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PAYROLL & HR · MIGRATION GUIDE

Switching from Gusto to OnPay

OnPay has no Gusto importer. Export payroll history and re-enter employee details; the entry price is identical, so this move is about features, not cost.

Bill Belcamino
Bottom line up frontby Bill Belcamino, founder of HelpCompare
Editorial assessment

Bottom line up front: When does moving payroll from Gusto to OnPay make sense?

When you're paying for a Gusto tier to get one feature: the entry price is identical at $49 plus $6 per head, and OnPay lets you add only HR ($15 base + $2/worker) or time tracking ($15 base + $4/worker).

OnPay has no Gusto importer, so you export year-to-date payroll reports, tax filings and employee records, then re-enter pay schedules, deductions and each worker's details. Timing matters more than the tool. Switch at the start of a quarter if you can, so each quarterly filing comes from one provider, and get it in writing who files year-end forms for wages paid before the switch. Use OnPay's first month free to run one payroll alongside Gusto and compare every employee's net pay to the cent, since a missed deduction is far easier to fix before anyone gets paid.

My read of the verified data on this page, checked against vendor sources on September 23, 2026. Disagree or spot an error? Tell Bill

Estimate · your inputs

Switching Cost & Friction Estimator

Most buyers only budget for the new subscription. This estimates the hidden labor, data-cleanup, and retraining cost of actually making the switch.

25,000
10

Estimate assumes: 1 hour of data-mapping/cleaning labor per 2,000 records, a blended $75/hr ops rate, tiered migration & cleaning tooling fees, and 4 hours of retraining per seat at a $45/hr fully-loaded rate.

Estimated Migration Time —
Data Friction Rating —
Total Hidden Switching Cost $0

    Why teams move from Gusto to OnPay

    Itemized add-ons

    Pay only for HR or time tracking if you need them.

    First month free

    A real trial period, not just free setup.

    Transparent, simple pricing page

    One core plan plus clearly priced add-ons.

    How the migration actually works

    You lose Gusto’s bundled higher tiers and its larger integration ecosystem.

    StepWhat you do
    1Gather payroll and tax recordsExport year-to-date payroll reports, tax filings and employee records from the old provider.
    2Sign up for OnPayStart OnPay’s first-month-free trial and set up your company profile.
    3Rebuild your pay schedule and deductionsRecreate your pay schedule, benefit deductions and any custom earnings or deduction types in the new tool.
    4Re-enter employee and contractor detailsAdd bank details, tax withholding elections and pay rates for each worker — sensitive data that never transfers automatically.
    5Run a parallel test payrollRun one payroll cycle in the new tool alongside the old one to confirm the numbers match before fully switching.
    6Cancel the old planOnce a real payroll cycle has run cleanly in the new tool, cancel the old subscription.

    What this path doesn’t do for you:

    Gusto’s bundled Plus/Premium HR depth and its larger integration ecosystem have no exact OnPay equivalent, though OnPay’s itemized add-ons can cover similar ground feature by feature.

    Pricing side by side

    PlanGustoOnPay
    Pricing basisFlat base + per-personFlat base + per-worker
    Entry price$49 base + $6/person/mo (Simple)$49 base + $6/worker/mo
    HR bundleFrom Plus ($80 + $12/person)$15 base + $2/worker
    Time tracking bundleFrom Plus$15 base + $4/worker
    Free trialNo, free setup onlyFirst month free

    Prices checked on each vendor’s pricing page on September 23, 2026.

    Feature parity check

    CapabilityGustoOnPay
    Entry price$49 + $6/person (Simple)$49 + $6/worker
    HR depthBundled into Plus/PremiumItemized add-ons
    Free trialNo, free setup onlyFirst month free

    Going the other direction, or want the full comparison first?

    Read the OnPay vs Gusto comparison Switching from OnPay to Gusto instead?
    Verified data

    Security & access: what changes when you switch

    Security, offline and access rules that differ between Gusto and OnPay. Rows where both tools are the same (1) are left out; the full side-by-side is on each tool’s page: Gusto, OnPay.

    What changesGusto (today)OnPay (after)
    SOC 2 reportSOC 2 reportType not stated by vendorsourceSOC 2 Type IIsource
    HIPAA (BAA)BAA availableFor benefits and health-insurance datasourceNot published
    Single sign-on (SAML/OIDC)NosourceNot published
    Two-factor authenticationYesEnforcement: Primary admin setting; applies to admins only (plan not stated)sourceYessource
    Data residency choicesUS onlysourceNot published
    EncryptionAES-256 at rest (AWS); TLS 1.2 in transitsourceAES-256 at rest; TLS 1.2 in transit; hosted on AWSsource
    Office & room hardwareTime Kiosk turns any internet-connected tablet or computer into a shared clock-in station (Plus, Premium, or Time & Attendance Plus Simple add-on).source—
    Editorial assessment

    Before you cut over

    • Gusto offers a HIPAA BAA; we found none for OnPay. Don’t move protected health information until that is settled.

    Checked September 24, 2026 against each vendor’s own trust center, help docs and app pages. Hover or tap “source” to see the exact wording we relied on. “Not published” means we could not find the vendor saying it on its own site; it doesn’t mean the feature is missing. Plan names are the lowest plan the vendor says includes the feature. Security · Offline · Remote vs office · Download the data

    Frequently Asked Questions

    Does OnPay import Gusto data?

    No. Export payroll history and re-enter employee and tax details.

    Will I save money?

    At the entry tier, the price is identical; savings depend on whether OnPay’s itemized add-ons cost less than Gusto’s bundled tier for the features you need.

    Do I get a free trial?

    Yes, OnPay offers a first month free.

    Will my tax filings carry over cleanly?

    Payroll providers don’t transfer tax-filing history automatically. Export year-to-date payroll reports and prior W-2/1099 data, and time the switch around a quarter or year boundary where possible to keep filings clean.

    Sources

    Prices on this page were recorded from each vendor’s own pricing page on the date shown at the top of the page. Vendors change pricing often — check the live source before you buy.

    Every figure is also in our open dataset (JSON and CSV, CC BY 4.0), with its source page and verification date. See how we research pricing.

    Cite this page: HelpCompare, “Switching from Gusto to OnPay”, helpcompare.com/gusto-to-onpay-migration/ (updated ).

    Source links on this site are checked every month; last check . How sources are checked.

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    Bill Belcamino, founder of HelpCompare
    About the author

    Bill Belcamino

    Founder and author, HelpCompare

    Engineer by training, operator by experience, marketer by choice. Bill spent eight and a half years as an engineer at HP, was COO of Auctiva (the number one third-party selling platform on eBay, past 200,000 users) and ran Google’s $70M/year search syndication partnership at Alot.com. Then he spent 13 years building his own web properties with his own money at stake. He has bought, trialled, integrated and cancelled more SaaS tools than he can count, and started HelpCompare because the real cost of switching tools is the part nobody covers.

    “I’ve sat on both sides of the table: the agency recommending the tool and the client paying for it.”

    Researched and fact-checked by the HelpCompare team. Pricing on this page was last verified on September 23, 2026. No paid sponsorships, no affiliate commissions.