Gusto vs. Intuit Online Payroll (discontinued)

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Gusto
Score 8.9 out of 10
N/A
Gusto offers payroll, benefits and compliance capabilities. Gusto is scaled for small to mid-sized businesses, and emphasizes an easy to use interface.
$496
per month
Intuit Online Payroll (discontinued)
Score 8.0 out of 10
N/A
Intuit Online Payroll was a small business payroll option available as a standalone SaaS solution, that Intuit announced it was discontinuing in favor of Quickbooks Online Payroll, available via Quickbooks.
$22.50
per month
Pricing
GustoIntuit Online Payroll (discontinued)
Editions & Modules
Simple: A streamlined set of automatic payroll features and benefits integrations
$49/month + $6/mo per person
per month
Plus: Comprehensive payroll, benefits, and HR tools for employers building a great place to work
$80/month + $12/mo per person
per month
Premium: Scalable payroll and benefits, expert HR, and dedicated support for the complex needs of growing teams
$180/month + $22/mo per person
per month
Core
22.50 + $4 per employee
per month
Premium
37.50 + $8 per employee
per month
Elite
62.50+ $10 per employee
per month
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
GustoIntuit Online Payroll (discontinued)
Free Trial
YesNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional DetailsGusto offers three pricing plans for payroll, benefits, and HR.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
GustoIntuit Online Payroll (discontinued)
Features
GustoIntuit Online Payroll (discontinued)
Payroll Management
Comparison of Payroll Management features of Product A and Product B
Gusto
9.2
Ratings
11% above category average
Intuit Online Payroll (discontinued)
7.3
Ratings
12% below category average
Pay calculation9.60 Ratings8.90 Ratings
Support for external payroll vendors8.50 Ratings2.20 Ratings
Benefit plan administration8.80 Ratings8.90 Ratings
Direct deposit files9.50 Ratings3.80 Ratings
Salary revision and increment management9.30 Ratings9.20 Ratings
Reimbursement management9.50 Ratings8.70 Ratings
Off-cycle/On-Demand payment00 Ratings9.30 Ratings
Best Alternatives
GustoIntuit Online Payroll (discontinued)
Small Businesses
Dayforce Powerpay
Dayforce Powerpay
Score 9.5 out of 10
Dayforce Powerpay
Dayforce Powerpay
Score 9.5 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Paypro Workforce Management
Paypro Workforce Management
Score 9.7 out of 10
Paypro Workforce Management
Paypro Workforce Management
Score 9.7 out of 10
Enterprises
Infor Human Resources
Infor Human Resources
Score 7.1 out of 10
Infor Human Resources
Infor Human Resources
Score 7.1 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
GustoIntuit Online Payroll (discontinued)
Likelihood to Recommend
9.1
(0 ratings)
3.0
(0 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
10.0
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Usability
9.5
(0 ratings)
3.8
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
1.2
(0 ratings)
1.5
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
8.2
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
GustoIntuit Online Payroll (discontinued)
Likelihood to Recommend
Gusto is a great fit for small teams and startups that want a simple, reliable way to run payroll, manage tax filings, and give CPAs access without constant micromanagement. It’s especially useful for founders who need something that “just works.” The human support has been excellent—especially when forwarding confusing IRS mail.
That said, it’s a bit less intuitive when it comes to benefits and compliance for fully remote companies. For example, labor law poster distribution isn’t streamlined for digital teams, and setting up benefits felt more complex than it needed to be. Still, I’d recommend Gusto to any startup looking to get payroll right from day one.
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First the cost is very competitive and reasonable, for what we use it for. Each coffee shop has about 5-6 employees, and the costs only incur as a per-check that is run basis instead of a large flat fee for services we won't use. Direct deposit feature is our must-have, the pay dates are super reliable and we have never had any issues with transmission, or taxes not being sent, etc.
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Pros
  • Gusto makes onboarding employees and ensuring their documents are signed very easy.
  • The way you can integrate things like Google Workspace makes both onboarding new employees into the apps you use a breeze, as well as when you need to offboard them.
  • Managing benefits is simple, because they take care of all the heavy lifting. I just have to review the options, make a selection, and they take it from there.
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  • Intuit Payroll manages all our different payroll cycles and alerts our team when it is time to process
  • Intuit Payroll calculates and maintains all tax related accounts and disburses appropriately
  • Intuit Payroll allows us to maintain a digit employee file with all relevant information pertaining to our staff.
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Cons
  • Adding in previous time manually could be more accessible.
  • Notifications for when employees manually change hours.
  • We should allow 1099 users to use the mobile app instead of restricting them to the website, especially since they can just log into the full website on their mobile device.
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  • Sometimes there are filings that need to take place outside of the Intuit platform. It would be easier if everything could be done inside the system.
  • It would be great if there could be an automated payroll run with an email that has a button to approve it in one click.
  • Automated filings with email approval.
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Likelihood to Renew
Unless they break it, I'm never leaving. It's just too easy. Gusto is also really affordable, and for what I pay, it's worth having the historical record within the system. I like that I can go back and pull up W2's for year's past. This sort of easy access reporting, has been helpful especially when getting reports for PPP loans.
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Works perfectly as advertised. Our simple needs are well taken care of.
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Usability
The overall platform and its speed of response are amazing. I would recommend this to any other business owner for ease of use and reliability. Email reminders are great if I’m super busy and have forgotten a few tasks. The price point compared to local payroll service is hands down a huge win.
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I would rate it a 0. It gets worse and worse all the time. It seems like every time I go into IOP to run a payroll for one of my clients, I have one more problem.
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Support Rating
Gusto's customer service has really deteriorated lately and they seem to have really changed their focus. It used to be when you called you were routed to an individual who knew about payroll, benefits, reporting, etc. but now you get someone who seems to have not received the correct training. My last call about a dismissal payroll took me over an hour of my time and the person still could not help me and finally transferred me to someone else.
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The customer support personnel have always walked me through the steps they need to take to assist me. Never rushed through anything. Always exceptionally thorough, answering all my questions and even sharing my screen visually (I have control, not them). It actually helps me to resolve future issues and questions, if they should arise.
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Implementation Rating
Reach out to support immediately if you are having trouble setting up Gusto. Rather than being confused and trying to figure it out yourself, it's much better to talk to someone who knows what they are doing. Save yourself time and frustration and reach out to support
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No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered
It's been a while since I used QuickBooks for payroll, but it doesn't even come close to it. Gusto is infinitely easier, allowing for employee time tracking, handling calculations and payments of payroll and payroll taxes, managing regulatory compliance in the background, and more. I had a lot of moments using QuickBooks Payroll where I thought, "Am I even doing this right?" — it felt like you had to have additional knowledge of HR regulations in your state to do everything correctly. Gusto has it ALL handled so you can focus your time on higher-impact tasks in your business.
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I like maintaining one very strong accounting/ERP ecosystem that I trust and that is why I selected Intuit Payroll. The system is trustworthy/reliable, runs on the cloud and integrates with existing QuickBooks products. The pricing becomes more competitive when it is bundled with other Intuit products. Also, Intuit tends to be a company that listens to its customers and accountant implementation partners, and if a feature or area of functionality is suggested or recommended to Intuit, they take it very seriously. They are continually improving and rolling out new features on all their products.
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Return on Investment
  • I am not involved enough to know well, but I would say that Gusto has saved me about 1-2 hours in my onboarding process with my new company compared to my past experiences trying to onboard with ADP. I have also finished the process and am not frustrated like usual.
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  • Having all of my clients on one platform has been a huge benefit to quickly and easily processing payrolls and tax payments.
  • Intuit Payroll has saved me a ton of time also since, after the setup, processing payroll, taxes, and forms takes only a few clicks. That equates to hours of work time I can spend on something else.
  • The reminders ensure I never miss a deadline. The dashboard shows me a list of all outstanding tax payments and forms that need filed and by when.
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ScreenShots

Gusto Screenshots

Screenshot of Gusto's automated payrollScreenshot of the time-off tracking interfaceScreenshot of the source of truth for HR data