Zoho Recruit

Zoho Recruit runs hiring from job request to HR hand-off in one system. Its AI matching, writing and screening tools sit on the Enterprise plan, and rules you set can reject candidates automatically. Zoho’s terms make the legal duties yours, and short logs mean you must plan your exports. Its most recent dated prices are from June 2021, and two Zoho documents disagree on trial data.

By Ashish Manchanda Published 4 Nov 2026 Last updated 4 Nov 2026

Zoho Recruit has a free plan, and its main AI tools sit on Enterprise

In one line

Zoho Recruit tracks jobs, applicants, interviews and offers in one system. It can hand new hires to Zoho People. Its AI matching, writing and screening tools sit on Enterprise. Zoho’s terms make you responsible for the legal side of using AI in hiring.

Buy it if

You want one system from job request to HR hand-off. You use Zoho People or Zoho CRM, or plan to. Someone on your side will stay the decision-maker in hiring, because Zoho’s terms make you responsible for that.

Do not buy it if

You want AI Candidate Matching but plan to buy only Standard. You need audit and activity logs kept longer than 60 and 90 days, and you will not export them yourself.

Price

Zoho’s latest dated prices are from June 2021. They put Standard at $25 and Enterprise at $50 per recruiter per month, billed yearly. Ask Zoho for today’s price in writing. The 15-day free trial includes every Enterprise feature.

It runs one hire from job request to HR hand-off in one system

Zoho Recruit’s main promise is that one hire can travel from job request to HR hand-off without leaving the system. That matters because every extra tool means another set of records to keep in step. Follow one hire through it. A job opening is created and approved inside Zoho Recruit. The job can then post to more than 75 job boards in a few clicks. Recruiters can build a customised career page without code, and the page can be shown in 27 languages. The interface itself comes in 29 languages.

Candidates who apply then move through hiring stages, and you can customise every stage and status. Interviews can be scheduled from a candidate’s profile and run in Microsoft Teams. Video interviews are a per-job add-on. The hiring team evaluates candidates and exchanges feedback in the same system. Administrators control when comments become visible, so you decide when interviewers see each other’s views.

Offers come next. They can go out for digital signing through Zoho Sign, DocuSign or Adobe Sign. An approval step can start when pay crosses a limit you set. One release can reach several candidates at once.

After the hire, Zoho Recruit can push the candidate’s details to Zoho People. That is Zoho’s HR software for what comes after hiring. Zoho sells two editions of Zoho Recruit. This page covers the Corporate HR edition for in-house teams. The Staffing Agency edition is built for consultants, clients and agency owners.

Zia scores candidates mostly on skills, with education at 10%

A match score decides which candidates a recruiter looks at first. It is worth knowing how Zoho Recruit builds one. Zia is Zoho’s name for its AI, and Zoho sells Enterprise as its AI-powered plan.

Zia Matches compares each candidate’s profile with the job’s requirements and gives the candidate a match score. It orders candidates from the highest score down. Zia displays at most 20 matching candidates, so anyone ranked lower does not appear in that list. Skills carry 60% of the score, so the skills you put in a job count most. When a job sets both, primary skills give 60% of the skills score and secondary skills 40%. Recruiters then link the matches they want to a job opening, one at a time or in bulk.

Education carries 10% of the score. Zoho matches qualifications, degrees and fields of study against the job requirements. If a degree should not weigh on your roles, test that before you rely on the ranking. Zoho also warns about unrelated skills. If a candidate’s skills are unrelated to the job’s field, Zia may be unable to find relevant matches. Ask Zoho to run the matching on three of your own jobs.

Semantic search works differently. It matches the criteria in a job description against your candidate database. Zoho offers it under Free, Standard and Enterprise. So buyers on Free or Standard still get a search that matches a job description against their candidates.

Zia Insights works on one application at a time. It helps you read one application and not choose between two. It gives an overall rating and recommendation, role fit, concerns and next steps. It does not rank applications against one another. It draws on the ratings and reviews already recorded against the application. With too little candidate information, Zia gives no rating or recommendation. Zia Insights is in beta, is off until someone turns it on in Setup, and works only in English.

Zia also writes. AI Assist drafts job descriptions, emails, SMS texts and notes. You can connect your own OpenAI account to it. Resume parsing reads a resume into candidate fields, including name, contact details, skills, education and work experience. It is on by default, and turning it off means contacting Zoho.

A free trial, wide connections and a direct hand-off to Zoho People

These are the points that work in a buyer’s favour. Each one lowers the cost or the risk of trying Zoho Recruit, or of running hiring in it.

You can test every Enterprise feature before paying

A trial is the cheapest way to check the AI claims on your own jobs. Zoho gives a 15-day free trial with all the Enterprise features. A paid edition then comes with a 45-day money-back guarantee, and Zoho promises no forced contracts. Zoho also promises not to lock customers into multi-year contracts with fixed price increases. Check what happens to your data if you do not buy, because two Zoho documents disagree on that.

It connects to common hiring tools

Every connection saves your team from copying details from one system to another. Jobs can post to LinkedIn and Indeed, though Indeed availability may vary by region and account set-up. Checkr handles background checks and Calendly handles booking. Interviews can run in Microsoft Teams, and Outlook contacts and calendar events sync both ways. Zapier links Zoho Recruit to other business apps, and Zoho’s marketplace has more than 200 applications.

New hires can move straight into Zoho People

The hire is the moment a candidate becomes an employee record, so the hand-off matters. Candidate details can pass to Zoho People at the hire. Moving a candidate’s status from hire to employee creates their Zoho People account, and a setting can do this automatically. Zoho Recruit also syncs with Zoho CRM, so accounts and contacts can be imported into it.

US equal-opportunity and privacy tools are built in

Hiring in the US, or holding candidate data under privacy law, brings reporting and consent steps into daily hiring. Zoho builds both into the product. Zoho Recruit is both EEO and OFCCP compliant. Those are the US rules on equal opportunity and on hiring by federal contractors. To show that record, candidates new to the career site get the EEO survey when they apply. Administrators can also view the applicant flow log, which records each candidate’s steps, in the reports. For privacy law, you can show candidates a privacy notice template on the career page. You can also customise the consent form and track each candidate’s consent. A data processing notice is marked on each candidate’s record. Compliance features can be turned on or off by region, so check which ones the regions you hire in need.

Where your data sits depends on your sign-up region

Where candidate data is stored matters for privacy rules, and Zoho ties it to your region. The cloud facility that serves you depends on your region or country at sign-up. Zoho’s data centres include the United States, the European Union, Australia, India and Canada. A backup is stored in the data centre where your account is registered.

It suits Zoho users, bulk hirers and teams starting small

Whether Zoho Recruit suits you depends on what you already run and how many people you hire. It also depends on how much you want to spend before you know. These cards describe where it fits best.

You already run other Zoho products

If you already use Zoho People or Zoho CRM, Zoho Recruit connects to both. AI Assist and the Screening Bot are offered on Zoho One and People Plus, as well as Enterprise. Ask Zoho whether your current Zoho plan already includes them. If your HR system is another one, ask how a new hire’s details would reach it.

You hire many people into similar jobs

Zoho pitches its Enterprise plan at high-volume hiring, and several of its tools fit that job. Candidates with certain skills can be assigned to recruiters directly or in turn, which Zoho calls round robin. Bulk SMS reaches contacts and candidates linked to a job opening, and Zoho Recruit also covers WhatsApp. Offers can go to several candidates at once. Zoho reports more than 3.5 million candidate conversations through its sourcing bot.

You are starting small

A small team can learn the pipeline before it pays for anything. The Free plan is recruitment basics for startups hiring their first teams, and it covers one active job. Add-ons are not available on it. When one job is no longer enough, Standard covers 10 active jobs per recruiter licence. It is the recruitment core for businesses looking to expand their workforce.

Customers report shorter hiring and approval times

These results come from Zoho’s own customer pages, so read them as examples and not as a forecast. Zoho’s customer list includes Stellantis, Bosch, ITC, Deloitte, Srilankan Airlines and Vinfast. One customer reports a recruitment cycle of at least three to four weeks, now at least 30% shorter. Another reports an approval process cut from two months to about 15 days. Each result belongs to the customer who reports it, and your own jobs and approvals may differ.

Rules can reject candidates for you, and the legal duties are yours

Zoho Recruit stops short in a few places. They matter once you let it act on candidates or keep their records. Settle these before you sign.

Rules you set can reject candidates automatically

It matters who rejects a candidate, because Zoho’s terms make the legal duties yours. Zia cannot eliminate unqualified candidates automatically, but rules that you set can. The Screening Bot gives candidates a pre-screening test in a chat. A candidate who fails a qualifier question is automatically disqualified and sees the message you set. You also set the weights and minimum scores. Workflows can reject a candidate on criteria you define. You own what those rules reject. AI assistants linked to Zoho Recruit can also delete candidates who do not meet eligibility criteria. Test those rules on past candidates before you switch them on.

Zoho’s terms put the legal duties on you

Under Zoho’s terms, you are responsible for any impact assessment, bias audit or candidate notice. This covers what law requires of a user of AI features. In daily hiring, that means a person on your side must stay the decision-maker. AI output is there to assist them, and it must not be the sole basis for a decision. You must also tell candidates, where relevant, that they are dealing with an automated system. Zoho forbids using the AI to infer protected characteristics for hiring decisions, except where law expressly permits. To help, Zoho gives authorised users tools to review, change, reject or override AI output. They can also record what users did.

Some AI features are in beta, or limited by language and region

Before you rely on an AI feature, check that it is live for your region and language. Zia Insights and Compare Applications are in beta. AI Assist works only in the United States, Europe, Australia and India. It also needs English as the default language, and only users with the Administrator profile can turn it on. Zoho’s AI roadmap includes a scheduling bot and a candidate ranking upgrade. It also includes sentiment analysis of interview conversations and salary range prediction. Treat those as plans until you see them working.

Zoho can change features and end integrations

If your hiring leans on one feature or one connection, Zoho’s terms matter. Under those terms, Zoho may modify, replace or discontinue any feature at its sole discretion. It may also suspend or discontinue an integration with a third-party application at any time. Get a commitment in writing for anything you cannot do without.

Activity records are short, and deleted data takes two steps

Hiring records matter most when someone challenges a decision, and Zoho’s logs are short. The audit log keeps user actions for the last 60 days. The activity log deletes entries after 90 days. Zoho tells customers to take periodic exports of both logs. Deleted candidate records stay in the recycle bin for 60 days. They must also be deleted from the recycle bin to be permanent. Once EEO is turned on, related records cannot be deleted for one year after a job opening’s last activity. For OFCCP records, admins choose a retention period of one or two years.

Getting your data out takes planning

It is easier to plan an exit on day one than on the last day. One export request covers up to 20,000 records of one kind, with notes and attachments. A larger database needs the Data Backup option, which sends CSV files in a single ZIP. Export links last up to 48 hours and backup links 7 days, so plan a time to download them. Enterprise users get two free backups a month. Zoho promises no data lockup, with export possible at any time. Under Zoho’s terms, ending an account deletes all the data in it, so export first. The global terms add prior notice and an option to back up.

Working out what Zoho Recruit really costs, and the terms you would sign

The real cost of Zoho Recruit is a sum. Start with the licence for each recruiter. Add the licences for hiring managers and any add-ons. Then add support and set-up. The figures below are the steps of that sum.

Zoho prices the Corporate edition per recruiter licence. Its most recent dated prices are from June 2021. They put Standard at $25 and Enterprise at $50 per recruiter per month billed yearly. Billed monthly, they were $30 and $60. In pounds the yearly prices are £20 and £40. In euros they are €25 and €50. In rupees they are INR 1250 and INR 2500. Those prices are more than five years old, so ask for the current price in your currency.

Two Zoho pages disagree on tax. Zoho’s main pricing page charges local taxes on top of the prices. Its Corporate pricing page includes local taxes in the prices. Get the tax treatment in writing.

Next, check what the licence buys. The Free plan covers one active job. Standard covers 10 active jobs per recruiter licence and Enterprise covers 20, so count your open jobs against that cap. Standard includes candidate sourcing, premium job boards, a branded career site, employee referrals, assessments, the hiring pipeline and standard reports. Enterprise adds AI Candidate Matching, advanced analytics and SMS. AI Assist and the Screening Bot come with Enterprise, People Plus and Zoho One.

Then count the extras. Employee licences can be used by employees or hiring managers, and they come only in packs of 10. Count how many hiring managers need a licence before you price a plan. Other add-ons cost extra on top of a plan. They include webhooks, workflow alerts, mass mail, extra active job openings and video interviews. Webhooks are automatic alerts to other systems. API calls are another add-on. They are the requests other systems make to Zoho Recruit. Zoho sets a daily limit of 500 on Free, 5,000 on Standard and 30,000 on Enterprise. The Free plan has no add-ons.

Last come support and set-up. Premium support costs 20% of the licence fee, and Enterprise support needs at least 15 users. Premium support does not cover data migration, which is priced separately. If you are moving from another system, budget for that. Moving data in uses CSV files of up to 4 GB, 200 files at a time. Zoho has migrated data from Bullhorn, CATS, Jobdiva and Workable. Custom record types cannot be imported from another applicant tracking system, so list any you rely on before the move. Jumpstart set-up with a dedicated expert costs $1,000 for 20 hours, $2,000 for 30 hours and $3,000 for 40 hours.

The contract terms below can change the sum or the exit, so read them before you sign.

Zoho gives two answers on trial data

Its pricing page moves the account to the Free plan with data kept after the 15-day trial. Under its terms of service, data entered during the trial is permanently lost. The loss happens unless you buy a plan, upgrade or export the data before the trial ends. Ask which one applies, and export your data before the trial ends either way.

Renewal is automatic, with a seven-day notice

Under Zoho’s terms, a subscription renews automatically. You avoid that by downgrading to a free plan or telling Zoho you do not want to renew. Zoho needs that notice at least seven days before the renewal date. A price increase does not apply until the current billing cycle ends. You may end the account if Zoho breaches its obligations, and then get a prorated refund of prepaid fees. Zoho may end unpaid accounts that are inactive for 120 days.

The governing law depends on where you are

The India edition of Zoho’s terms applies to customers based in India. It sends disputes to the courts of Chennai under Indian law. Other customers fall under the global terms. There the governing law and courts depend on a paid customer’s billing address.

You could also run hiring steps with agents built on your own systems. We have mapped what that looks like. The HR Agent Map

Nine questions to put to Zoho

These questions come before signing. Some cover a place where the price is old or two Zoho documents disagree. Others cover a duty that Zoho’s terms hand to you. A good answer comes with each, so you know what to accept.

What does each plan cost today, per recruiter, in our currency? Good answer: A written quote that also covers local taxes.
If we do not buy after the trial, is our data kept or lost? Good answer: Written confirmation that it is kept on the Free plan, with the terms changed to match.
Which AI features are live on our plan, in our region and language, and which are still beta? Good answer: A named list that matches what we see in a demo on our own account.
Does Zia send any of our candidate data to a third-party AI provider? Good answer: A named list of providers, or written confirmation that none handle our data. Zoho’s AI page promises no dependency on third parties. But under its terms of use, Zia also uses third-party AI providers.
Who produces the bias audit and impact assessment our law requires? What data will you give us? Good answer: A clear split of work in the contract, and exports of match scores and outcomes on request.
How do we switch off AI resume parsing, and how long does it take? Good answer: A named process with a stated time, since turning it off means contacting Zoho.
Can our audit and activity logs be kept longer than 60 and 90 days? Good answer: A longer period in writing, or an export schedule set up on day one.
Zoho Recruit can link to AI assistants such as Claude, ChatGPT or Gemini, which can search candidates and update records. What can they change or delete, and can we limit it? Good answer: A role that blocks deleting candidates, tested on our own account. The link follows existing roles and permissions.
Which country’s law and courts will our contract use? Good answer: A named country and court in our order form.

Alternatives to Zoho Recruit

Seven other products cover the same job as Zoho Recruit. They are Workable, Manatal, Breezy HR, Recruitee, BambooHR, Rippling and Keka. Our guide to applicant tracking systems sets out how the whole field splits.

Zoho caps active jobs at 10 per recruiter licence on Standard and 20 on Enterprise. If you hire for many roles at once, that cap matters. Workable offers unlimited active jobs, subject to fair usage limits. It prices by employee bands, from 1 to 20 employees up to 801 to 1,000. So cost follows company size and not the number of recruiters.

Manatal prices per user per month and keeps workflow automation for its Enterprise and Enterprise Plus plans. Zoho holds its AI matching for Enterprise in a similar way. So compare plan by plan and not product by product.

Zoho’s hand-off after a hire runs into Zoho People. If your HR system is another one, look at an applicant tracking system built to hand over to it. Rippling creates an employee record in its HR system when a candidate accepts. Keka hands accepted candidates to preboarding, document collection and the core HR record. BambooHR pre-fills its Add Employee form with the candidate’s details from its applicant tracking system. Recruitee sends new hires to Tellent HR with a few clicks.

Paying nothing is also an option. Zoho’s Free plan covers one active job, so you can try the pipeline on a single role before you pay.