Compared

InShift vs Planday: what the entry price includes, and what waits for the next plan

Planday is a European workforce platform with a punch clock, payroll preparation and compliance rules in every plan, and absence and integrations from the Plus plan up. InShift is a rota with payroll and absence built in from the first plan, a team app, and a Free plan for one site with up to ten people. This page sets the two side by side with the prices as the two pricing pages showed them on 21 September 2026, and names what each one lacks.

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Who each one is for

Planday sells three plans. Starter, from £2.99 per user a month with a minimum of five users, carries scheduling, time tracking, payroll preparation and live chat support. Plus, the plan it marks as most popular, adds leave and absence management and integrations, Xero among them. Pro is a custom quote with dedicated phone support. The home page names AI scheduling, employee availability, compliance rules, communication, reporting and document storage. It is a platform for a business that wants the rota, the punch clock, the rules and the accountant’s export from one vendor, and is ready to move up a plan for absence and integrations.

InShift puts absence, payroll and the team app in the first plan. A rate on each person, premiums as rules, the amount owed at the end of the period with “Export to Excel”, holiday and sick leave as requests with a balance, swaps and open shifts in the app, and locations without a cap. There is a Free plan for one site with up to ten people, and the paid plan is priced per active person with no plan above it to unlock the basics. What InShift does not have is staff availability and compliance rules, and its tablet time clock comes with Basic rather than with every plan.

The rule of thumb: if you need availability and compliance rules, Planday has them and InShift does not. If you want absence and payroll from the first plan at a price per person, and a Free plan to start with, read on.

Price and terms

InShift from our pricing page; Planday from planday.com/pricing, both on 21 September 2026. Planday’s per-user prices above the entry plan are shown on its page by country; InShift shows its prices in the currency of your country.

How it is priced

InShift
Per active person on the “Employees” list, monthly or yearly; locations without limit
Planday
Per user a month, in three plans: Starter, Plus and Pro

The entry price

InShift
$1.99 per person a month, $1.59 on the yearly plan
Planday
Starter from £2.99 per user a month

The smallest team

InShift
Free for one location and up to 10 people; the paid plan is billed in packs of 5 people
Planday
Minimum five users on Starter

What moves you to the next plan

InShift
Nothing: absence and payroll are in the Free plan too; roles, the API, AI assistants and property tracking are in the paid plan at no extra charge
Planday
Leave and absence management and integrations are on Plus and up; dedicated phone support on Pro

Time tracking

InShift
In Basic at no extra charge: a tablet by the door, a code or a PIN
Planday
In every plan

Trying it

InShift
Start on the Free plan and move up when the team grows
Planday
30 days free, no credit card; Pro by demo

Feature by feature

Planday’s column is what its pricing page and home page name. “Not listed” means we could not find the feature there, so ask them before you decide.

 InShiftPlanday
The rota
Building the weekShift types“AI scheduling”
Several locations in one accountPaid plan, no limit
Open shifts offered to the teamNot listed
Staff availability
Compliance rules on the rota
Time conflicts flaggedNot listed
The team
App on iPhone and Android
Swaps between colleaguesManager approves“Swaps and handovers”
Holiday and sick leave requests with a balanceEvery planPlus plan and up
Chat and announcementsChat, “Read by”“All messages”
Document storage
Hours and pay
Time trackingTablet, in BasicPunch clock, every plan
Rates on each person: per hour, per shift, salaryNot listed
Premiums as rules: nights, holidays, overtimeNot listed
What is owed to each person, paymentsNot listed
Payroll export“Export to Excel”“Payroll preparation”
Reporting“Dashboard”, “Stats”
Admin
Roles and rights per locationPaid planNot listed
API keys and webhooksPaid planNot listed
IntegrationsPoster, MCPPlus and up, Xero
Claude, ChatGPT and other assistants via MCPIn BasicNot listed
Interface languagesEnglish, Ukrainian, RussianNot listed
SupportChatChat; phone on Pro

Shift types

The week is built from shift types, and each one knows its days, times and price

A location in InShift holds its shift types: “Morning”, “Midday”, “Evening”, or whatever your week is made of, each with the days of the week it runs on, its start and end and a price per shift. A type can belong to one position, so the planner offers it only to the right people. The week is a click per cell, the planner flags a “Time conflict” when two shifts overlap, and next week is “Copy last week”.

  • A type carries its days of the week, its times and a price per shift
  • Types under a position are offered only to people who hold it
  • “Time conflict” on overlapping shifts; “Copy last week” for the next week
  • “Open shift” with “How many people needed”, offered to the team by position
The admin panel screen by screen

Absence in the first plan

Holiday, sick leave and swaps arrive as requests, with the balance next to them

“Requests” has three tabs: “Time off”, “Swaps” and “Open shifts”. A holiday or a sick day comes in from the app with the dates and a note, the balance is on the person’s card as “Vacation days per year”, and the manager presses “Approve” or “Reject”. A swap between colleagues waits on the same page for the manager’s approval, and an open shift shows who pressed “I want it”. None of it needs a higher plan.

  • “Time off”, “Swaps” and “Open shifts” on one page, with “Approve” and “Reject”
  • “Vacation days per year” on the person; the app shows “Over the balance by” when a request runs over
  • “Approve time-off” and “Approve substitutions” as rights on a manager’s role
  • Approved time off shows on the “Requests” page and in the manager’s day view in the app under “Off”

The team app

A holiday request from the phone, with the balance shown before it is sent

In the InShift app a person opens “New time-off request”, sees “Vacation 2026” with the days used and the days left, picks “Holiday”, “Sick leave”, “Personal” or “Unpaid”, the dates and a note, and presses “Submit request”. The manager gets it on “Requests”, and the answer comes back as a push. The same app holds the person’s shifts, “Who else is working”, swaps and “Stats” with their hours.

  • “New time-off request”: the balance, the type, the dates, a note
  • The answer comes back to the phone: “Request approved” or “Request rejected”
  • Shifts with “Who else is working”, swaps under “Substitute”
  • “Stats”: shifts, hours, “Earned to date”
The app screen by screen

Moving from Planday to InShift

There is no rota import. People, shift types and the first week are an afternoon for a team of twenty.

  1. 1

    Export your people

    Take the staff list out of Planday as a spreadsheet and paste it into “Add multiple” with a location, a job position and a rate for each person.

  2. 2

    Shift types and absence

    The three or four shift types your week is made of, with days and times; “Vacation days per year” on each person so the balances start right.

  3. 3

    The first week

    Build it by hand from the shift types, check the hours under each name, then “Publish”. From the second week on it is “Copy last week” and the changes.

  4. 4

    The team joins

    “Invite team” prints a code and a QR for everyone who has not joined; the app is on the App Store and Google Play. Run both tools for a month if you want to be sure before you cancel.

Frequently asked questions

Is InShift cheaper than Planday?▾

Both are priced per person, so compare the entry prices and what they include. Planday’s Starter is from £2.99 per user a month with a minimum of five users, and leave management and integrations wait for the Plus plan. InShift is $1.99 per person a month, or $1.59 on the yearly plan, billed in packs of 5 people, with absence, payroll, locations and the API in that plan, and up to ten people on one site run on the Free plan. Put your own headcount into both pricing pages.

Does InShift have a punch clock like Planday?▾

Yes, it comes with Basic at no extra charge: a tablet by the door shows a code that changes every 30 seconds, people scan it with the app or type a staff number and a PIN, and the “Board” shows who is on site. Pay is still counted from the published rota, with the clocked hours in their own column next to it. Planday includes its punch clock in every plan.

Can I move my rota from Planday to InShift?▾

People, yes: export the staff list and paste it into “Add multiple”. Rotas, no: there is no import of past or future weeks. You build the first week from your shift types and copy it forward. For a team of twenty that is an afternoon, and you can run both tools side by side for a month.

What does Planday have that InShift does not?▾

A punch clock in every plan, staff availability, compliance rules on the rota, document storage, ready integrations such as Xero from the Plus plan, and dedicated phone support on Pro. If availability and compliance rules are the reason you are shopping, Planday is the better fit.

What does InShift have that Planday’s pages do not list?▾

Absence and payroll in the first plan: holiday and sick leave with a balance, rates per person, premiums as rules and the amount owed with “Export to Excel”. A Free plan for one site with up to ten people. Open shifts offered to the team by position. Assistants such as Claude and ChatGPT connected through MCP. An interface in English, Ukrainian and Russian. Ask Planday about any of these before you count them as missing.

What does InShift cost?▾

Free for one location and up to 10 people. Beyond that it is $1.99 per person a month, or $1.59 on the yearly plan, billed in packs of 5 people, with locations, payroll, the team app and every module included. The details are on the pricing page.

Try InShift on your own rota

Add the team, build a week, publish it to their phones. Free for one location and up to ten people.

Start for free