Bullhorn alternative

A Bullhorn alternative you own outright.

Bullhorn is the industry default for a reason, and it costs $99 to $165 per user, every month, for as long as you use it. We build recruitment CRMs that agencies own, on the Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace they already pay for. No seat fees, to anyone.

The problem

The bill scales with your team, not with your results.

Bullhorn publishes two of its four tiers: Starter at $99 per user per month and Core at $165. Pro and Max say “Talk to us”. Every price is per seat, so hiring recruiter number seven raises your software bill before that recruiter has made a single placement. And the way out is guarded: review roundups report agencies quoted 5,000 to 10,000 US dollars just to get their own candidate records back out.

The long, honest comparison, including where Bullhorn wins →
The shift

Renting a system or owning one.

Renting

  • $99–$165 per user, per month, on the published tiers
  • Two of four tiers have no public price at all
  • Your data lives on their servers, in their export format
  • Review roundups report 5,000–10,000 USD quotes to export your own records

Owning

  • One build price (€12k–28k scope for most agencies), spread monthly if you like
  • Runs on the Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace you already pay for, or your own hosting
  • No per-seat fees, not to us and not to Microsoft or Google
  • Source code, schema and data in your own repository from day one
The numbers

Six seats, at list price.

Bullhorn Starter$99 per user/month × 6 seats
$7,128 / year
Bullhorn Core$165 per user/month × 6 seats
$11,880 / year
Five years on Coresame six seats, no price rises assumed
$59,400
A Sorapis buildworked example: €24k build paid over 1–3 years, then it is yours
€27–33k once, then €0

List prices from each vendor's own public pricing page, fetched 20 August 2026. Six seats, twelve months, list price of the named tier, no discounts assumed on either side. Bullhorn figures from bullhorn.com/pricing. The export-cost figure is what review roundups report agencies being quoted, not Bullhorn’s price list. Our figures: the pricing page, including what moves them.

The seventh recruiter here costs zero. There, another $1,980 a year at Core list price.

How it works

Three steps, no surprises.

01

Tell us your desk

Send a short note about your agency. We send back a tailored concept: your brand, your workflow, a real plan and price. No obligation.

02

We build in weeks

A useful first version in weeks, not months, at a number agreed before anything starts, delivered in steps you can see and approve rather than one big reveal.

03

You own it

Source code, schema, documentation and all your data in your own repository from day one. Care is optional from there, €150 a month.

Questions

Asked before every build.

Is this a feature-for-feature Bullhorn clone?
No, and it should not be. Bullhorn is a mature platform with an ecosystem a small agency mostly pays for and rarely uses. What we build is a single custom system with the parts your desk actually runs on: searchable candidate database, pipeline by stage, AI matching, client side, documents and compliance, shaped to how you work. If your desk genuinely needs the marketplace ecosystem, Bullhorn is the right answer and we will say so.
What does leaving Bullhorn actually cost?
Review roundups report agencies quoted 5,000 to 10,000 US dollars just to get their own candidate records back out, before anything is paid toward the replacement. That figure is collected reviewer reports, not Bullhorn's price list, and we could not check it at the original source, and it is the reason so few firms ever leave. On our side migration is part of the build: our largest so far brought about 25,000 records out of a dying setup with nothing lost, and it starts with a feasibility check on your real export before you commit to anything.
What does a build cost instead?
Most agency builds land in a €12k–28k build scope, spread as a fixed monthly if you prefer. Our worked example on the pricing page takes €24k: paid over one to three years it totals €27,000 to €33,000, and the month after the term the monthly stops. Care is optional from there, €150 a month. There is no per-seat fee at any point.
When is Bullhorn the right answer?
When you are big enough to use what you pay for. A desk running well past 100,000 records, heavy marketplace integrations, or a team that wants a SaaS that is fully ready on day one and accepts the seat bill as the price of that. We have written the long version, including where Bullhorn wins, in the comparison post.
More

Looking at others too?

Vincere alternativeZoho Recruit alternativeOur pricing, in the open