How much a PEO costs in 2026

PEO prices: published, quoted and estimated

Lowest published

$79 per employeeJustworks PEO Basic, per month

Published with health admin

$124 to $125Justworks PEO Plus; Deel US PEO

Industry range

$40 to $160 PEPMor 2% to 12% of payroll (ADP, July 2026)

Quote only

Most PEOsTriNet, Insperity, ADP, Paychex, Rippling

Justworks raised its PEO prices in 2026. Costbench, a third-party price tracker, has snapshots showing Basic moving from $59 to $79 and Plus from $109 to $124 between March and July 2026, with the caveat that Justworks also restructured its plans. If an older review shows $59 or $109, it predates the change; the current figures are on Justworks' pricing page. Plan details and complaints are in our Justworks review and TriNet review.

The two fee models: per employee or percent of payroll

ADP's own guide (updated July 14, 2026) describes the two models: a fee "calculated as a percentage of total payroll" or one "set as a dollar amount per employee, often monthly or per payroll cycle." It puts the industry at 2% to 12% of total payroll or about $40 to $160 per employee per month, and says "neither model is automatically better." Fit Small Business (updated October 15, 2026) uses the same ranges.

For a 10-person team earning $60,000 each ($600,000 of payroll), those ranges mean:

A percent-of-payroll fee rises every time you give a raise or hire a high earner. A flat per-employee fee does not. Insperity says its HR service charge is a fixed dollar amount per employee that "won't increase if you pay your employees more." When a PEO quotes a percentage, ask what part of it is the admin fee and what part is payroll tax, workers' comp or benefits passed through. A 12% "all-in" quote and a 2% "admin only" quote can describe the same bill.

Figures other sites use

• Rippling's blog (May 18, 2026): $500 to $1,500 per employee per year, or 2% to 12% of wages. No source given.
• Oyster (November 12, 2025): $1,395 per employee per year, from a NAPEO white paper. NAPEO is the PEO trade association.
• People Managing People (September 21, 2026): $100 to $120 PEPM as a headline, with $50 to $150, $40 to $160 and $100 to $150 in other sections, none sourced.
• Forbes Advisor (audited October 8, 2026): $96 to $150 "per user" for TriNet, Amplify, G&A Partners, Paychex, ADP and Insperity, each labeled "custom quote," undated.

All-in example: 10 employees at $60,000 each

Competitor cost pages stop at the admin fee. Here is the whole bill for a 10-person Texas office team, each paid $60,000, on Justworks PEO Plus. Payroll taxes come from 2026 federal and Texas figures. Health premiums and workers' comp depend on your quote, so we show three scenarios. These scenario inputs are assumptions for illustration, not market averages; we could not verify a current national premium figure on our check date. Replace them with the numbers on your proposal.

Two things stand out. First, the admin fee is the smallest controllable line: under 12% of the extra cost in every scenario. Health premiums are the biggest. Second, swapping providers moves the fee line only a little: Deel's $125 adds $120 a year at this size, and Remote's $99 starting price saves $3,000. A PEO whose health plans cost $100 less per employee per month saves $12,000 a year here, which is more than the gap between any two published fees.

Under a PEO, the FICA, FUTA and SUTA lines are paid to the PEO and remitted by it. They are not part of the fee and do not go away. With a certified PEO (CPEO), the wage bases do not restart when you join mid-year, because the CPEO is treated as the successor employer (26 USC 3511(b)). That carryover rule applies only to certified PEOs, so with any other PEO ask in writing how wage bases are handled when you join or leave mid-year (check status on our certified PEO list). Run your own numbers with the employee cost calculator and check your state's wage base in the 2026 SUTA rate table.

What the admin fee includes, and what it does not

How to read a PEO invoice

PEO invoices bundle several lines, and that is where complaints about hidden fees come from. An ADP TotalSource client wrote that "the admin fees are hidden in the workers comp rates" (Capterra, October 2024), and another ADP customer described fees bundled into both the admin fee and the workers' comp fee, followed by a large audit bill (Trustpilot, October 1, 2026). A Justworks customer said a basic plan was "charged at max rate" (Trustpilot, March 6, 2026), and a TriNet client found prior-period charges with no label (Capterra, July 13, 2026).

1. Ask for an unbundled quote with separate lines for the admin fee, each benefit premium, workers' comp, and each payroll tax.
2. Ask for the workers' comp rate per $100 of payroll for each of your class codes, and compare it with a quote from a standalone carrier (see what workers' comp costs).
3. Ask which SUTA rate applies: the PEO's or your own experience rate.
4. Check the first three invoices line by line against your payroll register.

Setup fees, add-ons and promotions

• Setup: Justworks says "we don't charge additional fees to get set up." TriNet, Insperity, ADP TotalSource and Paychex do not state a setup fee. People Managing People cites $500 to $2,000 for setup without a source.
• Add-ons: Justworks HR consulting $30 per employee per month; Justworks EOR $599 per employee per month.
• Deel: three months of platform fees credited on PEO order forms with a two-year minimum term signed July 15 to December 31, 2026. End early and you owe full list price for the whole order form, which conflicts with Deel's FAQ line about no long-term commitments.
• Insperity: a credit of up to $425 per full-time employee for new HR360 clients (homepage, October 2026).
• Paychex PEO: a "3 months free for National PEO Week" banner with no terms, eligibility or end date shown.

Read the promo terms for a minimum term and a clawback before you count the free months as savings. More PEO guides are on the PEO hub.

Renewals: what happens in year two

The year-one quote is not the price you will pay for long. Reviewers report:

• ADP TotalSource: "Steep increases each year. +8% in 2025 without justification," and "The second year our renewal went up 18%" (Capterra, April 2025 and May 2024).
• TriNet: price per employee that "continues to go up year after year" (Capterra, 2025 to 2026), and a reported 3x jump after TriNet bought Zenefits (TriNet reviews on Capterra and Hacker News).
• Market context for 2026: about 10% of small group rate filings asked for increases of 20% or more (KFF data cited by Nayya).

Ask the PEO for its admin fee and premium renewal history for clients your size over the last three years, and ask whether the admin fee is locked for a term.

Does a PEO save money?

Sometimes. NAPEO, the PEO trade association, publishes return-on-investment figures such as the 27.2% ROI from a 2019 study that Rippling quotes. Treat those as industry claims. The test that matters is your own: take the PEO's quote for fee plus premiums plus workers' comp, and set it against payroll software plus a broker-placed health plan plus your own workers' comp policy.

Using published prices, Justworks PEO Plus has to save about $98 to $107 per employee per month over Justworks Payroll with its health add-on to break even (worked out in PEO vs payroll service). Buyer reports point both ways: one founder found TriNet plans about 30% cheaper than Zenefits quotes for the same carrier, while an ADP TotalSource client found a better policy at about 75% of the cost on her own.

A PEO is also not the cheapest way to add a single foreign hire: for that, compare PEO and EOR costs.

Exit costs to price in

Most PEOs do not publish termination terms. What is known: a secondary source describes Paychex PEO exits as requiring written notice by mail or carrier with proof of delivery, a transition fee and an early termination fee based on headcount and days remaining (Gusto guide, August 2, 2026). Deel's promo order forms bill the full term if you leave early. A Justworks reviewer said it took about three months to get old tax records (Trustpilot, September 24, 2026). Ask for the termination clause, notice period and any per-employee exit fee in writing before you sign, and see how each provider compares in our PEO rankings.