7 Remote Alternatives for Startups (2026): An Honest Pricing Comparison

TL;DR: Remote publishes $699 per EOR employee and $29 per contractor. The lowest published alternative sticker is Remofirst at $199; the one we build, Shor, is $299-449 per employee and $19 per contractor in 150+ countries, with a flat disclosed 2% FX margin. On one EOR employee that is $250-400 a month less than Remote depending on country, or $3,000-4,800 a year. All seven alternatives are below with each provider's own published pricing.

Remote is a genuinely good product, and it earns its reputation the honest way: owned legal entities in most of its markets and pricing you can read without a sales call. But at $699/month per EOR employee, it carries an EOR sticker price at the upper end of this comparison, and the $29/month contractor plan leaves things like indemnity coverage to a $99/month Plus tier. If the price, or paying more to unlock the tier that actually covers you, is why you're reading, here are seven alternatives.

Full disclosure up front: we build Shor, and it's first on this list. We've kept every entry honest, including the part where Remote's entity ownership is genuinely hard to beat.

All pricing below is from each provider's published pricing pages or cited independent guides, as of August 2026, except Multiplier pricing, rechecked against its own website on September 17, 2026.

What Remote gets right

Before the list, credit where due, because this is what any alternative has to clear. Remote owns legal entities in most of its markets rather than working through third-party partners. Fewer intermediaries matters most in the sensitive moments: terminations, IP assignment, disputes. Its pricing page also states there are "no platform, onboarding, or setup fees" for its HR management, EOR and contractor products, and that it collects "reserve payments in rare, high risk circumstances", which is real cash flow relief compared to providers that hold a month or more up front. If owned entities in your specific countries are your top criterion, weigh that seriously before switching on price alone.

Is Remote worth $699 for a startup?

It depends on one thing: whether you need owned entities in the countries you are actually hiring in.

The $699 fee is not a software price. It buys a legal employer in a jurisdiction where you have none, and Remote's version of that is its own entity rather than a local partner's. For a company hiring a first employee into a market with real termination exposure, or one whose investors and counsel will ask who the employing entity is, that is worth paying for.

Where it stops being worth it for a startup:

• Your team is mostly contractors. Entity ownership does nothing for a contractor relationship. You are paying an EOR premium for a structure you are not using, and the number that matters is the per-contractor fee and the FX margin instead.
• You are hiring in one or two countries. The breadth of an owned-entity network is a portfolio benefit. At one hire in Colombia it is not doing anything a cheaper provider's local partner in Colombia is not also doing, and EOR vs. your own entity has the math for when you outgrow both.
• The fee is a visible share of the hire. At a $3,000/month salary, $699 is roughly 23% on top before statutory costs. At $12,000/month it is 6%. The same fee reads very differently at different salary bands, and startups usually hire at the lower one.

None of that makes Remote a bad product. It makes it a product priced for a buyer who needs the entity network, which many startups do not yet.

The short version

For a direct comparison of fees, coverage, and support, read Shor vs. Remote.

1. Shor

Shor is international payroll built for founders: hire and pay employees and contractors in 150+ countries, set up in minutes, with a founder in your Slack instead of a ticket queue.

• Pricing: $299-449/month per EOR employee depending on country, $19/month per contractor, and running payroll on your own entity from $50-60/month per employee. No setup fees, no minimums, month-to-month billing.
• The FX difference: a flat, disclosed 2% margin on every conversion, shown on every receipt. Remote prices conversion at a "Remote FX rate" that isn't published as a number, so you can't compare it in advance.
• Deposits: country-dependent, and quoted up front before you sign, so the cash-flow picture is on the table from day one.
• Leaving: no initial term, no early termination fee, no per-employee offboarding fee. Month-to-month, 30 days' notice. The unavoidable part is the employee's, not ours: EOR terminations run through local labor law, where notice and severance vary by country and often with tenure.
• Strengths: price transparency, contractor-first workflows, same-day payment rails to India, the Philippines, Nigeria, and 12+ LATAM corridors, founder-level support.
• Honest limits: we're a startup. If owned entities in every market or enterprise procurement processes are non-negotiable, Remote and the larger platforms are further along there.

See full pricing, including every statutory cost per country.

2. Deel

Deel is the biggest brand in the category, with the widest product surface: EOR, contractors, Contractor of Record, US PEO, and more. If you are weighing the last two against each other, EOR vs. PEO covers which one needs your own local entity.

• Pricing: $599/month per EOR employee, $49/month per contractor, $325/month Contractor of Record, $125/month US PEO.
• Strengths: product breadth, large coverage map, name recognition with investors and counsel.
• Watch for: independent guides report security deposits around one month of total employment cost, FX markup in the 0.6-2% range, and country surcharges of roughly $50-150/month in heavier-compliance markets. If you're leaving Remote over cost, price the full stack, not just the $599 vs. $699 line.

3. Oyster

Oyster leans into the HR experience: polished onboarding flows, good employee-facing UX, and strong documentation.

• Pricing: $699/month per EOR employee, $29/month per contractor, per an independent pricing guide, with discounts reported for annual commitments.
• Strengths: onboarding polish, HR tooling, a strong employee experience.
• Watch for: the sticker matches Remote's, so a switch here is about product taste rather than savings.

4. Rippling

Rippling is a different animal: a workforce platform where global payroll is one module among HR, IT, device management, and finance tools.

• Pricing: quote-based; you'll need a sales conversation to get numbers.
• Strengths: if you want one system for laptops, app provisioning, US payroll, and international hiring, nobody bundles more.
• Watch for: the all-in price depends on how many modules you adopt, and you can't see it without talking to sales.

5. Multiplier

Multiplier competes on price against the big three with particular depth in Asia-Pacific.

• Pricing: Core EOR from $499/month or $459/month billed annually; basic contractors are $40/month on the annual billing view. Confirm implementation fees, required additions, and the billing term in your quote.
• Strengths: a meaningful discount to Remote's $699, APAC coverage.
• Watch for: the features included in Core versus Growth, applicable implementation charges, and your quoted FX terms. For a focused comparison, see Oyster vs. Multiplier.

6. Remofirst

Remofirst is the budget option, and honestly, at pure sticker price it undercuts everyone on this list, including us.

• Pricing: from $199/month per EOR employee, from $25/month per contractor, per an independent guide.
• Strengths: the lowest published EOR base fee in the market.
• Watch for: coverage relies heavily on local partners (the opposite of Remote's owned-entity model), support is lighter, and the low base fee makes it especially important to ask how FX conversion is priced.

7. Papaya Global

Papaya is built for enterprise payroll operations: consolidating payroll data and payments across many countries and vendors.

• Pricing: quote-based, with independent guides reporting EOR from roughly $599/month.
• Strengths: payroll data infrastructure, payments licensing, enterprise reporting.
• Watch for: it's aimed at companies far larger than a typical startup; the product shines at hundreds of employees, not five.

Is there a Remote discount?

Not a published one. Remote's pricing page lists a flat $699 per EOR employee per month and $29 per contractor, with no annual-billing discount, volume tier, or promotional rate stated anywhere on it (checked September 2026). That is a deliberate choice on their part and part of why the product is easy to compare.

Which leaves three honest options if the price is the problem:

1. Ask. Concessions on enterprise-shaped deals are normal across this category and are a sales conversation, not a coupon. If you are bringing more than a handful of employees, it is worth asking what moves. Get any answer in writing, and get the term length that comes attached to it in writing too.
2. Check the tier you are actually on. The $29 contractor plan and the $99 Plus plan are different products; if you are on Plus for indemnity coverage across a large contractor base, price that line separately from the EOR line before you negotiate either.
3. Price the published alternatives first. Every provider below publishes a number you can read today without a call. That is your floor, and it is the strongest thing you can bring to a renewal conversation. A discount that lands you at $599 is still above three of the seven options here.

One thing worth separating out: a lower fee is not automatically a lower bill. FX margin, deposits, and country surcharges sit outside the headline on several of these platforms, which is why the entries below name them where they are published.

How to actually choose

Three questions cut through most of the noise:

1. Do you actually need owned entities? This is Remote's strongest card. If your hires are in countries where entity ownership matters to you, ask each alternative who the employing entity is there. If your team is mostly contractors, it barely matters, and you're overpaying for it.
2. What's your employee-to-contractor mix? Contractor-heavy teams should weight the per-contractor fee and FX margin far more than the EOR fee. At 10 contractors, the gap between $19 and $29 per month is $1,200/year before FX even enters the math.
3. Will anyone state the FX margin as a number? Salaries cross borders every month, and an undisclosed spread compounds quietly. Whoever you pick, get the FX answer in writing.

All third-party pricing and features referenced are from each provider's published pages or the cited sources as of August 2026 and may change; confirm details with each provider. All trademarks belong to their respective owners, and no provider mentioned here is affiliated with or endorses Shor.