Gem vs Ashby Pricing for Startups and Ashby vs Gem Cost by Company Size

Gem and Ashby charge the same list price. Both price companies of up to 100 employees by headcount at $300, $400, $500, $700 and $900 a month on monthly billing, and both take 10 percent off for yearly billing, which lands on identical crossed-out yearly rates of $270 to $810 a month. Gem is cheaper in the first year because its yearly startup card shows roughly half of that rate, $130 to $405 a month, and its second band runs to 30 employees where Ashby's stops at 25. Above 100 employees, both vendors quote.

Both pricing pages were read at source on October 19, 2026: gem.com/pricing including the startup price table inside the page code, and ashbyhq.com/pricing including the company-size dropdown values. Every number below is from those pages or is arithmetic on them. The full band-by-band breakdown for each vendor lives on our Gem pricing and Ashby pricing pages; this post is about choosing between them.

Gem vs Ashby pricing side by side

Gem's bands are 1 to 10, 11 to 30, 31 to 50, 51 to 75 and 76 to 100 employees. Ashby's are 1 to 10, 11 to 25, 26 to 50, 51 to 75 and 76 to 100. The table adds a separate 26 to 30 row because that is the only size where the edges put a company in different price bands. Gem also prints a crossed-out yearly rate on its card ($270, $360, $450, $630, $810), the same five figures Ashby charges on yearly billing.

Is Gem cheaper than Ashby?

In the first year, yes, in every size band, and by about half. A 20 person startup on yearly billing pays $180 a month at Gem against $360 at Ashby, $2,160 for the year against $4,320. A 60 person company pays $3,780 against $7,560. On monthly billing the two are identical except for companies of 26 to 30 employees, who pay $400 a month at Gem and $500 at Ashby because of where the band edge sits.

The honest caveat is year two. Gem's startup program text says companies move to a paid plan at 50 percent off, and the page code labels the partner offer "50% off first paid year". The page does not say what the second year costs. If it renews at the crossed-out rate, Gem and Ashby cost exactly the same from year two on, and the first-year saving is the whole difference. Budget year two at $270 to $810 a month for either vendor and treat anything better as a negotiated win you got in writing.

What each price includes

Both are all-in-one platforms at these prices, which is why the comparison is fair. Gem's startup program card lists AI sourcing and CRM, analytics, scheduling and the ATS, and its product grid lists multi-channel, multi-stage sequences and unlimited email finding on every Standard seat. Ashby Foundations covers the ATS, sourcing, CRM, candidate email sequences with reply tracking, scheduling and analytics, with 200 email lookups a month included and SSO at $100 a month extra.

• Sourcing data: Gem advertises AI sourcing across what it calls 800M+ profiles (its own llms.txt file says 650+ million; both are vendor claims). Ashby's Foundations plan meters contact lookups instead.
• AI features: Gem gates its AI sourcing agent, AI-personalized outreach, talent rediscovery and AI application review behind an AI-Powered seat on its main plans; the startup card does not say which seat type it includes, so ask.
• SSO: Ashby prints $100 a month on Foundations. Gem's pricing page prints no SSO price.
• Pricing unit: both price per company by employee band, not per recruiter seat, below 100 employees.

Which is better for a startup?

On price alone, Gem, as long as you qualify for its startup program and you have confirmed the year-two rate. The bigger practical difference is how you buy. Gem's two smallest bands, up to 30 employees, go straight to a self-serve checkout. Ashby routes every Foundations purchase through a Get in Touch form and a short demo call, though its FAQ says the price on the page will not change during the sales process. For a founder hiring alone who wants a system running this week, Gem's path is shorter.

The case for Ashby is that its numbers carry fewer conditions. The Ashby price is the price, the annual discount is a flat 10 percent, and the FAQ explains how pricing is reassessed each year as the company grows. Gem's first-year price depends on a startup program whose terms you should read in the order form. Companies that will cross 25 employees soon also lose less at Gem, because Ashby's third band starts at 26 and Gem's at 31.

If most of your first 20 hires are engineers, the ATS is only half of the problem. The other half is finding people who can actually do the work, and a team that wants to hire developers by skill instead of resumes can run that screen before candidates ever reach either system.

What about staffing and recruiting agencies?

Neither fits well, and the pricing tells you why. Both vendors price on your own company's headcount and are built for employers hiring for themselves, without client accounts, job orders by client or placement billing. An agency of 15 recruiters would sit in a cheap band at either vendor and still be missing the agency half of the workflow. Agency platforms publish per user prices instead: Recruiterflow at $119 per user per month on annual billing, Loxo from $149, Recruit CRM from $95. The full list across eighteen vendors is on our recruiting software pricing comparison.

When you only need the outreach

A lot of teams shopping Gem are really shopping for its candidate sequences: a way to reach passive engineers or sales leaders with a message that does not read like a template. If that is the job, an all-in-one ATS is a lot of platform to buy for one feature. ColdOutreach researches each candidate, writes the sequence in your voice, and sends it from warmed mailboxes, from $24 a month on annual billing for the whole workspace, and the same account handles sales outreach. Recruiters can see how that works on outreach software for recruiters, or try it on a real candidate in the composer at the top of this page.

How to get the best price from either vendor

• Pick the band for your size at renewal, not today. A company that moves from 24 to 27 employees crosses Ashby's band edge and stays in Gem's.
• Get Gem's year-two rate in writing before you accept the startup price, and ask whether the free months apply to you.
• Ask whether you qualify for a partner offer. Gem's page code carries a longer free period for founders who arrive through a list of named venture firms and accelerators.
• Price SSO up front if you need it. It is $100 a month on Ashby Foundations, about $1,200 a year on top of the plan.
• Compare against a quote, not a roundup. Several pages ranking for these names still quote Gem at a flat $135 or $270 and Ashby at $400, which are the default views of each page rather than the floors.