Gusto Pricing Per Employee:
What You Actually Pay

When you hire employees in a new state, Gusto charges a one-time $200 fee to register your business with that state's tax authorities. A company operating in 5 states pays $800 in registration fees on top of their monthly plan cost. This service handles all the paperwork for state unemployment insurance, income tax withholding, and any state-specific requirements.

Gusto offers an R&D tax credit service that identifies eligible activities and calculates your credit. This costs $50 per eligible employee per month. For a tech startup with 15 engineers, that adds $750/mo to your bill. The average credit claimed is $51,000 per year, so the math works for most qualifying companies, but you should compare this against standalone R&D tax credit services that charge a percentage of the credit rather than per employee.

On the Simple plan, each 1099 contractor costs an additional $6 per month. A company with 10 employees and 8 contractors on Simple pays $40 base + $60 employees + $48 contractors = $148/mo. On the Plus plan, contractor payments are included in the base price. If you have more than 7 contractors, the Plus plan starts becoming more cost-effective purely from the contractor savings.

Gusto's built-in benefits brokerage is free when you use Gusto-brokered health, dental, and vision plans. Gusto earns a commission from the insurance carrier, so there is no direct cost to you. However, if you bring your own broker or want to use a carrier not in Gusto's network, the integration is limited to basic deduction syncing.

Gusto partners with Guideline for 401(k) plans. The cost is $49/mo base plus $8 per participating employee per month. For a 20-person company where 15 participate, that adds $49 + $120 = $169/mo to your payroll platform costs. This is competitive with standalone 401(k) providers, and the direct integration with Gusto payroll eliminates manual contribution uploads.

2024: Core/Complete/Concierge Renamed to Simple/Plus/Premium

Gusto renamed all three tiers in early 2024. Core became Simple, Complete became Plus, and Concierge became Premium. The feature sets stayed largely the same, but pricing shifted. The old Core plan was $39/mo + $6/person. Simple launched at $40/mo + $6/person, a $1/mo base increase. The bigger change was Plus (formerly Complete) going from $39/mo + $12/person to $80/mo + $12/person, a significant base fee increase.

2024: Contractor-Only Plan Introduced

Gusto launched a dedicated contractor-only plan at $35/mo + $6/contractor. Previously, businesses that only paid contractors had to use the full Simple plan. The contractor-only plan saves $5/mo on the base fee and provides a streamlined experience focused on 1099 payments and year-end filings without the W-2 employee features.

2023: Premium Plan Moved to Custom Pricing

Before 2023, the Concierge (now Premium) plan had published pricing. Gusto moved it to custom quotes, making direct comparison harder. User reports suggest the effective rate is approximately $135/mo base + $22/person, but this varies based on team size and negotiation. Companies with 50+ employees can often negotiate lower per-person rates.

Pricing Trend

Gusto has increased base fees by roughly 5 to 10% annually over the past three years. Per-employee fees have remained more stable. The Simple plan per-person rate has stayed at $6 since 2021. The biggest jump was the Plus base fee going from $39 to $80, though Gusto added more features (time tracking, advanced onboarding) to justify the increase.