Why we’ve made Gem more affordable than ever

Steve Bartel

CEO and Co-Founder

Posted on

August 5, 2025

Articles

Let's be honest: We've made Gem too cost-prohibitive for too many teams. With recruiting budgets under intense scrutiny and individual recruiters doing the work of 2-3 people, pricing barriers are the last thing teams should face. We fixed this. Historically, our pricing has been perceived as premium in the market. While we still have a premium product, we've restructured our pricing to be more competitive while delivering superior value, ensuring that this old perception no longer matches reality.

The result? We now offer the most competitive value in recruiting technology. Teams consolidating from multiple point solutions typically save 60-70% with Gem, especially when eliminating expensive seats on standalone sourcing platforms. Unlike competitors who limit AI capabilities behind fixed credits and hit you with surprise overage bills, our AI-powered licenses include unlimited AI agents with no hidden usage caps.

Here's exactly what we changed:

Aggressive consolidation bundles: Save 15-50% when you bundle multiple Gem products like ATS, CRM, Scheduling, and more. With total consolidation, customers typically save 60-70% versus buying separate tools from different vendors. Get additional multi-year discounts when committing to Gem for the long term.
Database of 650M+ profiles included: Get access to 650+ million profiles to source from, eliminating the need for expensive sourcing tools.
Simplified seats and reduced license costs: We used to have many license types. Now, we have just two, and list pricing is lower across the board.
Unlimited AI agents for AI-powered licenses: You used to have to pay for AI Sourcing bots and an AI Ranking platform fee separately. Now, one AI-Powered Recruiter seat gets unlimited AI agents for sourcing, application review, and candidate rediscovery (coming soon!) – no hidden usage limits, credit counting, or surprise overage fees.
Transparent, all-inclusive pricing: What we quote is what you pay. Unlike other vendors who surprise you with implementation fees, service charges, and fine-print add-ons, our pricing includes everything – support, onboarding, integrations, and platform updates. No surprises, no hidden costs buried in contracts.

And we offer three clear paths to choose from:

All-in-one consolidation: For teams ready to fully consolidate, we offer the complete platform replacement (CRM + ATS + Scheduling + Analytics + 650M profiles) with significant bundle discounts.
Modular enhancements: Start with CRM, sourcing, scheduling, and/or analytics while keeping your current ATS – perfect for teams planning a gradual migration.
Startups: We've designed the most generous startup program for early-stage companies getting started with recruiting. Get the complete recruiting platform (ATS, CRM, sourcing, analytics), plus advanced scheduling, unlimited seats & email finding, generous AI credits, and search on top of 650M+ public profiles. Startups under 30 employees can get Gem for 6 months free, and startups under 100 employees can get 50% off in year 1. You can learn more and get started right away here.

Why are we doing this? One fully integrated recruiting platform delivers better results than fragmented tools, and we want to make consolidation both technologically superior and economically compelling for every team.

There's something poetic about this - we help our customers consolidate their tech stack, and Gem lets us practice what we preach. We've cut our recruiting tool costs by 66% and streamlined our operations significantly. Our team is more productive than ever. It's exactly the kind of consolidation story we tell our own customers about.

James Parker

Head of People

What we’ll cover in the rest of this post:

The problem with recruiting technology pricing today

Most vendors price their products in silos, making it more expensive to buy multiple solutions from one provider than to piece together point solutions from different vendors. As a result, most pricing models perpetuate fragmentation instead of encouraging consolidation.

Meanwhile, AI capabilities are often metered through usage-based credit systems, creating budget anxiety where teams worry about costs instead of focusing on results.

Teams also pay separately for talent sources and databases in addition to their core recruiting software, adding yet another layer of fragmented expenses.

Perhaps most frustratingly, complex SKU structures force talent acquisition leaders to become procurement experts. Instead of evaluating which platform will help them hire better, they decipher feature matrices and calculate per-seat costs across dozens of add-ons.

And it gets worse: hidden fees lurk in the fine print. Implementation charges, service fees, integration costs, and "platform access" fees that weren't mentioned during the sales process suddenly appear on invoices. What seemed like competitive pricing balloons into budget-breaking expenses.

Want to see your potential savings? Use our pricing calculator to compare your current recruiting tech spend against what you could save with Gem.

We were part of the problem, but we fixed it

Truthfully, Gem contributed to this problem. Our pricing was complex, our AI capabilities were gated behind individual bots, and teams had to juggle multiple license types to get complete functionality.

But we've completely redesigned our approach. Instead of adding to fragmentation, we're making consolidation economically smart and technologically stronger.

No more complex SKU structures: Our all-in-one platform includes ATS, CRM, sourcing, scheduling, and analytics in one simple line item. For teams not ready to migrate from their current ATS, we offer modular enhancements.
Unlimited AI agents for AI licenses: Unlike vendors who bolt AI onto legacy systems, Gem built AI into our platform's foundation. This architecture lets us offer unlimited AI agents for sourcing, application review, and candidate rediscovery (coming soon!) without usage limits or overage fees.
Database of 650+ million profiles included: With hundreds of millions of profiles available in the Gem platform, teams reduce dependency on expensive external sourcing platforms, delivering immediate cost savings and productivity gains.

True consolidation: Tools, talent database, and AI agents in one platform

Teams switching to Gem aren't just getting better functionality but also dramatically cutting costs. When comparing Gem against other all-in-one platforms or recruiting tools, the line items may differ, but our total cost of ownership wins when you factor in multi-product consolidation savings, access to 650+ million talent profiles, unlimited AI agents, and stronger products.

Teams consolidating from multiple point solutions often see total savings of 60-70% or more — especially when eliminating expensive seats on standalone sourcing tools & platforms.

Beyond the economics, the operational benefits are where teams see the real transformation. True consolidation means one login, one interface, and a unified data model that eliminates the constant context switching that burns out recruiting teams.

We're confident you won't get a better value than Gem.

“With Gem, you have a track record of success and excellence. This is a tool that is not just solving for one of your recruiting needs, Gem wants to solve for all of them. They’re only enhancing their product or continuing to develop. They’re building Talent Acquisition capabilities that are ahead of their time all while working in a sustainable way.”

Sammy Reardon

Senior Director of Recruiting

Looking ahead

This pricing refresh reflects our fundamental belief: price shouldn't determine access to the best technology. We'll continue to make it easier and more affordable to consolidate onto the only AI-first all-in-one recruiting platform.

Whether you're ready for complete transformation or planning a gradual migration, Gem is here to support you in your journey. See how Gem's refreshed pricing can transform your recruiting operations.