HR Statistics 2026: Hiring, Turnover, Pay and HR Software

US employers had 7.1 million job openings and made 5.2 million hires in August 2026, while 3.1 million people quit, a quits rate of 1.9%, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Employing someone costs $49.46 an hour in wages and benefits, 31% of US employees are engaged at work, and the average nonexecutive hire costs $5,475. On the software side, 30% of the 412 HR and recruiting tools Toolradar tracks offer a free tier.

Every figure on this page comes from a first-party source with its date: the BLS Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey for August 2026 (released 29 September 2026), the Employment Situation for September 2026 (released 2 October 2026), the Employer Costs for Employee Compensation release for June 2026 (9 September 2026), the Employment Cost Index for the 12 months to June 2026 (31 July 2026), the Employee Tenure release for January 2026 (24 September 2026), Gallup's US engagement update of 27 January 2026, SHRM's 2025 benchmarking release of 15 October 2025, and the Toolradar HR and recruiting statistics snapshot of 17 October 2026. Where we computed a number, the arithmetic is shown.

Toolradar data: of the 412 HR and recruiting tools on Toolradar, the software directory we run, 125 (30%) offer a free tier as of 17 October 2026, and the median entry price is $31.21 a month across the 99 tools that publish a flat price, $6 per user per month across 35 per-seat tools and $25.50 per employee per month across 14 per-employee tools.

Five findings

1. Hiring outpaces quitting by 1.7 to 1. August 2026 saw a hires rate of 3.3% against a quits rate of just under two percent, the levels in the table below. At that pace, our multiplication, US employers make about 62 million hires a year and absorb about 37 million resignations.
2. A full-time employee costs about $102,900 a year in total compensation. Civilian compensation averaged $49.46 per hour worked in June 2026; at 2,080 hours, that is $102,877, of which $15.61 an hour, or 31.6%, is benefits. Both percentages are our calculations from the BLS figures.
3. A nonexecutive hire costs about 5.6% of a private-sector worker's annual compensation. SHRM's 2025 benchmark puts the average cost per hire at $5,475; private-industry compensation of $46.89 an hour comes to $97,531 a year at 2,080 hours, so one hire costs roughly three weeks of that person's total pay.
4. Engagement has been flat at 31% for two years. Gallup's 2025 surveys of 78,945 US workers found fewer than a third engaged, unchanged from 2024 and down from the 36% peak of 2020.
5. HRIS is the least transparent HR software category on Toolradar. Only 3 of the 10 ranked HRIS tools publish a paid price, and the median cheapest paid plan among those is $108 a month, about five times the payroll median and 18 times the performance management median.

The US labor market in numbers

The JOLTS release is the monthly scoreboard for recruiters: openings measure demand, hires measure what got filled, and quits measure how many people chose to leave.

Source: BLS JOLTS, August 2026, released 29 September 2026.

The September 2026 Employment Situation adds the other half of the picture: nonfarm payrolls rose by 29,000, unemployment held at 4.2%, and average hourly earnings grew 3.0% over 12 months. Openings outnumber layoffs by more than four to one, so a recruiter's pipeline problem in 2026 is competition for the same candidates, not a shortage of vacancies.

What this means for a people team: the monthly quits rate compounds to roughly 23% of headcount a year if the rate holds, our arithmetic. A 100-person company at that pace replaces 23 people a year, and at SHRM's average cost per hire the replacement bill alone is about $126,000 before any lost output. The employee engagement software ranking covers the tools built to move the quits number.

What an employee costs

Sources: BLS Employer Costs for Employee Compensation, June 2026 and BLS Employment Cost Index, June 2026.

Benefits are growing faster than wages, 3.8% against 3.2%. For a budget owner, the line to watch is not the salary offer but the health, retirement and paid-leave costs attached to it, which are rising about a fifth faster. On the private-industry figures, every $10 of a raise carries about $4.30 of benefit cost on top, our calculation from the 70/30 split. Payroll tools that model the loaded cost rather than the gross salary earn their fee here; the payroll software ranking compares them, and how much an HRIS costs prices the system of record that holds the numbers.

Hiring cost, engagement and tenure

An executive hire costs 6.6 times a nonexecutive one (our division of SHRM's two averages). With recruiting taking 26% of the average HR budget, a company that fills 20 nonexecutive roles a year spends about $109,500 on those hires alone, which is a useful ceiling when an applicant tracking system quote lands; our how to choose an ATS checklist prices the options against that budget.

Median tenure of 4.1 years sets the planning horizon. A 25-to-34-year-old stays a median 3.0 years, so a company whose workforce skews young should expect to re-recruit a third of it every three years and should weigh onboarding tools accordingly: the employee onboarding tools ranking covers that category. Gallup's two flat years say the engagement programs of 2024 and 2025 did not move the national number, which argues for measuring your own baseline before buying a survey platform; the employee survey tools ranking compares those.

The HR software market, from Toolradar

Toolradar tracks tools by category and re-checks prices on vendor pages. The table below is its snapshot of the HR categories an HR leader buys from, as of 17 October 2026.

Source: Toolradar category pages, read 17 October 2026. Across the whole HR and recruiting group, tools average 4.41 out of 5 across 303 rated tools and 301,350 aggregated public reviews.

• The system of record is the expensive, opaque purchase. HRIS tools have the lowest free share after engagement and payroll, the fewest published prices and a median entry plan of $108 a month, roughly five times the payroll median. Buyers comparing HRIS quotes have less public data to anchor on than in any other HR category, which is why the HR software ranking leans on the vendors that print a rate.
• Recruiting is the most open category. 53% of recruiting tools have a free tier, the highest share in the table, and half the ranked tools publish a price. A founder hiring without a recruiter can start free; the free HR software ranking and the applicant tracking system ranking list the options.
• Cross-shopping concentrates on a few names. On the Toolradar statistics page, Greenhouse and Rippling are each listed as an alternative to 70 other tools, Gusto to 55 and Deel to 48. Rippling was also the most compared tool over the last 30 days with 133 comparison visits, ahead of Deel at 80 and Gusto at 78. If a vendor is not on that list, expect fewer independent comparisons to read before you buy. The HR software for startups ranking covers the early-stage case where those four names dominate.

Dupple keeps a broader HR statistics page that adds its own news-radar data on layoff coverage; this page is the version for HR practitioners, with the labor market, pay and software figures recomputed for October 2026.

How to use these numbers

Benchmark the quits rate first: the national monthly figure is in the table above, so a monthly voluntary attrition above it is worse than the market, not a sign of the market. Budget hires at SHRM's nonexecutive average plus three weeks of the role's loaded pay, and treat the $102,877 civilian figure as the cost of a seat, not a salary. When a software vendor will not print a price, the Toolradar medians give a floor for the negotiation. And if AI screening is on the table, the AI for HR guide covers what the current tools do before you add it to the cost model.

Methodology

Government figures are taken from the BLS release pages named above, read on 17 October 2026, and are the latest available on that date; JOLTS and the Employment Situation update monthly, compensation costs quarterly, tenure every two years. Gallup and SHRM figures are quoted from those organizations' own pages with their sample sizes. Toolradar figures come from its category and statistics pages on the same day; the category counts and the HR and recruiting total differ because the group page aggregates subcategories differently from the category pages, so each number is cited to the page it was read on. Annual figures (62 million hires, 37 million quits, $102,877 and $97,531 a year, 23% annual attrition, 5.6%, 6.6 times) are our arithmetic and are labeled as such. Dupple runs no survey of its own for this page. Louis Corneloup, founder of Toolradar and Dupple, edited it. Next refresh after the October 2026 JOLTS release in early December.

FAQ

How many job openings are there in the US in 2026?

7.1 million in August 2026, a rate of 4.3%, according to the BLS JOLTS release of 29 September 2026, which described the number as little changed. Hires were 5.2 million and layoffs 1.6 million in the same month.

What is the US quit rate in 2026?

1.9% in August 2026, or 3.1 million quits, unchanged on the month per BLS. Held for a year, that monthly rate compounds to roughly 23% of headcount, our calculation, so a 100-person company would replace about 23 people.

How much does it cost to hire an employee?

SHRM's 2025 benchmarking report, based on 2,371 member responses, puts the average cost per hire at $5,475 for nonexecutive roles and $35,879 for executives. Recruiting takes 26% of the average HR budget. Those figures exclude the hire's pay, which BLS puts at about $102,900 a year in total compensation for a full-time civilian worker, our calculation from the June 2026 hourly figure.

What percentage of employees are engaged at work?

31% of US employees were engaged in 2025, unchanged from 2024 and down from the 36% peak of 2020, according to Gallup's survey of 78,945 US workers published 27 January 2026.

How long do employees stay at a job?

The median US wage and salary worker had been with their employer 4.1 years in January 2026, per the BLS tenure release of 24 September 2026. Workers aged 25 to 34 had a median of 3.0 years and those aged 55 to 64 had 9.6 years.

How much does HR software cost?

On Toolradar as of 17 October 2026, the median entry price across the 99 HR and recruiting tools with a flat published price is $31.21 a month, and $6 per user per month across the 35 priced per seat. By category, the median cheapest paid plan is $108 a month for HRIS, $22 for payroll and $75 for recruiting, with performance management and engagement tools far lower, but most HRIS vendors publish no price at all.

Cite this: HRpresso, "HR Statistics 2026", October 2026. Sources: US Bureau of Labor Statistics, Gallup, SHRM, Toolradar.

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