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Paylocity vs Workday comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Paylocity
Ranking in Benefits Administration
25th
Ranking in Talent Management
48th
Ranking in Cloud HCM
30th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
5.9
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Workday
Ranking in Benefits Administration
1st
Ranking in Talent Management
1st
Ranking in Cloud HCM
1st
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
56
Ranking in other categories
Talent Acquisition (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Cloud HCM category, the mindshare of Paylocity is 0.5%, down from 0.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Workday is 18.3%, up from 18.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Cloud HCM
 

Featured Reviews

RP
Has a comprehensive and intuitive knowledge base, and time saving payroll administration features
Paylocity is not great at communicating customer support related issues such as account manager changes. They claim to provide concierge level of support, but it has not been great. Some of the Paylocity systems are limited. For example, I can't create custom offer letters. I can create generic offer letters with a logo, but I can't edit them or create sections. It does not read like a MS Word document and needs to be more robust. At present, I can't send attachments, add hyperlinks to videos, or embed questions in videos. Also, the number of notifications regarding benefits needs to be increased so that new employees get reminders more than once.
Sarvesh Kumar Jha - PeerSpot reviewer
Easy to use and provides great flexibility and security
Implementing the solution is generally not easy because it depends on our client's landscape. In the last one and a half years, Workday has started a new implementation approach called launch implementation. This approach allows you, as a client organization, to implement Workday in a shorter amount of time, given that you fulfill certain criteria. It depends on the number of subsidiaries and employees you have and their compensation structure. If it's not too complex, Workday provides its clients with this new approach called launch, where they can quickly onboard with the Workday without many complex requirements. The general implementation for Fortune 500 companies is always complex.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"My favorite feature is payroll administration, which has been awesome. You can import as many batches as you want to and run them synchronously or asynchronously. Since I work in a finance company with commissions, bonuses, and distribution, it's great to be able to do that. I can upload multiple things. Also, I can upload different sets of commission lists into the same payroll batch and upload the time card imports and overtime imports if I want to and separate them. I can create multiple batches around an individual or one one set of audit backing, and then I can approve them or leave them open. The way that Paylocity has set up their payroll system is really good and saves us a lot of time. It's very specific and helpful."
"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."
"There is a lot to like about it. I really enjoy the business process framework. It's something that's really seamless. It allows you to have people within the flow. They get assigned a task to complete something to approve, etc. That's a really good piece of functionality that Workday offers. Their out-of-the-box reporting framework is also really powerful in terms of what it provides. These would be two things that I would highlight."
"I like that it's easy to use and flexible."
"The most helpful Workday features for our HR processes were in HCM, particularly in areas like talent, compensation, benefits, and learning."
"I'm happy with the features Workday offers. But in particular, Core HCM is the best."
"Workday is easy to use. Timesheet and resource management are also easy."
"The solution is easy to use and provides great flexibility and security."
"We use this solution to manage financials, payroll and recruiting."
 

Cons

"Some of the Paylocity systems are limited. For example, I can't create custom offer letters. I can create generic offer letters with a logo, but I can't edit them or create sections. It does not read like a MS Word document and needs to be more robust."
"It has missing functionalities. Specific countries, like Germany, didn't have the option to do payroll. Now we need to look for another product for HR."
"The solution has some features missing when you put them in the test studio or Confluence Studio. I would like the tool’s coding to be easier to understand and automated. Most of the coding these days is automated. Any query given can pull the answer directly which can make the solution easier to understand."
"Setting up reports can be a bit tricky."
"They don't have worker payroll in the product. We have to solve our payroll. I hope one day they will be able to have their own localized standard payrolls for all countries."
"If you want to add more features to your subscription, Workday becomes expensive."
"We would like to see improvement in the mobile app variant of this solution. The time sheet entry and approval, and the geo-tagging features all need to have their functionality updated, in order to be comparable with other products on the market."
"The user interface could be better. Everything else was fine."
"This solution could be improved by providing user-level access to customization capabilities. Users currently rely on more technical teams to customize reports, for example."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"I need to pay for a license. It is expensive."
"Its price is pretty high. It is more expensive than what is offered by other competitors in the market."
"The solution is flexible in terms of pricing."
"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."
"Workday is an expensive solution."
"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."
"It's very, very expensive."
"I would rate the solution’s pricing a six out of ten."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
18%
Educational Organization
9%
Retailer
8%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
University
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

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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...
 

Comparisons

No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

POLYWOOD, University Clinical Healthcare, New England Authentic Eats, Revere Plastics, Stonewall Kitchen, Circuit Transit, Powerhouse Retail, Mountainside Fitness, Crafton Tull, Noble House Hotels & Resorts, Gurley Leep Automotive, Taco Johns
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!
Find out what your peers are saying about Workday, SAP, Oracle and others in Cloud HCM. Updated: July 2025.
861,524 professionals have used our research since 2012.