A flat-price alternative for teams that scale up and down
Zelos covers that slice of Deputy at one flat price,
without the time clock, compliance engine, and per-user fees.
Scheduling, time clock, compliance, and workforce analytics
Fits businesses rostering hourly employees to a wage budget.
Open shifts, task dispatch, notice board, and team chat
Built for people who aren't on payroll.
No credit card · Unlimited members on every plan · Set up in under 5 minutes
How open shifts work in each app
Open shifts inside a roster
Managers build the roster first, then release unfilled shifts as open, with approval if needed , alongside swaps and find-replacement.
Open shifts as the whole product
Admins post shifts and tasks; team members browse and claim what fits their skills and schedule.
What Deputy is better at
If your workflow depends on the things below, Deputy is the right pick.
Time clock and biometrics
Clock-in across mobile, tablet, web and watch, with geofencing and face-unlock kiosks to stop buddy punching. If hours are the thing you're measuring, that's Deputy's core job and Zelos doesn't do it.
Auto-scheduling and forecasting
Auto-scheduling, demand forecasting, labour optimisation, and wage budgets that build the roster against projected sales. For a business managing labour as a cost line, that's the whole product.
Labour law compliance
Break planning, fair workweek rules, compliance alerts, and pay centres, across multiple countries. If you have to evidence compliance to a regulator, Deputy is built for it and Zelos isn't.
Payroll, HR, and onboarding
Payroll through Paycor, plus an HR add-on covering hiring, paperless onboarding, and document management. Zelos exports CSV and nothing more.
If these bullet points are non-negotiable, you're a Deputy customer.
What Zelos is sharper at
If you don't need the full suite of workforce management tools, Zelos is a better fit.
Free that doesn't expire
Deputy has no free plan, you get 30 days, then pay per user against a $30 monthly minimum. The Zelos free tier has no headcount limit, no trial clock, and no credit card.
Every coordinator included
Deputy counts admins and supervisors as billable users, so each extra coordinator adds to the bill. Zelos gives you unlimited admins on every plan, including free.
Priced for teams that fluctuate
Deputy bills a full month for any user added or archived mid-month, so a crew that doubles for a festival costs a full month either way. Zelos costs $99 flat whether the roster is 20 people or 2,000.
Privacy that's the default, not an upgrade
Workspaces are invite-only. Members can't see each other's contact info. All chat includes admin oversight, no unsupervised one-to-one messaging. Built in Estonia, GDPR-compliant out of the box.
If you're drawn to this kind of simplicity, you should spin up a free project in Zelos right away.
per month
200 people, same coordination work. Deputy bills you $1,000 a month.
Zelos bills you $99.
What you'll actually pay at different team sizes
Here's what that looks like in practice (USD, before add-ons).
| Team size | Zelos | Zelos Pro | Deputy* |
|---|---|---|---|
| 10 people | Free | $99/mo | $50/mo |
| 30 people | Free | $99/mo | $150/mo |
| 50 people | Free | $99/mo | $250/mo |
| 100 people | Free | $99/mo | $500/mo |
| 200 people | Free | $99/mo | $1,000/mo |
| 500 people | Free | $99/mo | $2,500/mo |
* Deputy pricing pulled from deputy.com/pricing. Lite tier at $5 per user per month; Core is $6.50 and Pro is $9. HR, Messaging+ and Analytics+ are separate add-ons, and admins and supervisors count as billable users. There is no free plan.
If your team grows seasonally or scales for events, the per-user model changes the equation.
Nonprofits and education teams get additional discounts on Zelos Pro and Enterprise.
Seen enough?
Get started in our self-service.
Start your free project No credit card · Five-minute setup
Teams that pick Zelos over Deputy
Volunteer-led nonprofits with growing rosters
Volunteers have no wages to budget, no timesheets to approve, and no compliance rules to enforce, so most of what you'd be paying for goes unused. A 300-volunteer nonprofit on Deputy Lite would run about $1,500/month. Zelos covers the same group for free.
Seasonal and casual labour pools
Pools swell for a season and shrink after. Deputy bills a full month for users added or archived mid-month, which is exactly the wrong shape for a roster that turns over.
Zelos doesn't count heads at all, so scaling up costs nothing.
Event staffing and festival crews
Events spike to hundreds of staff for a weekend, then back down. Paying per user for a roster that exists three days a month is a poor trade, and every coordinator you add is another billable seat.
Most event staff also pick the shifts that fit their schedules, exactly what self-signup is built for.
Contractor pools and gig dispatch
Contractors set their own availability and aren't on your payroll, so rostering software is solving the wrong problem. Post the job, let the right people claim it, coordinate in the task chat.
Brand ambassadors and street teams
Marketing teams running ambassador programmes need lightweight self-signup and built-in chat, not biometric clock-ins and wage budgets. Zelos costs less and includes only what they actually use.
Community groups and youth programmes
No budget line for per-seat software, and participation matters more than attendance records. Zelos adds points and leaderboards, which is what actually moves turnout with younger participants.
Changemakers Academy took task completion from 20-30% of the group to 75-90%.
From teams who picked Zelos
What teams who picked Zelos say
"It helped us a lot reducing the planning overhead. It is way more motivating for staff to pick their task than just getting assigned!"
Manuel W.
Coordinator, Events Services
"We were looking for a system to handle our concert staff. Zelos is really easy to access both for the administrator and the users!"
Niels Peter H.
Board member, Music
"The overall experience has been great, the customer service is amazing and I can't wait for all the new changes coming up in the app!"
Celia D.
Coordinator, Motion Pictures and Film
Free for teams of any size
No credit card, no trial expiration.
Pro starts at $99/month, never per person.
Nonprofit and education discounts on Pro and Enterprise.
Frequently asked questions
Can Zelos do open shifts like Deputy?
Yes. Zelos is built around open-shift signup as the entire app, while Deputy releases open shifts inside a manager-built roster. In Zelos there's no roster to construct first, you post the shift, and the people it was targeted to claim it.
Is there a free version of Zelos?
Yes, and it doesn't expire. The Zelos free plan includes unlimited members, unlimited admins, self-signup, built-in messaging, and CSV export, with no credit card. Deputy has no free plan. It offers a 30-day trial, after which every user is billed against a $30 monthly minimum.
Do admins count towards the price?
Not in Zelos, admins, coordinators, and members are all unlimited on every plan. Deputy states that all users, administrators and supervisors count towards your total user number, so each additional coordinator is another billable seat.
Does Zelos charge per person?
No, never. The free tier includes unlimited team member accounts. The premium tier is a flat subscription starting $99/month for advanced features. Whether you have 50 or 5,000 people, the price doesn't change. Deputy charges per user on every plan, from $5 to $9 depending on tier, plus add-ons.
Doesn't Deputy have charity pricing?
Yes. Deputy offers special pricing for charities and not-for-profits, and a Flexi weekly plan aimed at short-term events, but neither rate is published, both go through sales. Zelos publishes its pricing and the free plan needs no conversation, no quote, and no credit card.
Can I track hours and run payroll with Zelos?
No. Zelos has no time clock and no payroll feature. Members submit their actual start and end times when they complete a shift, and hoursheets calculate each person's hours for CSV export into a payroll system. If payroll or labour law compliance is part of your workflow, Deputy is the right fit.
Does Zelos have team chat like Deputy?
Yes. Built-in messaging is included in every Zelos plan, including free, task channels, group chats, direct messages, and push notifications, with no add-on. Deputy includes basic messaging and a news feed on all plans and sells a richer Messaging+ tier as a paid add-on. The other difference is intent: all chat in Zelos includes admin oversight by design, with no unsupervised one-to-one messaging.
How does Zelos notify people about new shifts?
Push notifications, included free and unlimited on every plan including the free one. Most teams never need anything else, which is the point, you're not paying per message to tell people work is available. SMS is a separate matter in any tool: carriers charge per message, so it's billed per send wherever you use it, Deputy included.
Can I use Zelos for volunteers?
Yes, and it's the most common use. Deputy serves charities too, but it's built to roster employees against a wage budget, which is most of what you'd be paying for and none of what a volunteer team needs. Zelos covers unlimited volunteers on the free plan.
What's the catch with the Zelos free plan?
There isn't one. The free plan includes unlimited members, unlimited admins, full self-signup, built-in messaging, push notifications, gamification, smart targeting, and CSV export. The limits are 25 concurrent active tasks, 100-task archive, and 10,000 chat messages. If you need more volume or features like CSV bulk upload, that's when Pro at $99/month makes sense.
Can I use both Zelos and Deputy?
Yes, and some teams do. A venue might use Deputy for its rostered hourly staff (time clock, compliance, payroll) and Zelos for its volunteer or on-call pool (self-signup, no per-seat fees). The two products fit different parts of the workforce question.
Ready to let your team
pick their own work?
Create your first project in under five minutes. No credit card, no onboarding call.
Start your free project
Trusted by coordinators in 40+ countries since 2018.