Tanda vs Employment Hero: which one suits you (Australia)
Updated 21 August 2026•8 min read
Written by
Steve Harris
Which one suits you
We reviewed both platforms hands-on and scored them across the same twelve categories. The short version: Employment Hero is an HR platform that sells rostering as an add-on, and Tanda is a workforce management platform that includes it. That shows up in the scores as clearly as it does in the pricing.
Employment Hero earned the single highest score we gave either platform — 9.0 for HR tools. If HR administration is the problem you are solving, that strength is real and it is the reason to look at it. Tanda scored higher on every operational category: rostering, time tracking, payroll, communication, reporting and support. If you are buying because rostering and timesheets are painful, that is the more relevant list.
Read the full workings in our Tanda review and Employment Hero review. Scores below are our assessment from testing, not a vendor claim.
How they scored in our hands-on reviews
Both reviews use the same twelve-category framework, so these columns are directly comparable. Each score links to the reasoning behind it in the relevant review. We have left out "Use cases" because our Employment Hero review does not score it, and we would rather show a gap than invent a number.
| Category | Tanda | Employment Hero |
|---|---|---|
| Rostering | 7.5 /10 | 7.0 /10 |
| Time tracking | 8.5 /10 | 6.5 /10 |
| Payroll | 7.6 /10 | 4.0 /10 |
| Communication | 7.9 /10 | 5.0 /10 |
| Mobile apps | 7.6 /10 | 6.5 /10 |
| HR tools | 7.4 /10 | 9.0 /10 |
| Reporting | 8.3 /10 | 7.5 /10 |
| Pricing | 7.1 /10 | 6.0 /10 |
| Security | 8.2 /10 | 8.5 /10 |
| Support | 6.9 /10 | 4.0 /10 |
| User ratings | 8.9 /10 | 6.0 /10 |
Source: our own reviews of Tanda and Employment Hero. Both carry their own overall score and full reasoning.
Where the gap is widest
Four categories separate these platforms by two points or more. Three favour Tanda; one favours Employment Hero, and it is the one Employment Hero is built for.
Payroll — 7.6 vs 4.0
The largest gap on the board, and it follows the product structure. Tanda names payroll as part of its bundle. Employment Hero publishes no payroll plan at all on its Australian pricing page — payroll is the Managed Payroll add-on at $20 per employee per month with a $400 monthly minimum. See the payroll section of our Employment Hero review.
Support — 6.9 vs 4.0
Level with payroll as our lowest score for Employment Hero in any category. Worth weighing carefully rather than decisively: support is the category where one business's experience diverges most from another's. Both reviews set out what we encountered.
Communication — 7.9 vs 5.0
Tanda includes team communication in its bundle. On Employment Hero, Chat is a separate $2 per employee/month add-on with a $20 minimum — so part of this gap is again about what sits in the base plan rather than what the software can do.
HR tools — 7.4 vs 9.0
The one clear reversal, and the widest margin in Employment Hero's favour. It is an HR platform first, and our review scored it accordingly. If your shortlist exists because HR admin is the bottleneck — not rostering — this is the number that should carry the most weight. See our assessment of its HR tools.
What the two products look like
Screenshots from our own trial accounts, not vendor marketing renders — Employment Hero and Tanda both captured January 2026. They show where each tool puts the same job, which is usually more telling than a feature table. Both vendors ship changes continuously, so treat these as a record of what we saw on those dates rather than a guarantee of what a trial shows today.
Building the roster
Both present a weekly grid. Tanda groups by team and shows running hours and cost; Employment Hero groups by work site.
Clocking in, and approving the time
Two different halves of the job: Tanda's screen approves recorded time, Employment Hero's configures how staff clock in.
Reporting
Reporting breadth is the clearest visible difference between the two — 8.3 against 7.5 in our reviews.
What each vendor publishes
Each row states what the vendor puts on a public page — separate from our scores above, which are our own assessment. A question mark means we could not confirm it from a public source; it is not a claim that the capability is missing.
| Tanda | Employment Hero | |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing model | One bundled per-user price covering HR, payroll and workforce management | Modular: four HR plans plus eight add-on modules, each priced per employee/month |
| Published price for the full bundle | $12.80 per user/month +GST | No single bundle price published; the total depends on which modules you take |
| Rostering in the base plan | Workforce management is named as part of the bundle | Rostering & Time and Attendance is a separate add-on at $4 per employee/month, minimum $40/month |
| Payroll in the base plan | Payroll is named as part of the bundle | No payroll plan is published; payroll is the Managed Payroll add-on at $20 per employee/month, minimum $400/month |
| Per-module minimum spend | No minimum stated on the public pricing page | Every add-on carries a monthly minimum, and subscriptions require a minimum of 10 users |
| Module-level pricing published | Individual module pricing is quoted on request | All eight add-on modules list a per-employee rate and a minimum |
Sources: Tanda and Employment Hero AU pricing pages, read 21 August 2026.
Pricing
One vendor sells a bundle, the other sells modules — and that difference, not a feature list, decides which is cheaper for you. Every figure below is quoted from the vendor's own published pricing page, read on 21 August 2026.
Tanda
As published
Per user per month. HR + payroll + workforce management.
Tanda invites you to request individual module pricing rather than publishing per-module rates.
Tanda's pricing page
Employment Hero
As published — HR plans
| HR Essentials | $10 /month* |
| HR Engage | $14 /month* |
| HR Elite | Custom |
| Employment Unlimited | Custom |
Add-on modules — per employee/month, each with a minimum
| Rostering & Time and Attendance | $4 | min $40/mo |
| Chat | $2 | min $20/mo |
| Learning — 10-Course Bundle | $8 | min $80/mo |
| LMS Plus | $17 | min $170/mo |
| EAP Standard | $8 | min $80/mo |
| EAP Premium | $10 | min $100/mo |
| HR Advisory | $14 | min $280/mo |
| Managed Payroll | $20 | min $400/mo |
A note on units. Employment Hero's HR plans are published as "$10 /month*" without naming the unit on the same line, while its add-on modules are published as "per employee/month". We quote both exactly as written rather than assuming the plans are also per employee — confirm the basis in a quote before budgeting.
Costing a rostering + payroll + HR basket
Most shift-based businesses shopping in this category want the same three things. Here is what each vendor's published rates say that costs, using their own numbers and nothing else.
Rostering, payroll and HR
- Tanda — one line item: $12.80 per user per month +GST.
- Employment Hero — three line items: an HR plan (from "$10 /month*") + Rostering & Time and Attendance ($4 per employee/month, minimum $40/month) + Managed Payroll ($20 per employee/month, minimum $400/month).
We have not summed the Employment Hero figures into a single number, because the HR plans do not state their unit on the published page. The count of line items, and the $400 minimum on Managed Payroll, are the facts worth carrying into a sales conversation.
Xero App Store ratings
Public, dated, and specific to the Australian Xero marketplace — a different signal from our own scores above.
Tanda
4.5/5 (51 reviews)
Employment Hero
3.1/5 (17 reviews)
What we could not verify
Comparison pages usually assert more than their author can check. Here is what we deliberately did not claim, and why.
- The scores are ours, not the vendors'. They come from our own hands-on testing and reflect our judgement. Another business weighting HR over rostering would rank these platforms differently using the same numbers.
- How award interpretation actually works. Employment Hero markets it against its AI Payroll Agent and Employment Unlimited tier; Tanda does not mention it on its pricing page. Neither help centre is retrievable by non-browser clients, so we have not compared implementations.
- The unit behind Employment Hero's "$10 /month*". Stated without a unit on the pricing page; we have not assumed one.
- Tanda's module rates. Only the All in One price is published; per-module pricing is quoted on request.
- Implementation effort and contract terms. Not measurable from published material.
Where RosterElf fits
We build RosterElf, so read this section accordingly. If the thing you actually need is rostering with Australian award interpretation, it is worth knowing that on one of these platforms rostering is an add-on with a monthly minimum, and on the other it sits inside a bundle you may not need all of.
See Employment Hero vs RosterElf, our Tanda review and Employment Hero review, or Deputy vs Tanda.
Our review methodology
Learn how we evaluate workforce management platforms through hands-on testing and verified user feedback.
Feature comparisons are checked against each vendor's public documentation at the time of writing. Assessments of usability, fit and value are our reviewers' opinions, not statements of fact, and products change often. We'd encourage you to trial both platforms and judge for yourself. Spotted something out of date? Tell us and we'll correct it .
Tanda vs Employment Hero: frequently asked questions
- On our own testing, Tanda scores higher on every operational category a shift-based business buys for — rostering (7.5 vs 7.0), time tracking (8.5 vs 6.5), payroll (7.6 vs 4.0) and reporting (8.3 vs 7.5). Employment Hero scores higher on HR tools (9.0 vs 7.4), which is the category it is built around. The structural difference matters too: Tanda prices workforce management inside its bundle, while on Employment Hero rostering is an add-on to an HR plan.
- HR. It is the highest score we gave either platform in any category — 9.0 for HR tools — and its plan structure is built around HR rather than rostering. If HR administration is the problem you are solving, that strength is real. Our lowest scores for it were payroll (4.0) and support (4.0).
- We scored Employment Hero 4.0 for support against Tanda's 6.9. Both scores are our assessment from hands-on testing rather than a vendor claim, and the reasoning behind each sits in the full reviews. Support quality is also the area where individual experience varies most, so treat it as one input rather than a verdict.
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