8 Best Employee Scheduling Software For 2024 (Comparison)
Are you looking for the best employee scheduling software to keep your team productive?
There’s no other way around it. Scheduling software is critical for any business that is serious about ensuring their team are productive.
Managing team schedules using clunky spreadsheets isn’t going to cut it anymore.
Today, we’re sharing with you the best employee scheduling solutions for companies of varying sizes. We’re confident that you’ll find a tool in this list that’ll meet or exceed your needs. We’ll tell you their core features as well as how much they cost.
The best employee scheduling software – summary
TL;DR
- Soon — Best employee scheduling tool for most users. It’s simple, affordable, and robust.
- Connecteam — Best for those who need to go beyond employee scheduling. It includes solutions for task management, communications, and more.
1. Soon
Soon is the best employee scheduling solution for the average user. It’s a simple tool that anyone can pick up and use right away. It’s affordable and makes it easy to scale your team.
So what can you do with Soon?
You can do quite a bit. With the scheduling feature, you can simplify your day-to-day operations. It lets you create events that you can customize and re-edit when necessary. Then you can add people to that event based on their roles and skills. You can create events as far ahead as needed. You can view all scheduled events within the day, week, and month.
This employee scheduling software also lets you manage your team’s leaves. You can create, review, and approve time-off from within the tool. It’s just as easy adding new groups and setting roles. And best of all, you can manage everyone’s time and attendance — you can even export timesheets for payroll.
You can give your employees some control over their schedules. They can manage their shifts based on their availability and time-off. Each one also gets an inbox for better coordination between people. This is where they’ll get notified of changes to their shift scheduling.
There’s also a feature called Conversational Change Requests which allows your workers to handle shift changes more intuitively and autonomously. They can request shift cancellation, exchange shifts with coworkers, or drop an open shift.
It definitely improves any company’s scheduling process and makes sure that everyone is heard. And it’s also great for payroll because everyone’s activity is tracked.
If you want to see the tool in action, you can request a 30-minute online demo with the Soon team. They’ll show you how it can help you control your day-to-day scheduling operations. The company also has a Help Center that could give you a better idea of how everything works.
Soon has three plans available. You can either pay month-to-month or settle for an annual subscription. It should be pointed out that switching to an annual plan will give you a discount of 20%.
Pricing: Team (€10/month/user), Business (€20/month/user), Enterprise (Custom pricing)
2. Connecteam
Connecteam is not just an employee scheduling software. It does way more. Which makes it the right scheduling software for those of you that need more advanced functionality.
This platform is great for team communication and task management. It can handle employee training. You can even create a knowledge center for a more efficient onboarding process. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Let’s start by discussing all the employee scheduling solutions available.
With Connecteam, you can create schedules in just minutes and share them right away with your team in one click. You can rearrange items by dragging and dropping them into place. And you can create open shifts for your employees to take. In one glance, you’ll be able to see which of your people are unavailable, sick, or exceeding their limits.
When there’s a change in employee shifts, they’ll get notified through push notifications. They’ll always have access to their schedules. And you’ll get notified as well whenever they accept, reject, or complete tasks.
Since Connecteam has a mobile app, you have access to all your data while you’re on the move.
The Time Clock feature gives you real-time visibility of your workers’ clock-in and clock-out information. You’d even get GPS location tracking. Not only does this help with monitoring employee availability, but it also helps your payroll department streamline its process. This tool even flags auto-breaks, overtime, double-time, daily limits, and other crucial data.
Connecteam also gives you the ability to create any type of form through a simple drag-and-drop editor. This is ideal for operations that require checklists or paperwork. When forms are completed, you get real-time notifications. These can then be exported for further analysis.
You can create tasks as well. You can include task descriptions, attach files, create subtasks, set up due dates, and more. All task assignees are given notifications. You will be sent a notification once a task is complete.
There’s a communication app that lets your team talk with one another using the same platform. It’s great for making announcements, sending newsletters, or simply keeping each other in the loop about projects they’re working on.
Pricing: Free for small businesses with less than 10 employees. There are 4 paid plans; Basic from $29/month (billed annually), Advanced $49/month (billed annually), Expert $99/month (billed annually) and Enterprise (custom pricing).
3. Homebase
Homebase is a platform that allows you to schedule your employees and perform other tasks that will improve productivity in the workplace.
It allows you to create a schedule and immediately shares it with your team. They’re notified via text, email, and the Homebase app (Android and iOS). And if there are changes, all concerned employees will get an alert. Even better, you get a confirmation that they’ve seen the changes so there’s no confusion nor excuses.
You can use a template to create a schedule. But you also have the option of using the auto-scheduler feature. Tracking the availability is made easier to avoid conflicting schedules. And you can post open shifts for anyone on your team to claim.
Set your business up for success by automatically setting up shift reminders via text. You can also use notes to add reminders or instructions for the day. Employees have the option to cover for each other’s shifts in case of an emergency — all you need to do is to approve the request.
A manager has control over their coworkers’ time-off requests as they can black out dates, add request limits, and require advanced notice. Everyone’s time-off availability will show up in their respective schedules. They will also know whether their requests are approved or not.
All changes are seen in real-time so adjustments can be made on the fly.
The clock-in feature makes it possible to log in from any device. You can track hours, breaks, overtime, and paid time-off through your mobile device. GPS data will confirm where they are clocking in from. So this can work whether people are working from the office or home.
The timesheet feature makes payroll less tedious. Homebase will automatically calculate your employees’ total work hours, breaks, and overtime. You can even set up your own break and overtime rules to always comply with federal, state, or city laws.
Other notable features include a hiring and onboarding tool, team communication. HR and compliance features, and integrations. It’s one of the most complete solutions for employee management out today. Definitely worth looking more into.
Pricing: Free, Essentials ($14/month/location billed annually), Plus ($35/month/location billed annually), All In One ($70/month/location billed annually)
4. When I Work
When I Work is an employee scheduling software for businesses that rely on managing shifts all too often. It promotes faster scheduling, efficient time tracking, and better communication among team members.
With this tool, you can manage time-off requests with a few taps. You can fill shifts should an employee file a sick leave, giving others an opportunity to earn money. Workers can trade shifts as well. The employer can set up tasks for the day and monitor their progress in real-time. And you’re able to see everyone’s availability so you’ll always know who’s available.
Since this employee scheduling software is built to scale, you can use it for multiple store locations.
And you can do so much more with When I Work. For example, you can control labor costs from ballooning by assigning shifts to someone so that person can cover another employee that’s about to go overtime. There are also measures in place to clock someone in who may have forgotten to do so which prevents them from being marked as absent.
You can use GPS data to see where your employees are. So even if they forget to clock in, you’ll know if they’re close to the worksite. There’s an option to adjust someone’s timesheet so they accurately represent the amount of time a worker puts in. This is also a great employee scheduling software for managing employee breaks.
On top of all that, When I Work is also a communication tool. You’ll have a dedicated space for messaging employees. No more need to call, text, or email them. You can even start a group message should you ever need to talk with more than one person at a time. Or you can use broadcast messaging to announce something that everyone should know about.
Handling timesheets is more efficient when you use When I Work. You’ll be able to see everyone’s hours with a few scrolls of the app. This makes tracking labor costs much faster. You can set up pay rates for every employee. And there is a feature that prevents someone from clocking in too early.
Pricing: Small Business ($2/month/user), Enterprise (Custom pricing)
5. Calendly
Calendly is a bit different from the other entries on this list since it mainly focuses on scheduling meetings for teams. The idea is for workers to be able to set up meetings without the need for back-and-forth emails just to agree on a time and date.
With Calendly, all you need to do is to set the times and days that work for you. When a coworker sees an open spot and selects it, a meeting is instantly confirmed. Should something come up on the chosen time and date, you can reschedule just as easily.
You have control over how much or little bookings Calendly accepts on your behalf. You can set a cap on how many meetings you’d attend. And because not all meetings start or end on time, you can set a buffer period before or after a meeting.
Calendly is smart enough to detect time zones. So invites between coworkers in different time zones will not result in any confusion. You can also send meeting invites with options. That means you or the recipient can mix and match meeting types to offer more variety of hosts and availability.
Team meetings can come in the form of webinars for meetings with multiple guests or a sales demo with more than one member of your team.
You can set up workflows that automate communications before and after meetings. You can embed Calendly into your website or email to streamline scheduling. There’s also the option to sync up to six calendars per user so you’ll see each one’s real-time availability. And you can conduct polls to let invitees vote on their preferred meeting times.
This employee scheduling software works on browsers and through the mobile app. If you use CRMs, you can use Calendly too. And you can even streamline payments for Calendly events using PayPal or Stripe.
For those of you who only want basic auto-scheduling features, there is a free version of Calendly that you can use.
Pricing: Basic (Free), Essentials ($8/month/seat billed annually), Professional ($12/month/seat billed annually), Teams ($16/month/seat billed annually), Enterprise (Custom pricing)
6. ResourceGuru
ResourceGuru is another content for the best employee scheduling software. It’s a simple tool that you can use to track your employees’ schedules to keep your business more organized.
It gives you a bird’ eye view of your whole workforce. You’ll be able to identify who’s overbooked and who’s underutilized. This will help you prevent people from burning out. You’ll be able to update everyone’s schedules by dragging and dropping shifts. You can also split shifts or duplicate them as needed.
There’s also a powerful filtering feature that can help you find the right people for a job. So if you have a large organization and one of your employees can’t come to work, you will still be able to find an appropriate substitute based on skill, department, or location.
You can also toggle between billable and non-billable hours. That way, each person’s work hours are much more defined.
Best of all, you can schedule just about anything with ResourceGuru. If you want to use it for scheduling meetings, go right ahead. You can even use it to schedule the use of equipment.
ResourceGuru has a leave tracker that will give you an idea of who’s not coming in to work in the next couple of days. That way, you’re not caught off guard when someone you’re depending on doesn’t show up. The paid time off tracker tells you how many times an employee has filed for sick leave or has gone on vacation. You’ll also see how much downtime each worker has.
This employee scheduling software can work with third-party tools such as Slack, Microsoft Teams, and G Suite. Other features include project scheduling and capacity planning.
And we didn’t even mention one of the best things about ResourceGuru just yet. It’s absolutely affordable. You’d be surprised how little this scheduling software costs.
Pricing: Grasshopper ($2.50/month/user billed annually), Blackbelt ($4.16/month/user), Master ($6.65/month/user billed annually)
7. On The Clock
On The Clock is web-based clock software that helps business owners keep track of their employees — remote workers or otherwise. With it, users can log in from their phone, a computer, or using their fingerprint.
You can use this employee scheduling software to track where your employees are to keep them accountable during their shifts. There is an option to set up geo-fenced time clock locations so you can also be sure that they are at work before clocking out for the day.
Integrating the time clock feature with your payroll is easy. The time tracking software can be used as time cards for payroll. And you can integrate third-party payroll solutions like Quickbooks, Gusto, Accounting CS, Paychex, and ADP.
On The Clock has just added a messaging feature that’s able to help employees talk to one another and keep each other informed of their tasks and other concerns.
Employees can also use this platform to request time off from work. Their managers will receive an alert informing them who’s requesting PTO and approve or deny through the same app. Your workers will be able to tell how many PTO hours they have left and how many they have used for vacation, sick, and personal days off.
Since On The Clock is web-based, all employee information can be accessed anywhere and is synced across all devices. You don’t need to download, install, or update anything. It just works.
Pricing is based on how many employees will be using the system. If you only have 1 or 2, On The Clock is free to use. If you have 2 to 10 employees, it’s $3 per employee per month. The base price goes up from there as the number of employees increases.
Pricing: Free, Custom (Starts at $3/month/user)
8. Sage HR
Sage HR is the final entry on this list. It provides a holistic approach to employee management since it does more than just schedule shifts though that is one of its strongest suits.
Creating and moving shifts around is simple even if you manage multiple locations. You can assign a dedicated shift manager for each branch. Employees have the ability to add their own preferred time and let you know when they’re not available — a great feature for businesses that manage freelancers.
You can use Sage HR to track employee performance as well. Set aspirational goals to challenge your workforce and reward those who meet them. Workers can send a review of their performance as well and gather feedback from their coworkers, managers, or subordinates throughout the year.
Use Sage HR to set up discreet 1-on-1 meetings with your employees to catch up with them and see what you can do to help them improve their performance. Or if you’d prefer a broader approach, you can send out surveys (responses can be anonymous) to determine what your people feel about their workplace.
This employee scheduling software can also be used for recruitment. You’ll be able to track and streamline the whole recruitment process. From the app, you can schedule interviews and sync them directly to your Outlook calendar. You can create custom scorecards to identify which candidates are worth pursuing.
The Timesheet feature will help you with payroll procedures. You’ll know exactly what people are working on and how much time was spent on them. And you’ll be able to tell at a glance which employees worked overtime.
One of the amazing things about Sage HR is that you can pick which features you want. The fewer features you include in your plan, the lower the cost will be. The number of employees you wish to enroll will also affect pricing.
The Core HR + Leave Management plan comes standard. From there, you have the option of adding more features. Your options are Performance (setting goals, 1-on-1 meetings, etc.), Shift Scheduling, Timesheets, Expenses (submit and manage company expenses from the mobile app), and Recruitment (create job ads, manage applicants, etc.).
For example, if you only need Shift Scheduling and have 10 employees, you’ll pay $85/month. If you want all features for the same number of employees, you’ll pay $360/month.
Pricing: Custom (Starts at $5.50/month)
Final thoughts
And that concludes our comparison of the best employee scheduling software.
These tools can help you keep employees productive and make shift planning easy.
You can’t go wrong with any platform on this list. That said, we’re particularly big fans of Soon and Connecteam. These two platforms provide great starting points – particularly because they offer free pricing tiers.
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