Quick answer: all three are per-employee-per-month Indian HRMS products aimed below the price point of greytHR and Keka. Kredily is known for a free tier covering core HR and attendance, with payroll as a paid add-on — the cheapest entry point. factoHR is strongest on GPS and geofenced attendance for field and factory workforces. Pocket HRMS leads on face-recognition and mobile attendance, which suits construction sites and distributed blue-collar teams. Choose by workforce type, not by price.
Match the product to the workforce
| Your workforce | Best starting point | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Small office team, tight budget | Kredily | Free tier for core HR and attendance |
| Field sales, service engineers, delivery | factoHR | GPS punch, geofencing, live location trail |
| Construction sites, plants, daily-wage workers | Pocket HRMS | Face recognition, mobile-first, offline-tolerant |
| Payroll compliance is the whole problem | greytHR | Deepest Indian statutory handling |
| Employee experience and performance | Keka HR | Best self-service and review workflows |
factoHR
The differentiator is field attendance done properly: GPS punch with a geofence radius per site, a live location trail for field staff, offline punching that syncs when the network returns, and visit logs with travel-claim linkage. For a company with fifty service engineers across a state, that is the entire requirement and it is well handled.
Payroll, leave, shifts and employee self-service are competent. Where it is less strong is the polish of the employee experience compared with Keka, and depth of performance management.
Pocket HRMS
Face-recognition attendance with liveness detection is the headline, and it matters for workforces where fingerprint readers are impractical — dusty sites, high throughput at a gate, or workers whose fingerprints scan poorly. Mobile-first design suits distributed teams, and the product handles biometric, payroll and ESS as a package aimed squarely at Indian SMEs.
Be careful with one thing: face templates are biometric data, and where the workforce includes contract labour you still carry obligations under India's Digital Personal Data Protection Act. Establish where templates are stored, whether they leave the device, and the retention period.
Kredily
The free tier is the reason most companies look at Kredily. It covers core HR, employee records, leave and attendance for small teams, with payroll (Kredily Payroll) and advanced modules as paid additions. For a 15-person company that needs to stop running HR in a spreadsheet, it is a rational first step.
The trade is depth. Complex salary structures, heavy statutory variation, multi-entity setups and sophisticated workflows are not what a free tier is built for. Treat it as a good starting point with a planned upgrade path rather than a permanent answer.
What to check in every quote
- Minimum billable headcount — the most common surprise in Indian HRMS pricing.
- Is payroll included or an add-on? All three differ here.
- Your exact biometric or face device model, supported by name.
- Offline behaviour — disconnect the device, punch, reconnect, verify the sync.
- State-wise professional tax and LWF for every state you operate in.
- Implementation and opening-balance migration, reconciled and signed off before the first live payroll run.
- Renewal pricing for years two and three.
Where these sit against the rest of the market
Above this tier, greytHR buys statutory depth and Keka HR buys employee experience — see our greytHR pricing guide and Keka guide. At enterprise scale, Darwinbox, ZingHR and PeopleStrong take over — see Darwinbox pricing. The full field is in our HRMS buyer's hub and list of HRMS software in India.
FAQs
Is Kredily free?
Kredily offers a free tier covering core HR, employee records, leave and attendance for small teams. Payroll and advanced modules are paid. It is a genuine free product rather than a trial, but expect to upgrade as salary structures, statutory variation or headcount grow.
Which HRMS is best for field staff attendance?
factoHR is the strongest of these three for field workforces: GPS punch with per-site geofence radius, live location trail, offline punching that syncs on reconnect, and visit logs linked to travel claims. Pocket HRMS is the better pick where face recognition at a site gate is the requirement.
How much do factoHR, Pocket HRMS and Kredily cost?
All three are priced per employee per month, below the greytHR and Keka price points, usually with a minimum billable headcount and with payroll sometimes charged as an add-on. Current pricing is on each product's App Advisor listing. Confirm the minimum headcount and whether payroll is included before comparing.
Is face-recognition attendance legal in India?
It is widely used, but face templates are biometric personal data and carry obligations under the Digital Personal Data Protection Act — including where the workforce is contract labour. Establish where templates are stored, whether they leave the device, the retention period and what consent you are relying on, and put those terms in the vendor contract.
Should a 50-employee company buy one of these or greytHR?
If your pain is attendance for field or site staff, one of these three is the better fit and cheaper. If your pain is payroll being correct — arrears, full-and-final settlements, state-wise PT and LWF across locations — greytHR is worth the extra cost. Buy for the problem you actually have this year.
Next step: get a free matched HRMS shortlist for your headcount and workforce type.
