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Dayforce HCM vs Workday comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 3, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Dayforce HCM
Ranking in Talent Management
20th
Ranking in Cloud HCM
10th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
Talent Intelligence (5th)
Workday
Ranking in Talent Management
2nd
Ranking in Cloud HCM
2nd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
58
Ranking in other categories
Benefits Administration (1st), Talent Acquisition (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2026, in the Cloud HCM category, the mindshare of Dayforce HCM is 2.6%, down from 2.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Workday is 10.5%, down from 18.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Cloud HCM Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Workday10.5%
Dayforce HCM2.6%
Other86.9%
Cloud HCM
 

Featured Reviews

Thomas Noorkah - PeerSpot reviewer
Director of Enterprise Financial Systems at City of Columbus
Greatly improved our efficiency with its integrated time and attendance module
Dayforce has given us near to real-time access to time sheets and clockings since it has an integrated time and attendance module. Within six minutes of someone clocking in, we can see them on the timesheets. Dayforce has enabled us to smooth out our payroll system so not everything is happening at the end of the payroll cycle. We can see the impacts during the week and make it a lot more manageable. It's also been helpful for benefits administration with employees being able to file life and work events online. They can access their pay stubs, request leave, change their address, update their direct deposit details, and other things. We've become much more efficient, and much less paper driven.
Eslam Abo Elnaga - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior people and systems analyst at B_labs & Mylo
Has improved HR process efficiency through intuitive workflows and responsive support
There is something that could be improved in Workday, specifically in the time tracking module. While I am not working on Workday now, I was a regional HRIS working for Egypt, Malta, India, and China. I mention these countries to relate to high population countries and companies. In our company, we use assigned work schedules for our teams. Because we work with the time tracking module, we need to assign shifts. In the manufacturing industry, we might need to change shifts every day or week. Manufacturing teams are huge, approximately 50 to 200 people in one team. If this team has one leader, the leader needs to assign a work schedule for each person individually. While there is mass upload functionality where we can load shifts for all people or specific groups, we need to select multiple people and assign them to a schedule from the interface itself. I have requested this functionality many times. When extracting business processes awaiting actions report, I can select different processes in one box, hit okay, and the report comes up. However, the same functionality does not work for work schedule assigning. If implemented, it would help many people in companies with high populations and big teams.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"The implementation was through a team assigned to us by Ceridian. They were extremely knowledgeable and it made the implementation go very smoothly."
"Ceridian Dayforce HCM is a stable product."
"The tool has improved a lot in the area of its mobile application, especially considering its added security features, like single sign-on capabilities."
"It has created efficiencies in HR and Payroll by eliminating double entry into two systems, implementing a time clock feature for hourly employees, and by having a downloadable general ledger (G/L) constructing journal entering for payroll."
"It provides real-time information with great reports."
"We have been able to automate many of our manual processes."
"Statutory holiday pay is calculated automatically."
"The solution's payroll portion is very streamlined."
"The most valuable feature is the ease of reporting."
"It's a fully consolidated system. All the transactions and configuration are co-located in one fully in-memory system, so there is no need to go to different data sources (multiple DBs) to pull data; it’s all in one place."
"In the process of obtaining representative sites in NaviNet, it assists us in facilitating decision-making and taking action."
"The user interface is good and very easy to use."
"The most valuable feature of Workday is the ease of navigation to browse the application. The solution can hold information about the company and people with accounts can be discovered by others in the whole company."
"The platform itself is very robust and I generally like the reporting and analytics capability."
"I like its UI and UX. When we were using Oracle or SAP, the UI/UX wasn't very user-friendly for the employees."
"Provides flexibility to integrate with the product. It has several tools, out-of-the-box, for integrations. It delivers pre-built interfaces for specific vendors, pre-built generic integrations to extract or push data into Workday through configuration."
 

Cons

"The reporting could be improved."
"Many things are presented as though they will be included with the system but then require costly upgrades."
"It would be nice if retro pay calculations were made automatically for salaried payroll, so a calculation and manual entry do not have to be done."
"The solution's initial setup was difficult. Also, the solution's initial deployment took around six months."
"The solution has a lot of glitches."
"I would also like to see some improvement in standard reports. A standard report should be available to pull the required information for Affirmative Action Plans. I do not think I should have to build or create one."
"Customizing the home screen was difficult; I could not remove certain tabs that were irrelevant to our users."
"The solution's dashboards and geofencing could be improved."
"The product must include payroll features."
"I would be happy if it was faster. Currently, when I try to navigate within the solution itself, it is a bit slow in terms of the page load time. When I click on something, it usually takes time to load. When you click on different icons or areas on the website, it is slow. Even when you navigate between different models, it is a bit slow. I would like to see a bit faster performance and a better user experience."
"Workday does have a community site where people can go on and off for suggestions. They call them Brainstorms, and you can vote them up. That is something that they do well, but oftentimes, they seem to be racing to deliver something based on what a competitor is delivering. For example, if they hear SAP has this new functionality and learning that's going to be coming out, they prioritize there, which makes sense, but unfortunately, some of these Brainstorms may get neglected where the product might not be improved as quickly or as needed for the customers. You might be waiting for a year or two to get a feature that you'd like released. They should pay more attention to customer feedback and ensure that customer feedback is an essential part of their product roadmap."
"The solution has some features missing when you put them in the test studio or Confluence Studio. I would like the tool’s coding to be easier to understand and automated. Most of the coding these days is automated. Any query given can pull the answer directly which can make the solution easier to understand."
"The implementation could have gone a little smoother."
"Workday does not support many Korean language features. So, it will be great if they have some development on the Korean language side – then it will be really powerful in our market."
"Workday has several helpful features. It has categorized payroll processes into sections, such as CTC separation and pay slips. It also provides detailed information on promotions and salary hikes, showing changes from the previous year to the current year. This includes a clear view of the new CTC and the monthly paycheck breakdown."
"The user interface can be enhanced."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Earlier, the price of the product was reasonable. Under present circumstances, the price or cost of the product has been increased."
"Negotiate for everything you want."
"Ceridian continually enhances Dayforce HCM. Some of these enhancements they charge for and some are just straight enhancements with no extra charge."
"In terms of pricing, the product is expensive. However, it is crucial to take into account the manner in which the solution will be utilized and the availability of other alternatives."
"We paid for the implementation costs in the first year with the money that we saved by switching to Dayforce HCM."
"We found the setup costs and pricing to be very reasonable."
"I rate the solution's pricing a seven on a scale where one is the lowest and ten is the most expensive."
"The XOXO program associated with Dayforce allows you to earn credits towards registration and accommodations at their annual Insight Conferences, which can be a real savings to the company when sending employees to the conference."
"You have the license fee per module, and then you have a kind of annual training fee, which is a kind of add-on. I wouldn't say it is exhaustive; it is minor. Licensing is pretty transparent for most of the part."
"It is on a yearly basis."
"The solution is flexible in terms of pricing."
"I rate the product’s pricing a ten out of ten."
"With a bigger budget, I would recommend SAP."
"By and large, Workday is expensive. It is based on the headcount. I'd probably rate it a three or four out of five in terms of pricing. It'd be like buying a Mercedes or a high-end car. It's expensive, but there's a specific value that you're getting with additional features and things of that nature. Using that metaphor, Workday probably tends to be more of a luxury. There are others like ADP that can do your payroll, your time off, and other things, but they don't do it as well."
"Workday is an expensive solution."
"The pricing for this solution is fairly high. It is not affordable for small and mid-sized companies."
report
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
12%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Non Profit
7%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
8%
University
8%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business7
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise5
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise42
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Ceridian Dayforce HCM?
Customizing the home screen was difficult; I could not remove certain tabs that were irrelevant to our users. The search functionality is poor as there's no way for administrators to tag keywords t...
What is your primary use case for Ceridian Dayforce HCM?
We have used Dayforce HCM for our HR functionalities and for the learning module over the last five years. We actually just migrated to a new learning management system.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Ceridian Dayforce HCM?
The Learning Module add-on to Dayforce HCM was relatively inexpensive per user compared to other LMS’s.
What are the biggest differences between Workday, Oracle Cloud and SAP SuccessFactors?
Differences between Workday, Oracle Cloud,w and SAP SuccessFactors:w Oracle: "simple interface and deep customization to suit the purpose." SAP: Multiple functionalities that increase process effi...
What do you like most about Workday?
I like its UI and UX. When we were using Oracle or SAP, the UI/UX wasn't very user-friendly for the employees.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Workday?
If you go with the launch implementation approach, the solution is generally not very expensive. If you want to add more features to your subscription, Workday becomes expensive. The solution is fl...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Ceridian Dayforce HCM, Ascender Talent Management, Ceridian Ideal
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

ACCO Brands
AAA, Allied Global, Avago Technologies Limited, Aviva, Cardinal Health, CareFusion, Chiquita Brands International, Equifax, Flextronics, HP, Life Time Fitness, McKee Foods, MGM Resorts International, Sanofi, ServiceSource International, Symantec, TripAdvisor, Yahoo!
Find out what your peers are saying about Dayforce HCM vs. Workday and other solutions. Updated: March 2026.
884,266 professionals have used our research since 2012.