ADP RUN vs Rippling for Small Business: 2026 Payroll Comparison
ADP RUN ($79/mo, no preview payroll) vs Rippling ($8/user, modular) for small business payroll. Support, preview workflows, and HR depth compared.
LedgerGrade™ Score
How we scoreComposite score based on features, pricing, usability, and reported friction severity.
Savings Calculator
Estimated monthly savings: hours reclaimed from manual bookkeeping minus software cost.
ADP RUN
+$621/mo
Rippling
+$692/mo
Formula: (Manual Hours × 70% Automation Rate × Hourly Rate) − Monthly Software Cost.
Estimated monthly savings. Actual results vary by business complexity and workflow.
Feature Comparison
| Feature | ADP RUN | Rippling | Edge |
|---|---|---|---|
| Starting price | $79/mo + per-employee | $8/user + modules | Rippling |
| Preview payroll before submit | Not supported per Capterra | Full preview included | Rippling |
| Dedicated rep / support continuity | Re-explain setup each call per G2 | Chatbot + email | |
| Core HR included | Paid add-ons for PTO, onboarding, org charts | Native HR included | Rippling |
| Benefits administration | Full broker relationship available | Self-serve | ADP |
| IT / device management | Not offered | Native module | Rippling |
| Tax filing | Included | Included | |
| Multi-state support | Strong | Strong | |
| Reporting depth | Standard small-biz | Customizable + export | Rippling |
| Total cost for 10 employees | ~$200+/mo | ~$80/mo payroll core | Rippling |
Real Friction Points
Manually researched issues reported by actual users. Not AI-generated.
ADP RUN
ADP RUN has no preview-payroll feature — Capterra reviewers want a full breakdown to review before submitting, but the platform commits payroll without a final dry-run summary. There's no dedicated account rep, so every support call connects to a new person who requires re-explaining the payroll configuration from scratch per G2 — frustrating for anything beyond a basic question. Core HR functionality (PTO tracking, onboarding workflows, basic org charts) requires paid add-ons, which drives up cost for smaller businesses that signed up expecting a full payroll-plus-HR stack.
Rippling
Rippling's list price has climbed roughly 25% in two years per G2 — annual price hikes are cited by multiple reviewers migrating away. Support is gated behind a chatbot with no readily available phone number, and Capterra reviewers report slow resolution times for complex multi-module issues (payroll + benefits + IT provisioning tangled together). The modular pricing model also drives total cost up quickly — while marketed as 'pick-what-you-need,' the practical minimum is 3-4 modules, and reviewers flag a notable gap between marketed functionality and what's consistently stable in production.
The Verdict
Choose Rippling if you want preview-payroll, native HR, and modular scaling at ~60% of ADP RUN's cost for a 10-person team. Choose ADP RUN only if your benefits complexity demands a full broker relationship and you're willing to pay for add-ons that Rippling includes natively; the no-preview-payroll issue is a real operational risk for monthly payroll review cycles.
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