Gusto

Unverified
Product not verified by the Software Seller.
Tekpon Score
8.9

Gusto Reviews

& Product Details

What is Gusto?

No matter how small or large, every company must pay its employees and hire and let go of some of them. It is inevitable. To make things easier for small and medium-sized companies, Gusto decided in 2012 to bring its contribution to the market.

Gusto is a payroll and HR software that integrates the full spectrum of compensation and onboarding related to an employee or contractor. Furthermore, the software has the primary purpose of helping small and medium-sized companies handle all HR-related tasks efficiently. Last, the HR and payroll tool will help  you manage tasks such as:

  • Onboarding
  • Pay
  • Insurance
  • Support

Best For

Set your business up with modern payroll, benefits, and more.
  • StartUps
  • Freelancers
  • Small Business
  • Medium Business
  • Large Enterprise
  • Non-profit Organization
  • Personal
  • Cloud, SaaS, Web-Based
  • Mobile - Android
  • Mobile - iPhone
  • Mobile - iPad
  • Desktop - Mac
  • Desktop - Windows
  • Desktop - Linux
  • Desktop - Chromebook
  • On-Premise - Windows
  • On-Premise - Linux
  • Company Name

    Gusto

  • Located In

    United States

  • Website

    gusto.com

Starting from:

$40 /month

Pricing Model: Subscription

Pricing Details:

Gusto pricing for Contractor Only starts at 6 dollars if you have no employees and work only with contractors. After that, the price of $6 is charged per person per month. However, if you have employees or contractors in the US, the price will be a minimum $40 base price plus $6 per person.

  • Benefits Manager
  • Direct Deposit
  • Automatic Tax Payment
  • Payroll Entry
  • Pre-tax Deductions
  • Reporting and Dashboards
  • Performance and Reliability
  • Tax Calculation
  • Tax Filing
  • Time Off Accrual
  • User, Role, and Access Management
  • Wage Garnishment
  • Web Portal

Additional Features

  • 401(k) Tracking
  • ACA Reporting
  • Applicant Tracking
  • Benefits Administration Outsourcing
  • Benefits Dashboard
  • Check Printing
  • COBRA Administration
  • Compensation Management
  • Deduction Management
  • Disability Insurance Administration
  • Document Management
  • E-Verify/I-9 Forms
  • Electronic Forms
  • Employee Benefits Administration
  • Employee Database
  • Health Insurance Administration
  • Employee Handbook
  • Employee Profiles
  • HIPAA Compliant
  • HSA/FSA Administration
  • Life Insurance Administration
  • Multi-State
  • Onboarding
  • Online Benefits Enrollment
  • Orientation Workflow Management
  • Payroll Management
  • Payroll Reporting
  • Recruitment Management
  • Retirement Plan Management
  • Self Service Portal
  • Task Management
  • Tax Compliance
  • Time & Attendance
  • Training Management
  • Vacation/Leave Tracking
  • W-2 Preparation
  • Wage Garnishment

Zenefits

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All-in-one HR software that saves you time.

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How long has Gusto been in business?

Gusto payroll software started back in 2012 to ease all HR-related activities for small and medium-sized businesses. The company started as ZenPayroll and helps around 100.000 companies pay and enroll their employees monthly.

honest review by Tekpon to Gusto

What is Gusto software or hardware?

Gusto is a software product, more specifically, software as a service product. The product is cloud-based and comes with a monthly subscription.

In-depth review of Gusto Features

Moving on to probably the most important part of the Gusto review, the Gusto feature section, where we’ll look at what the SaaS offers.

Gusto Payroll

The Gusto payroll software is a small feature from all that the software has to offer. Above all, the software will ensure employees’ salaries are paid on time, taxes are delivered on time, and forms are sent in duly.

Automated Taxes

Gusto payroll software will collect all the federal payroll taxes & the state taxes, which are calculated and paid automatically for all your employees. Thus, the system will ensure that you, all your employees, and your contractor have all your federal taxes in order. Moreover, Gusto also automated their payroll to make things easier, so you don’t have to worry about it. Let’s continue the Gusto review by seeing what the payroll on autopilot s all about.

Payroll on AutoPilot

The Gusto Payroll on AutoPilot feature will automate the whole payroll for you and ensure that all your employees are paid on time. Furthermore, the software will also inform the government about your new hire’s whereabouts and get them registered.

Last, the software files all the federal, state, and local taxes on your behalf. Now, let’s see how they do that.

Minimum Wage Adjustment

Gusto can automate the FLSA Tip Credit minimum wage requirement and automatically bring your employees up to that standard. Therefore if this is your case, go to your settings and automate this function for all the employees under this category.

Forms

The software will ensure that all the forms that follow are filed on time and for each one of your employees and contractors.

  • W-2 forms
  • Contractor form 1099
  • 940 form
  • Form 941
  • Form8974

These forms are great to have and file via e-signature as they will enable your company to encourage paperless work and save precious time to focus on its growth. However, if you are looking for local forms, Gusto also provides a local tax description of other taxes it can automate. Check out their Federal and State taxes filled by Gusto section.

Moving on with the Gusto review to the flexible payroll features.

Flexible payroll features

The Gusto payroll software gives on the receivers end the possibility to opt-in or out of several benefits on the one hand and for employers to save time and money on others, such as paperless paychecks.


  • Gusto debit card – employees can opt for a debit card from Gusto
  • Paperless paychecks –  with the debit card, you can go paperless
  • Multiple states – Gusto supports payroll in all 50 states
  • Unlimited payrolls –  you can run payroll as many times as you please


  • Contractor payments –  you can pay them through the platform, and the 1099s will be sent directly.
  • Easy cancellations – with 2 clicks you can cancel any paycheck
  • Flexible payment schedules – pay your team as you wish
  • Multiple pay schedules


  • Net-to-gross calculations – the software will automatically pay taxes with minimal effort
  • Deductions – you can add them pre-tax or post-tax
  • Hourly and salaried employees
  • Unlimited bonus and off-cycle payrolls – you can pay bonuses whenever you please any time of the month

  • Multiple pay rates – you can pay employees separate rates based on the work they perform.
  • Garnishments– deduct child support garnishment in all states but South Carolina.
  • Reimbursements – pay at the same time as the payroll
  • Next-day direct deposit – you can hold on to your money until payday and still be on time

Wrapping up those mentioned earlier, it was evident that the Gusto software has put some thought into the comfort and flexibility of the employee. It even makes life easier for employers, giving endless possibilities for hiring contractors, same-day payments, bonuses, Gusto debit cards, and paperless payslips.

Advanced payroll features

The Advanced payroll features are most useful for the company as they report and file a piece of cake. Thus, integration with the accounting platform makes double-entry bookkeeping synchronize automatically.

  • Payroll reports
  • Accounting integrations
  • Integrated pre-tax benefits
  • Federal R&D Tax Credit
  • Time-tracking integrations
  • Expense integration
  • FICA Tip Credit for restaurants

Above all, we enjoyed the Gusto software time-tracking integrations and expense integration. We believe they might be some of the many reasons Gusto is an American favorite in onboarding and payroll solutions.

Hiring and Onboarding Features

Now, while we are not true believers in one tool does it all, we are more of a “focus on a niche and be the best at what you do” admires; we do believe Gusto did a good job at tackling both the payroll side of things and also HR and onboarding. While somewhat commented, these two fields sometimes fall under different job descriptions and can get blurry sometimes.

However, this particular feature of Gusto falls under the responsibilities of the human resources responsible or department. Still, considering the number of features it truly comes with, we find it hard to believe that a small to medium-sized company will need all these functionalities. Therefore we think the solution would also be suitable for larger companies.

  • Direct deposit – payments straight to their desired bank account
  • Paperless employee onboarding –  new employees fill out their details, including bank account and W-4s online
  • Digital paystubs – easy access for employees to their paystubs in their email, Gusto account, and Gusto wallet
  • Lifetime accounts – access to their paystubs and W-2s lifetime all over the platform
  • Charitable donations – employees can make donations straight from their paycheck
  • Teams – everybody can be organized into departments for easy reporting
  • Vacation and sick policies – easy track of sick leave and vacation time for every employee

vacation and medical leave on Gusto

Integrations of Gusto

Gusto integrates with over 50 applications making it easy for you to have the best experience and keep your payroll activity smooth and organized. Thus, the software integrates with the most popular accounting software on the market and is a widely used time-tracking software. Furthermore, it also integrates with point-of-sales systems to accommodate brick-and-mortar stores.

Accounting Integrations


  • Xero
  • FreshBooks
  • QuickBooks Online
  • QuickBooks Desktop


  • ZipBooks
  • AutoBooks
  • Synder
  • SunRise


  • AccountingSuite
  • ZarMoney
  • Fulfil.io

  • Bookkeper360
  • Aplos
  • Xendoo

Time Tracking Integrations


  • Homebase
  • Tsheets
  • When I Work
  • Deputy


  • 7Shifts
  • Sling
  • Boomr
  • TimeTracker


  • Timeero
  • ClockShark
  • OnTheClock
  • AttendanceBot


  • Tinq
  • Workforce.com
  • WorkYard
  • WorkForceHub


Point of Sale Integrations

  • Clover
  • Shopify
  • Upserve
  • SpotOn

Business Operations Integrations


  • Procare Solutions
  • Vagaro
  • Housecall Pro
  • Hubstaff


  • Trainual
  • Veryfi
  • ClientTrak
  • Accelo


  • AllGeo
  • Sinc
  • ChartHop
  • WorkIz


  • Dealr. cloud
  • Brandly
  • Online Check Writer


Accountant Tools Integrations

  • Jirav

Gusto Customer Support

Gusto software supports migrating all the payroll information from another payroll system to them. Furthermore, Gusto will give you support to get you set up and ready to use the programs.

data migration to Gusto- honest reviews

The support team will ensure and confirm that your setup is made properly and that all the needed information is properly introduced. You will always have the option to reach out to one of their customer support team members for answers.

Above all, if you are not looking to migrate from another payroll to Gusto, you will still get support via chat, email, and phone.

If you have any other questions, Gusto payroll has a generous library of how-to videos for any action you would like to take.

Gusto Review Conclusion

In conclusion to all that was said about Gusto, it has many features that are extremely helpful for the US market. However, not so much so in the case of international contractors, where it is fairly limited. Furthermore, while not high in contrast to other payroll solutions, Gusto pricing does come with a different approach of a base price and a user price; user price can become quite pricey.

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