve its deployment time and reduce setup costs. It may also benefit from further enhancing its mobile capabilities. DarwinBox could enhance its integration options, expand analytics features, and strengthen market presence.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Workday follows a traditional deployment model requiring significant time investment, with an extensive support network. DarwinBox offers a cloud-based, agile model with personalized customer support, making it more agile.

Pricing and ROI: Workday's setup costs are significant but promise long-term ROI due to its extensive functionalities and scalability. DarwinBox offers a cost-effective initial setup and competitive ROI with lower upfront costs, focusing on maximizing operational efficiency.

To learn more, read our detailed DarwinBox vs. Workday Report (Updated: September 2025).

DarwinBox vs. Workday

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Helped 868,787 peers since 2012

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Categories and Ranking

DarwinBox

Ranking in Talent Management

11th

Ranking in Cloud HCM

10th

Ranking in Talent Acquisition

9th

Average Rating

6.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.5

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

HR Analytics Software (6th)

Workday

Ranking in Talent Management

2nd

Ranking in Cloud HCM

2nd

Ranking in Talent Acquisition

1st

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Benefits Administration (1st)

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Cloud HCM category, the mindshare of DarwinBox is 3.4%, up from 2.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Workday is 17.0%, down from 17.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Cloud HCM Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Workday	17.0%
DarwinBox	3.4%
Other	79.6%

Cloud HCM

Featured Reviews

SHANOOPCHATHOTH PARAMBIL

Program Manager at Intelliswift

Enhancing attendance and leave management but needs better performance customization

Our primary use case for DarwinBox includes managing attendance, payroll-related tasks, and employee appraisal cycles DarwinBox has provided a significant return on investment for our finance team. Managing payroll and attendance manually would require more team members, so using DarwinBox…

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Eslam Abo Elnaga

Senior people and systems analyst at B_labs & Mylo

Has improved HR process efficiency through intuitive workflows and responsive support

There is something that could be improved in Workday, specifically in the time tracking module. While I am not working on Workday now, I was a regional HRIS working for Egypt, Malta, India, and China. I mention these countries to relate to high population countries and companies. In our company, we use assigned work schedules for our teams. Because we work with the time tracking module, we need to assign shifts. In the manufacturing industry, we might need to change shifts every day or week. Manufacturing teams are huge, approximately 50 to 200 people in one team. If this team has one leader, the leader needs to assign a work schedule for each person individually. While there is mass upload functionality where we can load shifts for all people or specific groups, we need to select multiple people and assign them to a schedule from the interface itself. I have requested this functionality many times. When extracting business processes awaiting actions report, I can select different processes in one box, hit okay, and the report comes up. However, the same functionality does not work for work schedule assigning. If implemented, it would help many people in companies with high populations and big teams.

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Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"The most valuable features of the solution are organogram and position-based mapping."

"The solution that we used previously was very complex. As a result, without referring to the manuals and consulting an expert, it was difficult for a newly hired employee to navigate the platform. However, this is not the case with Darwinbox. It has a very intuitive user interface, and anyone can use it and implement it without having to use a guide or a walk through process. It's very simple."

"The leave-related modules are comprehensive, offering built-in functionalities for optional leaves."

"In our company, we use DarwinBox to maintain the data of our employees and for recruitment purposes."

"It's a fully consolidated system. All the transactions and configuration are co-located in one fully in-memory system, so there is no need to go to different data sources (multiple DBs) to pull data; it’s all in one place."

"The solution was very good at reconfiguration and customization of their software. It helped us to meet federal regulations."

"It was more efficient for the agents for their performance reviews, but when it came to HR and the recruitment team, it sometimes worked, and sometimes, it didn't work."

"It is fairly easy to set up"

"The platform itself is very robust and I generally like the reporting and analytics capability."

"I like its UI and UX. When we were using Oracle or SAP, the UI/UX wasn't very user-friendly for the employees."

"The most helpful Workday features for our HR processes were in HCM, particularly in areas like talent, compensation, benefits, and learning."

"Workday is highly intuitive from a customer experience perspective. It was effortless for us to understand what to do even though we didn't have any related training. It was easy to use without guidance."

More Workday pros

Cons

"Customization in performance management is cumbersome."

"DarwinBox is not a stable solution...DarwinBox is not a scalable solution."

"The solution's API integration with third-party applications should be improved."

"Like most software, it has a base version, the vanilla, out-of-the-box version, and customization is required to match it to the unique processes of each company. The Darwinbox team seems to be having difficulty with the customization process. They have to be a little more mature to customize it as per every company's need."

"The expenses and reimbursements module could be improved. Creating expense reports is time consuming and inefficient compared to other expense solutions."

"This solution could be made easier to use by continuing to release new improvements."

"It's possible that the way things are integrated could be improved"

"They could provide a web chatbot feature in the dashboard for Workday."

"The cost of Workday is certainly not inexpensive. It's very pricey."

"The user interface can be enhanced."

"The user interface could be modernized somehow."

"If you want to add more features to your subscription, Workday becomes expensive."

More Workday cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Compared with SuccessFactors, there is no major difference in DarwinBox's cost."

"My company makes some yearly payments towards the licensing costs attached to DarwinBox."

"Workday is moderately priced - I'd rate its pricing three out of five."

"By and large, Workday is expensive. It is based on the headcount. I'd probably rate it a three or four out of five in terms of pricing. It'd be like buying a Mercedes or a high-end car. It's expensive, but there's a specific value that you're getting with additional features and things of that nature. Using that metaphor, Workday probably tends to be more of a luxury. There are others like ADP that can do your payroll, your time off, and other things, but they don't do it as well."

"The solution is flexible in terms of pricing."

"It's very, very expensive."

"With a bigger budget, I would recommend SAP."

"You have the license fee per module, and then you have a kind of annual training fee, which is a kind of add-on. I wouldn't say it is exhaustive; it is minor. Licensing is pretty transparent for most of the part."

"The pricing is good from an HR perspective, although management gets upset after spending $500,000 a year, every year."

"It has an annual subscription rate, but I'm not sure how it will work."

More Workday pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Comms Service Provider

13%

Computer Software Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

University

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	16
Midsize Enterprise	6
Large Enterprise	41

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about DarwinBox?

The most valuable features of the solution are organogram and position-based mapping.

What needs improvement with DarwinBox?

Customization in performance management is cumbersome. Processes like six-month appraisals lack easy configurations, and any significant customization requires working with vendors.

What is your primary use case for DarwinBox?

Our primary use case for DarwinBox includes managing attendance, payroll-related tasks, and employee appraisal cycles.

What are the biggest differences between Workday, Oracle Cloud and SAP SuccessFactors?

Differences between Workday, Oracle Cloud,w and SAP SuccessFactors:w Oracle: "simple interface and deep customization to suit the purpose." SAP: Multiple functionalities that increase process effi...

What do you like most about Workday?

I like its UI and UX. When we were using Oracle or SAP, the UI/UX wasn't very user-friendly for the employees.

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Workday?

If you go with the launch implementation approach, the solution is generally not very expensive. If you want to add more features to your subscription, Workday becomes expensive. The solution is fl...

SAP SuccessFactors vs DarwinBox

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Compared 27% of the time

Oracle HCM Cloud vs Workday

Compared 12% of the time

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Compared 8% of the time

UKG vs Workday

Compared 8% of the time

Dayforce HCM vs Workday

Compared 5% of the time

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Product Reports

Cloud HCM

Download DarwinBox product report

Download Workday product report

Overview

Darwinbox is a cloud-based, feature-rich human resources management system that emphasizes on usability and data protection. ... The software unifies all your HR processes, enabling you to be on top of your employees' whole lifecycle with a centralized, singular platform.

DarwinBox

Workday is a cloud-based software solution that specializes in developing applications for capital and finance management applications. The system is built to work in global workforces and is adaptable. The global system ensures that users are up to date and can manage internal career-related information, and everyday business problems like timesheets, payrolls, and time off.

“A Pioneer in Software-as-a-Service”

Workday Human Capital Management tool is designed to simplify and streamline your work. It leverages machine learning to adapt capital management to a changing environment.

The Workday model is based on delivering a single system that uses a single source of data and a single security model to deliver a unique user experience. The system is user-friendly and ensures that employees and management can use it from any and all devices. Workday HCM integrates into a central system that includes financial management, payroll, recruiting, learning, and planning. Managers and employees can provide feedback to one another, too.

Workday’s features include:

Flexible framework that lets you organize your staff according to different criteria. You can group employees by function, hierarchy, or department.
Personalized career guidance: Knowledge management and career guidance that can be easily customized for each staff member and also done at scale.
Augmented reporting and analytics: Configure, change, update, and publish reports, scorecards, and dashboards. The system centralizes the transactional and analytical data so you can act on the data from anywhere.
Compensation tools: Compensatio, payroll, and time tracking are automated and simplified.
Workforce planning allows you to uncover and address talent gaps and get visibility of your staff.
Mobile-first ensign approach: Users can access all resources from any device, and they are always in sync.
Machine learning capabilities enable personalized enterprise experiences and faster business processes.

Workday smart platform consists of the following modules:

Human resource management
Business process management
Reporting and analytics
Benefits administration
Compensation management
Talent management
Survey framework
Employee and management self-service

Reviews from Real Users

Many organizations choose Workday because it provides an all-in-one modular solution for human capital and finance management. Our users say they like the ease of use for time-off requests, career and development segments, and overall HR management. The records and reporting capabilities are another popular feature.

"The solution was very good at reconfiguration and customization of their software. It helped us to meet federal regulations," said one user. Another said that the best feature is the optimization of the work day experience with a unified platform that can be applied across different business units. “You will never find a use case that cannot be covered," said a third.

Sample Customers

Myntra, GVK BIO, Bisleri, Times Internet, Delhivery, Aarti

AAA, Allied Global, Avago Technologies Limited, Aviva, Cardinal Health, CareFusion, Chiquita Brands International, Equifax, Flextronics, HP, Life Time Fitness, McKee Foods, MGM Resorts International, Sanofi, ServiceSource International, Symantec, TripAdvisor, Yahoo!

DarwinBox vs. Workday