The bench splits by criterion, not by product. When I Work leads roster planning 6.8 to 5.0 and payroll and integrations 5.7 to 3.7 — six judges lean its way on both, none lean Deputy — with narrower leads in pricing transparency, 6.2 to 5.2 on four leans and two ties, and staff self-service, 6.0 to 5.5 on three leans and three ties. Deputy leads codetermination and privacy 4.0 to 3.2, with five judges leaning its way and one tie, and working time rules 3.2 to 2.7 on three Deputy leans and three ties. Sovereignty sits at 0.3 to 0.0, two leans to Deputy and four ties. The weighted totals shown run higher for When I Work — 5.3 to 4.9 for the shift manager, 3.7 to 3.4 for the skeptic — yet the criterion leans point both ways; the result depends on what a buyer weighs.
Choose Deputy if
Working time rules drive your decision and you follow the relative lean: three judges lean Deputy on working time rules (3.2 to 2.7), three tie, and none lean When I Work.
Your works council weighs codetermination and privacy heavily: five judges lean Deputy there (4.0 to 3.2) and one ties.
Sovereignty scoring is your tiebreaker: two judges lean Deputy (0.3 to 0.0), four tie, and none lean When I Work.
Choose When I Work if
You need the documented roster tooling — shift templates, skills and certification tracking, OpenShifts and labor sharing across unlimited locations: six judges lean When I Work on roster planning (6.8 to 5.0), none lean Deputy.
Your payroll and integrations needs come first: six judges lean When I Work on payroll and integrations (5.7 to 3.7), none lean Deputy.
Your hourly staff live in the mobile app: staff self-service holds a uniform 6 for When I Work, with three judges leaning its way (6.0 to 5.5).
You want public per-user prices: four judges lean When I Work on pricing transparency (6.2 to 5.2).
Your teams work from the United States: the captured terms state the service is designed for use in the United States, and primary data centers are in the United States.
Read this comparison as one judge. Each weighs the same scores by what they care about.
The Works Council Advocate
Co-determines how hours and overtime are distributed and how staff are monitored (BetrVG §87), and will not sign a works agreement for a system that watches more than it plans. Asks who sees absence reasons, what the app stores about location, what is logged and when it is deleted. Reads "performance insights" as a warning.
Deputy
When I Work
This judge's pick
Criterion by criterion
Roster building & demand planning
Deputy
Auto-scheduling, demand forecasting, wage and labour budgets, micro-scheduling and multi-location operation are all named as features, but the captured pages stay at feature names: we found no public information on staffing requirements per shift, qualifications, coverage checks before publication, or which data source feeds the forecast. For a works council the decisive question — who proposes the roster and who approves or adjusts it — goes unanswered, and "Auto-Scheduling" with "Deputy AI" in every plan only sharpens that question.
When I Work
Shift templates, skills and certification management, open shifts and labour sharing across unlimited locations are documented, and a smart auto-scheduler proposes shifts matched by eligibility, availability and preferences, with labour forecasting set against a budget. What the pages never say is where the 'future demand' figures come from — no POS revenue, footfall or bookings source is named — and we found no public information comparing forecast, proposal and actual hours in one place.
Working-time law & collective agreements
Deputy
Compliance appears as claimed features — "Labor Law Compliance", "Advanced Labor Law Compliance", "Break planning compliance", "Fair workweek compliance" — without a named European rule among them: we found no public information on ArbZG daily maxima, the 11-hour rest period, youth or maternity protection, Minijob earnings limits or Tarifvertrag surcharges, and nothing on whether any check blocks publication or merely warns. A claim of compliance with no rule named is exactly what I cannot co-determine on.
When I Work
The only rule-like capability anywhere in the evidence is generic 'overtime and break tracking' with paid break tracking; no statute, rest period, youth protection, collective agreement or surcharge rule is ever named, and the service is stated to be designed for use in the United States. For a council that has to defend rest periods and overtime distribution, there is no rule book here to check a roster against.
Mobile self-service for deskless staff
Deputy
The list shows a mobile app with availability, leave, shift swapping and find-a-replacement, plus messaging, a time clock app and biometric clocking — most of what the shop floor needs day to day. We found no public information on push notification of changes, swaps approved under rest or qualification rules, offline handling or language coverage; and biometric clocking is presented as a headline feature with no mention of it being switchable, which for me is a co-determination question, not a selling point.
When I Work
The mobile app covers availability and time-off requests, shift swaps submitted for manager review, open-shift claiming with instant notifications, GPS clock-in and built-in team messaging for shift talk. We found no public information on multilingual coverage, offline clock-in handling, or swap approvals being checked against qualifications and rest periods, and the only export route for data held about an employee is a privacy request by email.
Works council & employee data
Deputy
Custom access levels exist but only on the top plan, a privacy centre with sub-processor change notifications is published, and Analytics+ adds "additional audit reporting" — more than nothing. But we found no public information on retention or deletion periods for employee records, on who may see absence reasons, or on deactivating biometric clocking, and the HR module advertises "shift performance" and turning "team data into useful insights" — language I read as individual performance monitoring that would have to be carved out of any works agreement before signature.
When I Work
Admin, Supervisor, Manager and Employee roles exist and permissions are called customizable, but GPS and geofencing are marketed as headline features — 'GPS-enforced geofencing to prevent early arrivals' — and we found no public information on switching location monitoring off employer-side; the device-permission wording is consent on the employee's phone, not a works-agreement opt-out. We also found no public information on retention or deletion periods for employee records, an audit log of who viewed whose data, a published data-processing agreement, or any material for works-council approval, while absence monitoring is sold as a feature and the vendor records calls.
Payroll handoff & integrations
Deputy
The pages show a Payroll module offered as a US-only add-on whose "monthly base and per employee fee varies by business size", generic "Payroll & HR Integrations", and a "Deputy API" — we found no public information on a named payroll system such as DATEV, on surcharge handling, or on a named POS or HR connection. A German buyer cannot see from these pages how planned and worked hours would ever reach their tax adviser.
When I Work
Four payroll platforms are named — Rippling, ADP, QuickBooks and Gusto — with attendance and labour data synced, POS integration, calendar sync and a documented API alongside. We found no public information on a lock step before transmission, wage-type mapping for surcharges, or how corrections after a payroll close are handled, so the payroll story rests on named logos rather than documented mechanics.
European sovereignty
Deputy
The vendor is Australian, a US contracting entity at a San Francisco address serves the Americas, the hosting region is unstated, and the sub-processors are unnamed — the privacy centre confirms other sub-processors whose locations are not given, and a US payroll add-on sits in the chain. Availability, absence and time data of employees who never chose this vendor under a non-EU entity with US Cloud Act exposure is not something I can sign a works agreement around.
When I Work
The contracting entity is a US company in Minneapolis, primary data centres are stated to be in the United States, and the terms impose mandatory arbitration with a class-action waiver; no subprocessor list is published, with only Clair named — receiving hours worked, hourly rates and break information — alongside Facebook and Google logins. For availability, absence and GPS location data about employees, this is US jurisdiction end to end, and we found no public information on any EU hosting option, certification, or EU contracting entity.
Pricing transparency
Deputy
Per-user monthly prices are public for all three named plans — "$5 per user per month", "$6.50 per user per month", "$9 per user per month" ("USD excl. all applicable taxes"), with a stated 10% annual discount — so the basic maths is possible. But the payroll add-on is priced only as varying by business size, the Flexi event plan carries no figure, and we found no public information on minimum terms, terminal hardware, or how seasonal and inactive staff are counted.
When I Work
Two per-user prices are public — a single location or schedule at $2.50 per user per month and multiple locations or schedules at $5 per user per month — with monthly or annual billing stated, no setup fees, and a 14-day trial without credit card. A buyer still cannot see how inactive or seasonal staff are counted or how VAT is treated (fees are in US Dollars), the enterprise tier is 'contact us', and the captured pages give different pictures of whether the time and attendance capability is included in a plan or separately licensed.
Sovereignty, side by side
Dimension
Deputy
When I Work
Legal entity
Not determined
Not determined
Ownership
Not determined
Not determined
Data residency
Not determined
US by default
Subprocessors
US CLOUD Act reach
Not determined
Facts, side by side
Only facts both products carry under the same definition — anything else would not be a fair row.