Best Applicant Tracking Systems for SMBs and Startups

Applicant tracking systems (ATS) are essential tools for modern hiring. For small businesses and startups, the right ATS software streamlines the recruitment process, saves time, and improves the candidate experience. In this guide, you’ll learn what an applicant tracking system does, how it works, and discover the best ATS for small business teams and growing startups.

An applicant tracking system is software designed to automate and manage the recruitment process in one centralized platform. From posting jobs to tracking applicants and managing communication, ATS systems reduce manual tasks and keep hiring organized.

For startups and small businesses, the best ATS software can be a game-changer—saving hours of admin work while helping teams make better hiring decisions.

Modern ATS systems simplify the recruitment process by automating repetitive tasks and improving team collaboration. A typical applicant tracking software platform offers:

• Job posting automation: Post a job once and distribute it to multiple job boards and your careers page.
• Resume collection and parsing: Gather applications in a searchable database and extract key details automatically.
• Candidate screening: Use keyword filters and scoring to rank applicants or eliminate unqualified resumes
• Interview scheduling: Sync calendars, send invites, and even host video interviews without email back-and-forth.
• Automated communication: Send bulk or triggered emails to candidates (e.g., acknowledgments, updates, next steps).
• Offer and onboarding management: Generate offer letters and connect new-hire data to your HR system.
• Recruiting analytics: Track time-to-hire, source of candidates, and other important hiring metrics.

These features turn a manual hiring process into a smooth, trackable workflow that small teams can easily manage.

For growing companies, the best applicant tracking systems offer significant advantages:

• Centralized data and visibility: Keep all job postings, resumes, and candidate notes in one system.
• Time-saving automation: Let the ATS handle tasks like resume scanning, scheduling, and bulk messaging.
• Better candidate experience: Easy application forms, fast feedback, and online status updates make a positive impression.
• Faster hiring decisions: Quickly identify top applicants and reduce the time it takes to move candidates through stages.
• Scalability: As your team grows, your ATS grows with you—making it easier to scale your hiring processes.

Manatal is an AI-powered recruitment software that offers robust Applicant Tracking System (ATS) and Recruitment CRM functionalities. It’s designed to streamline the hiring process with features like AI-based candidate recommendations, extensive job board integrations, and customizable hiring pipelines. It aims to make recruiting more efficient and data-driven for businesses of all sizes.

• Strong Points: Its core strength lies in its AI capabilities for candidate sourcing and scoring, making talent identification more efficient. It offers extensive job board integrations and is generally praised for its user-friendliness and ease of setup.
• Drawbacks: While generally affordable, some advanced integrations might require higher-tier plans or external tools like Zapier. Some users have noted limitations in its mobile app functionality and occasional UI/UX inconsistencies.

Greenhouse is a comprehensive hiring platform that focuses on creating a structured, data-driven, and equitable hiring process from sourcing to onboarding. It emphasizes structured interviewing, candidate experience management, and robust analytics to help companies build diverse and high-performing teams.

• Strong Points: Its strong emphasis on structured hiring, interview scorecards, and bias mitigation tools promotes fairness and consistency. It offers extensive integrations with over 500 HR and productivity tools, making it highly adaptable, and its reporting is robust for data-driven insights.
• Drawbacks: It can be a significant investment, potentially pricing out smaller SMBs or startups. Its extensive features can lead to a steeper learning curve, and the lack of public pricing requires direct engagement for a quote.

BambooHR is a comprehensive HR platform that integrates an Applicant Tracking System (ATS) with broader HR functionalities like payroll, time tracking, benefits, and performance management. It aims to centralize all employee data and simplify HR processes for small and growing businesses.

• Strong Points: Its main advantage is being an all-in-one HRIS that includes ATS, simplifying HR management by centralizing all employee data. It’s highly praised for its user-friendliness, intuitive interface, and excellent customer support, making it ideal for lean HR teams.
• Drawbacks: While it includes an ATS, its recruiting features may not be as specialized or robust as dedicated ATS platforms for high-volume or complex hiring. Its comprehensive nature might be overkill for businesses solely seeking an ATS, and pricing is not publicly transparent.

Lever combines a powerful Applicant Tracking System (ATS) with a Candidate Relationship Management (CRM) system, offering a comprehensive solution for managing the entire talent acquisition lifecycle. It focuses on proactive talent nurturing, streamlined workflows, and data-driven insights to help companies build strong candidate pipelines.

• Strong Points: Its integrated ATS + CRM approach allows for proactive talent sourcing and pipeline nurturing, a key differentiator. It offers AI-powered features for efficiency, focuses on candidate experience and DEI, and provides strong analytics for recruiting insights.
• Drawbacks: It can be a substantial investment, potentially beyond the reach of very small or early-stage startups. The extensive features may present a steeper learning curve, and pricing is not publicly disclosed.

Zoho Recruit is a versatile recruitment platform offering both ATS and CRM functionalities, designed to cater to in-house recruiters and staffing agencies. It provides tools for job posting, candidate tracking, automated tasks, and client management, with a strong emphasis on customization and integration within the broader Zoho ecosystem.

• Strong Points: Its “Forever Free” plan makes it highly accessible for very small businesses or startups on a tight budget. It offers extensive customization options, robust resume parsing, and seamless integration with other Zoho applications for a holistic business solution.
• Drawbacks: While feature-rich, the platform can sometimes feel complex or have a steeper learning curve for users new to its extensive capabilities. The interface, with its many options, can sometimes feel cluttered

Workable is an all-in-one recruiting software that provides robust ATS functionalities alongside some HRIS capabilities, making it suitable for managing the entire hiring and employee lifecycle. It emphasizes ease of use, AI-assisted screening, and streamlined workflows to help companies find and onboard talent efficiently.

• Strong Points: It offers a comprehensive set of features for recruitment, including AI-assisted screening and self-service scheduling, making it highly efficient. It’s user-friendly and can serve as both an ATS and a basic HRIS, which is attractive for growing SMBs.
• Drawbacks: Its headcount-based pricing model means costs can escalate significantly as a company grows, potentially becoming expensive. Many useful features are available as add-ons, increasing the overall investment, and its HRIS functionalities may not be as deep as dedicated HRIS platforms.

AshbyHQ is an integrated recruiting platform that combines ATS, scheduling, CRM, and powerful analytics, primarily targeting high-growth startups and scaling companies. It focuses on automating recruiting tasks, providing deep data insights, and enhancing productivity through AI-powered features.

• Strong Points: It offers a truly all-in-one recruiting solution with very strong, real-time analytics and reporting capabilities, including AI-assisted report building. Its emphasis on automation and AI-powered assistance significantly boosts recruiter efficiency.
• Drawbacks: Positioned for high-growth companies, its pricing is generally higher and less transparent than typical SMB-focused ATS solutions. Its extensive features might be an overkill for very small or early-stage businesses with simpler hiring needs.

Eightfold.ai is an AI-powered talent intelligence platform that goes beyond traditional ATS to offer a unified view of talent across acquisition, management, and internal mobility. It leverages deep learning AI to provide insights into skills, potential, and learnability, aiming to transform talent decisions for large enterprises.

• Best for: Strong Points: Its most significant advantage is its advanced AI and “Digital Twin” technology, which provides unparalleled insights into talent skills and potential. It offers solutions across the entire talent lifecycle, from sourcing to internal mobility, and focuses on reducing bias in hiring.
• Drawbacks: It is primarily designed and priced for large enterprises, making it a substantial investment likely out of reach for most SMBs and startups. While powerful, some users have reported occasional performance lags or desire for more robust analytical tools for deep data dives.

Recruitee is a collaborative recruitment software focused on streamlining the hiring process and enhancing team communication. It provides comprehensive ATS functionalities, extensive job board multi-posting, customizable pipelines, and tools for employer branding, making it suitable for growing organizations.

• Strong Points: It excels in collaborative hiring features, allowing teams to work seamlessly together. It offers multi-posting to a vast network of job boards for wide candidate reach and is generally praised for its user-friendly interface and highly customizable workflows and career pages.
• Drawbacks: Some users note that the mobile app’s functionality can be limited compared to the desktop version. Advanced analytics might require higher-tier plans, and there’s generally no option to pause subscriptions during hiring freezes

JazzHR is a cloud-based Applicant Tracking System (ATS) specifically designed to simplify and automate the hiring process for small and growing businesses. It offers unlimited job postings and users, customizable workflows, automated tasks, and compliance features, aiming for an affordable and user-friendly experience.

• Strong Points: It is highly affordable and transparently priced, offering unlimited job postings and users even on lower tiers, which is excellent for SMBs. It’s praised for its user-friendly interface and ability to streamline basic hiring tasks and centralize applications.
• Drawbacks: Many desirable features, such as advanced visual reporting, e-signatures, or candidate texting, are available only as paid add-ons. While suitable for SMBs, it might lack the advanced scalability or deep analytical capabilities required by very large or complex organizations.

Tool	Description	Strong Points	Drawbacks
Manatal	AI-powered ATS and CRM designed to streamline hiring with AI recommendations, job board integrations, and customizable pipelines.	Excellent AI for sourcing/scoring, user-friendly, easy setup, wide job board integration.	Some integrations require higher-tier plans/Zapier, mobile app limitations, occasional UI issues.
Greenhouse	Comprehensive platform focused on structured, equitable hiring with robust analytics.	Structured interviews, bias mitigation, 500+ integrations, strong analytics.	Expensive for SMBs, steep learning curve, no public pricing.
BambooHR (with ATS)	All-in-one HRIS with integrated ATS, focused on centralizing HR data for SMBs.	Combines HRIS and ATS, intuitive UI, great support, ideal for lean teams.	ATS features less advanced than dedicated tools, overkill if only ATS is needed, no public pricing.
Lever	Integrated ATS and CRM offering proactive sourcing and full lifecycle management.	ATS + CRM combo, AI features, DEI focus, robust analytics.	High cost, complex setup, no public pricing.
Zoho Recruit	ATS + CRM for in-house teams and agencies with strong customization and Zoho integration.	Free tier available, customizable, integrates well in Zoho ecosystem.	Steeper learning curve, cluttered interface.
Workable	All-in-one recruiting software with ATS and some HRIS features.	AI-assisted screening, user-friendly, supports hiring and basic HR.	Headcount-based pricing can get expensive, features often locked behind add-ons.
AshbyHQ	End-to-end recruiting platform with strong automation, analytics, and CRM features.	Real-time reporting, automation, AI-assisted workflows.	High pricing, more suited for scaling/high-growth companies.
Eightfold.ai	Enterprise-grade AI talent platform covering acquisition, mobility, and management.	Deep AI insights, lifecycle coverage, Digital Twin tech, bias reduction.	Enterprise pricing, complex, not ideal for SMBs.
Recruitee	Collaborative ATS with customizable pipelines and employer branding tools.	Strong collaboration tools, multi-posting, customizable and user-friendly.	Mobile app limitations, advanced analytics in higher plans, no pause option.
JazzHR	Affordable cloud-based ATS aimed at SMBs with unlimited users and jobs.	Transparent pricing, easy to use, great for small teams.	Some key features as paid add-ons, limited scalability for large orgs.

• For budget-conscious startups: Zoho Recruit, Manatal, JazzHR
• For all-in-one HR solutions: BambooHR
• For structured growth hiring: Greenhouse, Recruitee
• For proactive sourcing and CRM: Lever, AshbyHQ
• For fast-scaling small teams: Workable, AshbyHQ
• For enterprise hiring needs: Eightfold.ai (less suitable for SMBs)

Choosing the best ATS for small business hiring comes down to your budget, team size, and hiring complexity. Fortunately, many applicant tracking systems offer free trials or flexible pricing plans, so you can test the platform before committing. Whether you’re a startup hiring your first employee or an SMB building out a full team, the right ATS system can help you hire faster, smarter, and more efficiently.