The benches split by criterion. Teamtailor leads candidate pipeline (4.0 to Recruitee's 2.2; six judges lean Teamtailor and zero lean Recruitee), applicant data governance (4.2 to 2.7; six lean Teamtailor), job distribution (3.5 to 3.0; three lean Teamtailor, three tie) and AI screening control (1.7 to 1.0; four lean Teamtailor, one Recruitee, one tie). Recruitee takes sovereignty (4.7 to 3.3; six judges lean Recruitee and zero lean Teamtailor): its privacy policy commits that Tellent will never transfer processor data outside the EU unless the customer instructs it, and data residency is EU-only against Teamtailor's EU-optional. Integrations and handover read 4.2 to 4.0, one lean Recruitee, five ties; pricing transparency 2.2 to 1.5, three leans Recruitee, three ties, with pricing not weighted into either verdict since neither vendor publishes numeric prices. Weighted totals: Teamtailor 3.2 to 1.9 on the works-council bench, narrowest at 3 to 2.9 for the data protection officer.
Choose Recruitee if
You need processor data to stay in the EU: Recruitee's data residency is listed as EU-only, and its privacy policy commits that Tellent will never transfer processor data outside the EU unless the customer instructs it — six judges lean Recruitee on sovereignty, zero lean Teamtailor.
You sign in Germany, Austria or Switzerland: Recruitee GmbH in Düsseldorf contracts for customers in those countries.
Your team will connect the ATS to surrounding HR systems: Recruitee leads integrations and handover 4.2 to 4.0 (one judge leans Recruitee, five tie), with API, webhooks, e-signed offer letters and HRIS integrations stated publicly.
Your purchase weights data-location guarantees above candidate-facing workflow: the table has Recruitee ahead on sovereignty 4.7 to 3.3 and behind on candidate pipeline 2.2 to 4.0, so the leans favor Recruitee when sovereignty drives the decision.
Your process scores pricing transparency: three judges lean Recruitee, zero lean Teamtailor, with three ties.
Choose Teamtailor if
You need the candidate-facing pipeline to carry your hiring process: Teamtailor leads candidate pipeline 4.0 to Recruitee's 2.2 — six judges lean Teamtailor, zero lean Recruitee.
Applicant data governance tops your scorecard: Teamtailor leads 4.2 to 2.7, six judges lean Teamtailor, zero lean Recruitee.
Job distribution carries weight in your evaluation: Teamtailor leads 3.5 to 3.0 — three judges lean Teamtailor, three tie.
Your team will use AI screening tools: Teamtailor leads AI screening control 1.7 to 1.0 — four judges lean Teamtailor, one leans Recruitee, one ties.
Your works-council or employer-branding bench runs the shortlist: Teamtailor's weighted totals read 3.2 to 1.9 (works council) and 3.8 to 2.8 (employer branding).
Read this comparison as one judge. Each weighs the same scores by what they care about.
The Skeptic
Has read "DSGVO-konform" and "AI-powered matching" on every page in this category. Reads instead for the deletion deadline that is actually configured, the AI feature that can actually be turned off, and what the invoice does when a job goes out to three paid boards.
Recruitee
Teamtailor
This judge's pick
Criterion by criterion
Applicant management & hiring workflow
Recruitee
The homepage sells "workflow automation & collaboration" and real-time reporting dashboards, but we found no public information on pipeline stages per job, hiring-manager permissions, structured scorecards, or any history of who decided what. The daily workflow is marketing copy, not documentation.
Teamtailor
Structured scorecards with fixed criteria and interview kits are evidenced, plus an optionally activatable audit log that tracks user activity in detail — the closest thing to a decision record on offer. We found no public information on pipelines configurable per job, hiring managers limited to their own vacancies, interview scheduling with calendar integration, or approval steps for offers, so evaluation structure is evidenced but the documented-decision layer is not.
Multiposting, career page & candidate experience
Recruitee
A career site builder and a promise to "put every job in front of the right audience" are what the captures show, plus a terms-level detail that "Powered by" branding can be hidden on the careers site. We found no public information on named German job boards, Google for Jobs markup, mobile application, or source attribution per applicant.
Teamtailor
A block-based, multilingual career page editor is real, and the statistics dashboard includes job-ad performance, but we found no public information on multiposting, on the Bundesagentur für Arbeit or any other named German job board, or on Google for Jobs markup. What a buyer can see is a career site; the distribution side is unshown, and nothing in the captures describes the application flow on a phone.
Retention, deletion & talent-pool consent
Recruitee
What is public is fixed rather than configurable: data is "kept by Tellent for up to 365 days" and content is deleted 30 days after contract termination. We found no public information on automatic deletion after rejection, talent-pool consent with expiry, or any log of who viewed or exported an applicant file.
Teamtailor
Retention periods are published per data class (prospects two years after last contact, meeting recordings two years), deletion within sixty days of contract termination is committed, and backups roll off after ten days — an actual answer to how deletion propagates. We found no public information on automatic deletion on a configurable deadline after rejection, on recorded talent-pool consent with expiry, or on candidate self-service, and the audit log must be switched on rather than being there by default.
AI screening transparency & control
Recruitee
The pricing page sells a "Matching Assistant" and a "Screening Assistant" by the search and by the credit, yet we found no public information on what they evaluate, where the models run, whether they can be switched off, or who the provider is; the terms also state no IP indemnity for AI-generated subscriber content. Recruitment AI is high-risk under the EU AI Act, and nothing captured would support a works-council conversation.
Teamtailor
The co-pilot is marketed as performing applicant evaluation, talent-pool search, CV summaries, question suggestions and job-ad generation, and we found no public information on what it evaluates, where it processes, whether each feature can be switched off, or who the model provider is. An applicant rating advertised with no stated inputs, no switch and no provider is the co-determination problem stated in one product blurb.
HR handover, integrations & API
Recruitee
API, webhooks, e-signatures and generic "HRIS integrations" are stated on the homepage and in the terms. We found no public information naming a German or DACH HR or payroll system, on SSO and SCIM, or on published API limits, so the handover of a hire cannot be traced before signing.
Teamtailor
API access, a third-party marketplace, e-signature for offers and onboarding documents, and SSO are evidenced, and the vendor sells its own HR service (Aboard HR) alongside the ATS. But the integration claims — '450+ integrations', 'integration into the existing HR tech stack' — name no system, and we found no public information on a handover to HR systems common in DACH, calendar or video integration, webhooks, or published API limits.
European sovereignty
Recruitee
The contracting route is genuinely European: Recruitee B.V. in Amsterdam, Recruitee GmbH in Düsseldorf for customers in Germany, Austria or Switzerland, and a privacy-policy commitment that processor data is never transferred outside the EU unless instructed. But we found no public information on hosting infrastructure, ownership, or a subprocessor list for the SaaS itself — the captures name advertising platforms and Sympa for Tellent's own marketing — and the group includes a US entity.
Teamtailor
The privacy notice and terms name the Swedish company with its register number under Swedish law and a DPA included, while the independently sourced sovereignty attributes record jurisdiction, ownership and hosting as unconfirmed; subprocessors appear only as categories (data centres, PaaS, ticketing, CRM), with standard clauses covering transfers outside the EU. We found no public information on where hosting runs or where the AI co-pilot processes the CVs it summarises. A Swedish entity with unnamed data centres, unnamed processors and a vendor controller role over platform logs is a partial answer at best.
Pricing transparency
Recruitee
The captured pricing page shows plan names, per-plan AI quotas and euro signs, but no numeric prices, and agencies are told to contact us for a custom quote. The terms do publish the commercial frame — fees per number of employees with auto-upgrade at then-current list prices, default yearly auto-renewal with 90 days' non-renewal notice, all fees exclusive of taxes — but a buyer still cannot compute the invoice.
Teamtailor
The billing frame is public — annual provision, invoiced yearly in advance, twelve-month auto-renewal with one month's notice, sixty days' warning on price adjustments, no refund on early termination, prices excluding VAT — and the pricing page states unlimited job ads and users. But every fee sits in the Order Form: we found no public price figure of any kind, so a buyer can learn the term and the VAT treatment but cannot derive a single line of the annual invoice. That is a sales conversation with paperwork.