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SAP HCM vs UKG vs Workday comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
1.0
SAP HCM boosts efficiency and decision-making through automation and insights, offering a return in months to years.
Sentiment score
6.2
UKG users enjoy data integrity and efficiency, but many find ROI unclear despite improved processes and cost savings.
Sentiment score
6.1
Workday boosts employee engagement, saves 40% time, enhances interaction, and positively impacts ROI with reasonable pricing and streamlined processes.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.3
SAP HCM customer support is praised for quality but needs faster response times and more personalized consultant engagement.
Sentiment score
7.2
UKG's customer service is inconsistent, praised for expertise but criticized for delays and inefficiencies, needing service consistency improvements.
Sentiment score
7.0
Workday customer service is responsive and knowledgeable but desires improvements in response times and regional expertise, especially for Koreans.
Not all requests are attended to promptly.
I am totally satisfied with the response time and quality of support.
We have our own internal team that supports the deployment process.
One developer and one functional person can efficiently manage the implementation for a large organization.
With Workday, I can pick up the phone, call them on Teams, and they answer immediately.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.2
SAP HCM offers seamless scalability and flexibility, efficiently supporting diverse organizations and adapting to evolving demands across sectors.
Sentiment score
7.4
UKG is scalable and adaptable across various organization sizes and industries, effectively meeting growth and flexibility requirements.
Sentiment score
7.7
Workday's cloud-based, flexible, scalable system supports diverse roles, excelling in growing medium to large enterprises efficiently.
This solution deserves a 10 because we can easily scale and upgrade to new versions.
SAP HCM is quite scalable.
UKG is scalable, especially for organizations with shift work activities like healthcare, as it can accommodate different shift timings and overlapping schedules efficiently.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.0
SAP HCM is stable and reliable, with cloud versions showing improved stability despite isolated initial issues and configuration challenges.
Sentiment score
7.1
Users find UKG mostly stable with occasional issues, but appreciate quick responses and effective system integration.
Sentiment score
7.9
Workday is generally stable and reliable, with occasional minor issues like slowness or login disruptions, rated highly by users.
I would rate its stability as nine out of ten.
I would rate the stability of SAP HCM as seven out of ten.
 

Room For Improvement

SAP HCM faces usability, integration, and customization challenges, with high costs, complex payroll, and limited talent modules compared to competitors.
UKG users seek improved implementation, customer service, system integration, platform flexibility, and enhanced features like time management and training.
Workday struggles with data integration, user interface inflexibility, and limited mobile utility, affecting user experience and international functionality.
SAP HCM needs to be more customizable to fit unique organizational processes.
The organizational management (OM) side needs improvement due to frequent reorganization.
We are able to optimize a lot of processes but there is always room for improvement.
It is a productive ERP application, but many people in the IT market are not aware of it.
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.
The ease of use is notable because seeing all the videos and demos, the user interface is quite simple to use.
 

Setup Cost

SAP HCM's high, complex pricing often hinders small businesses, with hidden costs and compared unfavorably to cheaper alternatives.
UKG's pricing, influenced by employees and modules, is high yet justified, with negotiation options and discounts available.
Workday's pricing is high, based on headcount and modules, offering value in reduced HR complexities and integration.
SAP HCM is quite expensive, but considering solutions like Oracle, they are similar.
SAP HCM is costly compared to other ERPs like Microsoft Dynamics or Oracle, and I would rate the cost as one out of ten.
I would rate pricing for SAP as one because the price is high.
Compared to other ERPs like Oracle SCM Cloud or SAP, UKG's pricing is standard and not as expensive.
 

Valuable Features

SAP HCM enhances productivity with integration, payroll management, scalability, user-friendly interfaces, and supports global operations efficiently.
UKG offers intuitive, customizable HR solutions with seamless integrations, enhancing automation, data management, and employee lifecycle efficiency.
Workday excels with its intuitive interface, powerful integrations, customizable functions, and strong security, enhancing HR efficiency and reducing costs.
When we face challenges and raise tickets, Red Hat provides support within an hour, fixes bugs, and allows us to move to production after resolving issues.
The main benefit SAP HCM provides is that we have all the information in one place; it is basically one centralized system with all the information rather than having multiple systems across the organization.
Capturing all the attendances and absences is a huge task that must be completed before running payroll.
The application is like an ERP, providing comprehensive features for organizations, simplifying their processes, and reducing the need to use multiple software solutions.
What I appreciate best about Workday is the recruiting component.
The interface of Workday is superior.
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Cloud HCM category, the mindshare of SAP HCM is 9.6%, down from 16.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of UKG is 5.7%, up from 5.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Workday is 17.0%, down from 17.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Cloud HCM Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Workday17.0%
SAP HCM9.6%
UKG5.7%
Other67.69999999999999%
Cloud HCM
 

Featured Reviews

Bijoykrishna Das - PeerSpot reviewer
Centralized system enhances resource and capital management efficiency
The functions in SAP HCM that I have found most valuable include a bundle of resource management as well as capital management, which is also integrated with payroll and other systems. I also use a payroll processing feature in SAP HCM. The talent management tool in SAP HCM is useful, though it does not provide everything; it is not at the level of some other third-party tools for talent management, but we can still use it. SAP HCM supports our organization's global operations with multi-currency capabilities. The main benefit SAP HCM provides is that we have all the information in one place; it is basically one centralized system with all the information rather than having multiple systems across the organization.
Talia Jean Paul - PeerSpot reviewer
Affordable but needs to improve its stability
Our company is testing the UKG Ready Mobile App, but there are some glitches. I feel that in the system when you log on to Kronos, UKG Dimensions, and UKG Workforce Central, we have different modules in different versions. With regards to the newer version, I feel the older version, which was UKG Workforce Central, was more user-friendly for the end user as opposed to the newer version, which looks a bit more complicated. When training someone who wants implementations to be done, it would be easier if you could hover above certain things, and it shows you or tells you exactly what it is. There are certain SAP modules that can be audible. If you click on it if someone is being a bit slow with regards to training, the tool will tell you what needs to be done and what needs not to be done by you, but for us, it is fine because we are in the back end with configuration and the administrators. I am talking about the need for improvements in the tool for the benefit of the end users. The explanation on UKG's community consists of training manuals and some of the other stuff that we use, and we send to our supervisors at the site. With the tool in place, catching onto white-collared employees is quicker. The tool is not quick to catch onto certain blue-collared employees in the plant or supervisors who are actually working with machinery and stuff because they are not as computer-centric as white-collared employees. If I could scan the tool across the globe with our site supervisors, there are a few loopholes in the tool. There are some issues with the tool's stability. For me, I would like someone who is building the system in the back end to know if a front-end user can manipulate the system. I am not going to rate the tool's scalability to be high. I would rate the tool's scalability to be at a mediocre level or at something like 50 percent, so there is a lot of room for improvement.
Eslam Abo Elnaga - PeerSpot reviewer
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.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Computer Software Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
8%
University
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business19
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise39
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business48
Midsize Enterprise43
Large Enterprise48
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise41
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about SAP HCM?
SAP HCM is the one of the best ERP for an organization with a small to large scale business. It has the most efficien...
What do you like most about SAP HCM?
HCM is a very important module that each organization should want to use. It will help any organization to calculate ...
What is better, SAP HCM or SAP SuccessFactors?
When it comes to user experience, SuccessFactors is unquestionably superior, as it provides end users with a new expe...
What needs improvement with UKG?
UKG needs more publicity. It is a productive ERP ( /categories/erp ) application, but many people in the IT market ar...
What is your primary use case for UKG?
I worked for a healthcare organization and a university. Most organizations use UKG ( /products/ukg-reviews ) to trac...
What advice do you have for others considering UKG?
Publicity is very important for any software. If people aren't aware of UKG, despite its productivity, they won't use...
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 customizatio...
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 m...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

SAP Human Capital Management
UKG Pro, UKG Dimensons, UKG Ready
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

City of Cape Town, ADAMA Agricultural Solutions Ltd., TransAlta Corporation, Keolis, PT XL Axiata Tbk, National Football League (NFL), Plan International, Yoh, A Day & Zimmermann Company, China Talent Group (CTG TMO), Umicore S.A., Butterfield Bank, Skrill Group Ltd.
Tesla, Marriott, Yamaha, Aramark, Feeding America, Samsung, Sony Music, Dave & Buster's, Revlon
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 SAP, Workday, Oracle and others in Cloud HCM. Updated: September 2025.
869,566 professionals have used our research since 2012.