Dayforce HCM vs UKG comparison

Read 125 UKG reviews

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89% willing to recommend

Dayforce HCM

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 3, 2024

UKG and Dayforce HCM are leading HCM solutions competing in the same category, both with strengths and weaknesses observed in their feature sets and user reviews. UKG seems to have an upper hand in some areas due to its seamless integration and configurability, while Dayforce HCM is praised for its real-time payroll and time-tracking accuracy.

Features: UKG is recognized for its strong data integration, ease of use in payroll and benefits administration, and efficient self-service modules, with a notable compensation management module that minimizes manual tasks. Dayforce HCM stands out with its sophisticated time and attendance systems and the comprehensive integration of HRIS and payroll processes. It provides a unified view of employee data, from application through performance reviews.

Room for Improvement: UKG needs to address issues with support consistency and integration complexities with acquired products. Enhancing real-time assistance and overall functionality integration could also be beneficial. Dayforce HCM users suggest simplifying reporting and improving customer service communication to better align modules and streamline implementation processes.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: UKG supports deployment across private, public, and hybrid clouds, though customer service experiences vary, with reports of inconsistent support responsiveness. Dayforce HCM's on-premises and public cloud deployment options offer substantial customization but also face critiques for complex setup processes. Both providers offer strong technical support, though users experience occasional delays in problem-solving.

Pricing and ROI: UKG is perceived as having higher pricing, yet many users find value in its comprehensive features and bundled discounts, ideal for organizations with significant needs. Dayforce HCM has competitive pricing suitable for large enterprises, albeit with higher costs than some users initially expect. ROI tends to be realized gradually through improved operational efficiencies.

To learn more, read our detailed Dayforce HCM vs. UKG Report (Updated: May 2025).

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Dayforce HCM vs. UKG

May 2025

Helped 860,168 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

Dayforce HCM

Ranking in Talent Management

9th

Ranking in Cloud HCM

7th

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Talent Intelligence (3rd)

UKG

Ranking in Talent Management

6th

Ranking in Cloud HCM

5th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.7

Number of Reviews

125

Ranking in other categories

Benefits Administration (5th), Employee Scheduling Software (1st), Employee Time Tracking Software (2nd), HR Analytics Software (2nd), Talent Acquisition (6th)

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Cloud HCM category, the mindshare of Dayforce HCM is 3.2%, up from 3.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of UKG is 5.5%, up from 5.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Cloud HCM

Featured Reviews

TracyBritan

Manager, Learning & Development at Ampersand

Frustrating support and difficult customization prevent optimal use of learning system

Customizing the home screen was difficult; I could not remove certain tabs that were irrelevant to our users. The search functionality is poor as there's no way for administrators to tag keywords to training courses, making it hard for people to find content. Additionally, there is no way to send a direct link to training if someone asks about it. The reporting is subpar; you can only report by course and not by person unless you go into specific Dayforce reports, which do not match the fields in the learning module. The support is also terrible, with slow response times and a lack of useful knowledge-based articles.

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Talia Jean Paul

Global HR UKG Specialist at a outsourcing company with 10,001+ employees

Affordable but needs to improve its stability

Our company is testing the UKG Ready Mobile App, but there are some glitches. I feel that in the system when you log on to Kronos, UKG Dimensions, and UKG Workforce Central, we have different modules in different versions. With regards to the newer version, I feel the older version, which was UKG Workforce Central, was more user-friendly for the end user as opposed to the newer version, which looks a bit more complicated. When training someone who wants implementations to be done, it would be easier if you could hover above certain things, and it shows you or tells you exactly what it is. There are certain SAP modules that can be audible. If you click on it if someone is being a bit slow with regards to training, the tool will tell you what needs to be done and what needs not to be done by you, but for us, it is fine because we are in the back end with configuration and the administrators. I am talking about the need for improvements in the tool for the benefit of the end users. The explanation on UKG's community consists of training manuals and some of the other stuff that we use, and we send to our supervisors at the site. With the tool in place, catching onto white-collared employees is quicker. The tool is not quick to catch onto certain blue-collared employees in the plant or supervisors who are actually working with machinery and stuff because they are not as computer-centric as white-collared employees. If I could scan the tool across the globe with our site supervisors, there are a few loopholes in the tool. There are some issues with the tool's stability. For me, I would like someone who is building the system in the back end to know if a front-end user can manipulate the system. I am not going to rate the tool's scalability to be high. I would rate the tool's scalability to be at a mediocre level or at something like 50 percent, so there is a lot of room for improvement.

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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

"We like being able to hire from the Dayforce recruiting module straight into Dayforce and having the file feeds go to our benefits vendor."

"The initial setup is easy."

"Great time and attendance payroll and benefits administration which has improved our efficiency."

"We used the solution to do a lot of performance management during the review cycle and it helped us alleviate the administrative burden."

"The product has a pretty clean look."

"Employees like being able to see what entitlements/balances that they have for their time away."

"Dayforce has transformed how we operate by saving us time, paper, accuracy, money, and the employee/supervisor experience."

"The implementation was through a team assigned to us by Ceridian. They were extremely knowledgeable and it made the implementation go very smoothly."

More Dayforce HCM pros

"UKG allows us to customize our home screen so that we can easily monitor important items on a daily basis."

"Overall, I would rate UKG nine out of ten."

"The most valuable feature is being able to get time management reports which break out reclassified jobs and departments to separate areas of the company. This allows for better tracking of hours spent in certain jobs and where more hours may be needed."

"It is much easier to use and the customer service is better than our previous solution."

"The solution's employee experience is pretty good."

"The solution has improved our organization by helping us cut hours and lessen our labor force. It saved us probably over $100,000 in just the last couple of years."

"The setup process is straightforward."

"I have found the most valuable feature to be business intelligence and Cognos reporting."

More UKG pros

Cons

"Our current software program offers a home page with important company documents and a place for company announcements. Unfortunately, Ceridian Dayfoce does not offer this."

"The solution's dashboards and geofencing could be improved."

"Customizing the home screen was difficult; I could not remove certain tabs that were irrelevant to our users."

"The reporting could be improved."

"The solution's initial setup was difficult. Also, the solution's initial deployment took around six months."

"It would be nice if retro pay calculations were made automatically for salaried payroll, so a calculation and manual entry do not have to be done."

"Dayforce has its gaps like every HR system, but nothing comes to mind at the moment."

"One area to be improved is the solution's reporting function, which can be cumbersome."

More Dayforce HCM cons

"Certainly, the time and attendance and the payroll integration need a lot of work. They are disjointed pieces, and they don't work smoothly together. That's the main drawback."

"Since UKG is a SaaS software, other parts of the application or add-on solutions are not the best in class or very configurable."

"The platform's features need enhancement while being used as a recruiting tool."

"UKG has complex clock-in and clock-out features. It changes things too often, and it feels like the tool is constantly changing things without testing before implementing changes in production. Additionally, it doesn't communicate these changes very well."

"The system is slow sometimes."

"The tool needs improvement on the configuration side."

"I would like to see more functionality in the next release to be able to get hours and dollars per calendar month rather than just by payroll in the Business Intelligence reports."

"I would like the capability to use UKG as a single platform without the need to alternate between systems."

More UKG cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Earlier, the price of the product was reasonable. Under present circumstances, the price or cost of the product has been increased."

"The XOXO program associated with Dayforce allows you to earn credits towards registration and accommodations at their annual Insight Conferences, which can be a real savings to the company when sending employees to the conference."

"I rate the solution's pricing a seven on a scale where one is the lowest and ten is the most expensive."

"We found the setup costs and pricing to be very reasonable."

"Negotiate for everything you want."

"Ceridian continually enhances Dayforce HCM. Some of these enhancements they charge for and some are just straight enhancements with no extra charge."

"In terms of pricing, the product is expensive. However, it is crucial to take into account the manner in which the solution will be utilized and the availability of other alternatives."

"We paid for the implementation costs in the first year with the money that we saved by switching to Dayforce HCM."

"UKG's pricing and licensing model involves ongoing expenses based on the number of employees paid. The initial implementation cost is low when UKG implements it directly. However, when partners handle the implementation, it becomes more expensive since partners don't receive the monthly recurring fees."

"The platform is not affordable but also not the most expensive."

"The pricing depends on the number of licenses we buy."

"If you're going for the full suite, it can be fairly pricey."

"While I am unsure of the licensing cost itself, the total cost of implementation and licensing for a company with over 5000 employees would be around 6,00,000. So, there are additional costs beyond licensing."

"I wasn't involved in the pricing part. I'm a user, and I believe it is based on the user count. One thing that is nice about Ultimate is that you can learn how to use the system without additional fees. The learning aspect is the life of a product, and the training was a huge reason why we went with Ultimate. We did have some integration costs. They were a part of the implementation because of the integrations to other systems that we included in our implementation."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

22%

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

Comms Service Provider

Educational Organization

61%

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

Healthcare Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Ceridian Dayforce HCM?

The solution's payroll portion is very streamlined.

What needs improvement with Ceridian Dayforce HCM?

What is your primary use case for Ceridian Dayforce HCM?

We have used Dayforce HCM for our HR functionalities and for the learning module over the last five years. We actually just migrated to a new learning management system.

What needs improvement with UKG?

UKG needs more publicity. It is a productive ERP ( /categories/erp ) application, but many people in the IT market are not aware of it. Greater awareness could increase its adoption.

What is your primary use case for UKG?

I worked for a healthcare organization and a university. Most organizations use UKG ( /products/ukg-reviews ) to track employee timesheets, capturing accurate swipe-in and swipe-out data. UKG ( /pr...

What advice do you have for others considering UKG?

Publicity is very important for any software. If people aren't aware of UKG, despite its productivity, they won't use it. Expanding the awareness is essential for greater adoption. Overall, I would...

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Compared 26% of the time

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Compared 16% of the time

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Compared 12% of the time

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Compared 7% of the time

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Product Reports

Download Dayforce HCM product report

Dayforce HCM

June 2025

Download UKG product report

June 2025

Also Known As

Ceridian Dayforce HCM, Ascender Talent Management, Ceridian Ideal

UKG Pro, UKG Dimensons, UKG Ready

Overview

Dayforce HCM is a global, cloud-based human capital management (HCM) software platform for managing the complete employee lifecycle. This solution was designed to improve the employee experience by bringing together data from across the employment cycle to help managers make better decisions at all levels.

Dayforce HCM is an HR, payroll, benefits, workforce management, and talent management platform. The scalable software uses a single, flexible rules engine, as well as real-time updates and calculations, to help you meet complicated regulatory requirements.

Dayforce reduces the burden of disconnected applications by delivering a single application for all of your human capital management needs. All transactions made anywhere within the application flow seamlessly across all functional areas in real time, eliminating the need for repeated data entry, manual workarounds, and batch operations. This is thanks to a single employee record and a single rule engine. Organizations can achieve shorter training time, faster user adoption, and a faster return on investment.

With Dayforce HCM, users can view all HR data in real time in one place.

Here are some key tasks companies can do with the solution:

Hire the right people
Design work/life balance plans
Manage employee development
Handle payments
Administer benefits
Track compliance throughout the employee lifecycle

Dayforce HCM Features

Dayforce HCM has many valuable key features. Some of the most useful ones include:

Continuous payroll for staff: Dayforce HCM aids in paying staff accurately and on schedule. Give your payroll staff the ability to access and audit data at any time during the pay cycle.

Personnel management: Empower and engage your frontline employees while keeping labor expenses and compliance under control. Make proactive, data-driven decisions that can help you run your business more efficiently.

Optimized staff benefits: Assist employees in selecting the best benefit plans while streamlining administrative tasks. With the help of analytics, you can maximize the value of your benefits investments and gain a better understanding of your costs.

Streamlined human resources: With a single consolidated, real-time solution, you can eliminate HR information silos. Improve HR productivity by streamlining administrative tasks and gaining access to key HR analytics.

Dayforce HCM Benefits

There are many benefits to implementing Dayforce HCM. Some of the biggest advantages the solution offers include:

Dayforce HCM aids in planning, hiring, retaining, and building your team, whether they be full-time employees or hourly workers. Insights based on data can help you see around corners and predict the future.

Dayforce HCM helps you keep track of compliance everywhere in order to reduce risk. Simplify compliance in a global workplace. Keep up with complicated payroll and tax requirements from different regions and countries, as well as internal policies and processes. Dayforce can help you reduce the risk – and the cost – of noncompliance.

Dayforce HCM empowers your workforce by improving your employee experience with always-on technologies like Dayforce Wallet. Transform pay, enable self-service, and assist your employees in developing future skills, no matter where they are or what device they are using.

Dayforce

At UKG, our purpose is people — real people with real challenges, and a simple request. Help me keep my employees productive, connected, and happy. So that’s what we did.

We’ve created an unmatched suite of HR and workforce management solutions, backed by our people who care about yours. Our solutions deliver global workforce experiences that truly reflect the connection between life and work today. That means insights are deeper. Work is easier. And interactions are more meaningful.

Sample Customers

ACCO Brands

Tesla, Marriott, Yamaha, Aramark, Feeding America, Samsung, Sony Music, Dave & Buster's, Revlon