Gusto Pricing
Gusto’s pricing is genuinely simple for US domestic payroll: $49/month base plus $6/employee on the Simple plan.
For a 15-person single-state business, that is $139/month.
No contracts. No setup fees. No termination penalties.
You can cancel at any time.
The complication is what happens when you need more than the Simple plan provides.
Multi-state payroll requires Plus ($80 + $12/employee). Performance reviews require Premium ($180 + $22/employee).
Gusto does not sell its own EOR: to hire employees abroad, new customers are referred to its partner Remote, whose own pricing and coverage apply.
Each step up doubles or triples your per-employee cost, so the plan you land on matters far more than the $49 headline.
This page breaks down every plan, every add-on, and every hidden cost so you can model the real number for your specific situation, not the $49 headline.
What Does Gusto Cost?
View the provider’s latest pricing, plans, and setup details.
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What does Gusto charge?
Gusto offers four plan tiers for US domestic payroll and a contractor-only plan. For international employees it does not run its own EOR: since 1 May 2026 new customers are referred to its partner Remote, which employs the worker and sets its own price. The US pricing is transparent and published, which is genuinely unusual in this category.
The catch is the tier gating: features you might assume are standard are locked behind higher plans.
| Plan | Base fee | Per employee | Key unlock |
|---|---|---|---|
| Simple | $49/month | $6/month | Single-state payroll, basic HR, benefits admin |
| Plus | $80/month | $12/month | Multi-state payroll, time tracking, PTO policies |
| Premium | $180/month | $22/month | Performance reviews, dedicated CSM, phone support |
| Contractor-only | $35/month | $6/contractor | US contractor-only plan; global contractors have no base fee, just a service + FX fee |
| EOR (international employees) | Set by Remote | Set by Remote | Handled by partner Remote; new customers referred from 1 May 2026 (Remote is the employer) |
| Int’l contractor payments | None | $5/payment (US bank); intl wire min $15, then 1%-1.5% + FX margin | No monthly per-contractor fee; payments take around 5-10 business days |
Source: Gusto.com/product/pricing, verified July 2026. Gusto says international employees are now hired through its partner Remote (remote.com/partners/gusto), so EOR pricing and country coverage come from Remote, not Gusto.
What does Gusto’s fee include?
We reviewed Gusto’s full plan documentation and compared the inclusions against six other providers in our coverage.
Across all domestic plans, Gusto includes:
- Automated federal, state, and local tax calculation, filing, and payment
- W-2 and 1099 year-end generation
- Employee self-service portal
- Onboarding workflows (I-9, W-4, offer letters)
- Benefits administration (health, dental, vision, FSA, HSA) at no separate admin fee
- Direct deposit, ATS, and compliance alerts
The benefits brokerage inclusion is the detail worth highlighting for your Finance team. Most competitors either charge separately for benefits administration or do not offer brokerage at all.
For a 30-person company, bundling payroll and benefits on Gusto eliminates a separate broker relationship, and the reconciliation work between payroll and benefits enrolment that creates a headache every open-enrolment period.
The 401(k) integration via Guideline (acquired August 2025 for approximately $600M) adds retirement plan administration.
This is still maturing, but the direction is clear: payroll, health benefits, and retirement on one platform.
What costs sit on top of Gusto’s fee?
Gusto’s pricing is more transparent than most competitors, but three cost drivers catch buyers who budget from the headline.
Tier gating. This is the primary hidden cost.
Multi-state payroll requires Plus. Performance reviews require Premium.
The jump is steep: a 30-employee company on Simple pays $2,748/year. On Plus: $5,280/year (92% increase). On Premium: $10,080/year (267% increase).
If you start on Simple and discover you need multi-state payroll six months later, the budget conversation with your manager is not a pleasant one.
Before signing up, check whether your current and 12-month needs fit within the Simple plan. If you have employees in more than one state, you need Plus from day one.
International contractor fees. There is no monthly per-contractor fee.
Gusto says it charges $5 per payment to a US bank account. An international wire runs a $15 minimum ($18 for Taiwan, Ukraine and Turkey), then 1%-1.5% plus an FX margin in the rate.
At low volume, this is trivial.
At 20 contractors with weekly payments, the $5/payment fee adds $5,200/year. That number does not appear on the pricing page in a way that is easy to model.
FX opacity for international payments. Gusto does not disclose its FX spread for international contractor payments.
The cost is borne by the contractor, not you, which means it is invisible to your Finance team but visible to your contractors.
If contractor satisfaction matters to your talent strategy, the FX situation is worth investigating before you commit.
Cost modelling
30-employee US company: what each plan actually costs per year
Simple (single-state): $49 + 30 x $6 = $229/month = $2,748/year. Plus (multi-state): $80 + 30 x $12 = $440/month = $5,280/year. Premium (with performance reviews + CSM): $180 + 30 x $22 = $840/month = $10,080/year.
OnPay ($49 + $6/employee, all features included, no tier gating) is the natural benchmark to model against, since the tier gating means Gusto’s cheapest plan only applies to single-state teams.
How does Gusto compare on price?
For US domestic payroll, Gusto is competitive for small teams but the tier gating makes direct comparison tricky. OnPay and Justworks offer simpler pricing with no feature lockout. Our Justworks fees page breaks down those per-employee bands in full.
For international employees there is no Gusto EOR price to compare: Gusto refers you to Remote, so weigh Remote or Deel directly on their own current pricing and coverage.
| Provider | US payroll (30 employees) | EOR price | Contracts |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gusto (Plus) | $5,280/year | Via Remote (Remote’s price) | Month-to-month, no lock-in |
| OnPay | $2,748/year | N/A | Month-to-month |
| Rippling | ~$6,000-$8,000/year | $499-1,000 per employee/month | Annual commitment |
| Deel (US Payroll) | $10,440/year | $599 per employee/month | Month-to-month |
Source: Provider pricing pages, re-verified 6 August 2026. Gusto Plus is $80 + 30 x $12. OnPay Payroll Essentials is $49 + 30 x $6.
Deel US Payroll is 30 x $29 at its published self-service rate; Deel prices its managed tier on request, so a managed quote will land above this. Rippling US payroll is estimated from third-party reports, not from a published rate.
WhichPayroll view
Gusto undercuts the global platforms on US payroll and loses to the dedicated ones. At thirty employees it runs roughly half of Deel and comfortably under Rippling. OnPay charges $2,748 for multi-state payroll, which is what Gusto charges for single-state only.
The tier gating is what closes that gap. Gusto’s cheapest plan only serves single-state businesses, so the moment you hire in a second state you are on Plus and paying $12 a head rather than $6.
For international employees, Gusto no longer sells its own EOR: new customers are referred to its partner Remote, which employs the worker and sets the price and country coverage. Compare Remote (or Deel) directly on that basis.
Since Remote is the actual employer either way, going directly through Remote keeps the relationship simplest.
Is Gusto worth the cost?
Gusto is worth the cost when your workforce is primarily US-based, your headcount is under 100, and you want payroll, benefits, and basic HR on one platform without the overhead of a contract negotiation or implementation project.
The value is clearest for a US company with 10-50 employees in one or two states that wants to stop managing payroll manually or escape the contract lock-in of ADP or Paychex.
In that scenario, Gusto’s combination of automated tax compliance, integrated benefits brokerage, 401(k) via Guideline, and month-to-month pricing is genuinely hard to beat.
It is not the tool for international employment (Gusto refers you to Remote for that anyway, and Deel is worth weighing directly), for companies approaching 200 employees (Rippling handles scale better), or for businesses that need all features on every plan (OnPay has no tier gating).
In each case, the savings from choosing the right tool now exceed the switching cost of changing later.
For the full platform review, see our Gusto. For the comparison, see Gusto vs Deel.
Where Can You Check Gusto's Latest Plans and Prices?
View the provider’s latest pricing, plans, and setup details.
Gusto
Official provider site
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Frequently asked questions
What does Gusto cost for a 30-employee company?
On Simple (single-state): $229/month ($2,748/year). On Plus (multi-state): $440/month ($5,280/year).
On Premium (with performance reviews and dedicated CSM): $840/month ($10,080/year). No setup fees, no contracts.
Month-to-month billing means you can switch plans at any time, so you are never locked into a rate you no longer want.
What does Gusto’s US pricing look like right now?
The current published prices are Simple $49 + $6/employee, Plus $80 + $12, Premium $180 + $22, and Contractor Only at a $0 promotional base (regularly $35) + $6/contractor.
Billing is month-to-month, so any change takes effect with no contract protection. Check the live pricing page before you budget.
Does Gusto do EOR, and how does it compare with Deel?
Gusto does not sell its own EOR. Since 1 May 2026, new customers hiring international employees are referred to its partner Remote (remote.com/partners/gusto), which handles onboarding, payroll and support and is the employing entity. Customers already on the older integrated Gusto+Remote setup before that date may stay on it.
So there is no separate Gusto EOR price to weigh against Deel. Compare Remote (on its current coverage and pricing) or Deel directly for international employment.
Can you negotiate a lower rate with Gusto?
Gusto’s domestic payroll pricing is published and non-negotiable for the standard plans. There is no enterprise pricing tier and no volume discount structure for the Simple, Plus, or Premium plans.
For international employees, Gusto refers you to its partner Remote, so any rate is set by Remote rather than negotiable with Gusto.
The practical lever is switching to a competitor: OnPay’s all-inclusive $49 base plus $6/employee and Justworks‘ flat-fee PEO model are the alternatives most commonly used as negotiating benchmarks.
If you are currently on Simple and approaching 30 employees in multiple states, model the Plus cost against those alternatives before your next renewal.
What is the cheapest alternative to Gusto with no tier gating?
OnPay: $49/month base + $6/employee/month, all features included on every plan. No multi-state payroll paywall, no performance review paywall.
For a 30-employee company that is $2,748/year against $5,280 on Gusto Plus, and OnPay includes on every plan the features Gusto locks behind Premium. If the multi-state paywall is what pushed you off Gusto Simple, OnPay is the cheaper answer as well as the simpler one.
Methodology and disclosure
WhichPayroll is an independent comparison site. We do not sell EOR, payroll, or contractor services.
We may earn a commission from provider links. This does not affect our editorial judgement.
We assessed Gusto’s public pricing page, support documentation, and third-party pricing analyses. Price increase dates verified against multiple sources. Gusto was not tested as a live product.
Corrections and updates
6 August 2026. Corrected Deel’s US payroll cost for thirty employees from $6,840/year to $10,440/year. The old figure worked out at $19 per employee per month, a rate Deel no longer publishes; its pricing page lists Deel Payroll: US at $29 per employee per month self-service, checked the same day.
The EOR cell now says $599 per employee per month rather than $599 per month, because the earlier wording read as a flat fee for the whole team.
Same date. Corrected OnPay’s cost for thirty employees from $5,388/year to $2,748/year in both the comparison table and the FAQ. OnPay publishes $49 base plus $6 per worker, which this page already stated two paragraphs above the wrong total, so the page was arguing against itself.
On the corrected arithmetic OnPay comes in below Gusto Plus rather than above it, and the surrounding assessment has been rewritten to say so.
Last reviewed: August 2026