The benches split along two lines. Shiftbase leads on roster planning (5.3 vs 4.0, five judges leaning Shiftbase, one tie), working time rules (2.5 vs 1.3, six judges leaning Shiftbase), staff self service (6.2 vs 5.2, four lean Shiftbase, two tie) and payroll and integrations (6.2 vs 5.3, four lean Shiftbase, two tie). Staffomatic takes sovereignty, 5.0 vs 3.3, with six judges leaning Staffomatic; its subprocessor exposure attribute reads "EU only" against Shiftbase's "US CLOUD Act reach", both hold data residency "EU only", their legal entities sit in DE and NL, and ownership is unknown for both. Pricing transparency is tied at 6.8 to 6.8 (six ties), as is codetermination and privacy at 4.0 to 4.0. Of the weighted totals shown, four benches put Shiftbase ahead and the works council is level at 4.2 to 4.2; Shiftbase's totals range 4.0 to 5.3, Staffomatic's 3.7 to 4.4; the operations director's total is not shown.
Choose Shiftbase if
You need the strongest roster planning: Shiftbase scores 5.3 to Staffomatic's 4.0, with five judges leaning Shiftbase and one tie.
Your operations depend on working time rules: Shiftbase scores 2.5 to Staffomatic's 1.3 and six judges lean Shiftbase, though its captured pages name no actual rule and compliance appears only as a coming add-on at 0,50 € / Monat / Mitarbeiter.
Your staff manage availability, open shifts, in-app swaps and a geofenced time clock from iOS and Android apps: staff self service leans Shiftbase 6.2 to 5.2 (four judges lean, two ties).
You export approved hours to DATEV format and to Personio over the API: payroll and integrations leans Shiftbase 6.2 to 5.3 (four judges lean, two ties).
You weight the frontline-employee perspective: that bench's weighted total reads Shiftbase 5.2 to Staffomatic 3.7.
Choose Staffomatic if
You require subprocessor exposure listed as EU only: Staffomatic's subprocessor exposure attribute reads EU only, while Shiftbase's reads US CLOUD Act reach, and six judges lean Staffomatic on sovereignty (5.0 vs 3.3).
Your contract calls for a German legal entity: Staffomatic's legal entity jurisdiction attribute is DE; Shiftbase's is NL.
You answer to a works council that weighs codetermination and sovereignty together: codetermination and privacy is level at 4.0 to 4.0 with six ties, and the works council's weighted totals read 4.2 to 4.2, while sovereignty leans Staffomatic 5.0 to 3.3.
Your procurement screens out US Cloud Act exposure in subprocessor handling: the captured sovereignty attribute reads US CLOUD Act reach for Shiftbase and EU only for Staffomatic.
Read this comparison as one judge. Each weighs the same scores by what they care about.
The Payroll Officer
Turns the worked month into DATEV and answers for every surcharge. Cares about night, Sunday and holiday supplements from the Tarifvertrag, Minijob limits caught before the month closes, and corrections after the close. Treats "CSV export" as an admission that the handoff was never designed.
Shiftbase
This judge's pick
Staffomatic
Criterion by criterion
Roster building & demand planning
Shiftbase
Availability, open shifts, swap requests, conflict notices and automatic scheduling are all advertised, and pricing shows the plan scaling from a single department to franchise operations, with POS revenue flowing back so each shift's take sits next to the plan. We found no public information on shift templates, qualifications, staffing requirements per shift, or the method behind the automatic scheduling, so the demand side stays in the planner's memory rather than in the system.
Staffomatic
Templates for shift and week plans, shift swaps, open-shift applications and visibility of absences or double bookings while planning are all shown, and qualifications and availabilities arrive from the Professional tier. We found no public information on staffing requirements per shift, departments or multiple locations, or any demand figure or generated proposal behind the plan, so the roster is drawn rather than proposed.
Working-time law & collective agreements
Shiftbase
A Compliance+ add-on is announced as coming soon at "0,50 € / Monat / Mitarbeiter" alongside generic conflict notices, and that is the whole of it — we found no public information on ArbZG daily maxima, the 11-hour rest period, breaks, Minijob earnings limits or Tarifvertrag surcharges. As the one who books night and Sunday supplements, I see nothing on these pages that knows a rule, let alone warns or blocks before publication.
Staffomatic
We found no public information on any legal rule being checked — nothing on the ArbZG daily maximum, the eleven-hour rest period, breaks, youth protection, or a Minijob earnings warning caught before the month closes. Working time appears only as accounting (working-time account, overtime account, surcharges at Premium), and the captured pages do not name night, Sunday or holiday supplements, so I cannot tell whether the surcharges are separated by type.
Mobile self-service for deskless staff
Shiftbase
The iOS and Android app carries availability, open shifts and swap requests — the team trades and takes over shifts in the app — in five interface languages, with a time clock and geofencing for stamping in. We found no public information on qualification or rest checks before a swap is approved, offline handling, or employees seeing and exporting their own data, and the team chat is early access with no price yet.
Staffomatic
The shop floor gets a real app: swaps, open-shift applications, availability entry, holiday requests that a manager approves, and a dedicated punch-clock app, with time capture on any mobile device. We found no public information on swaps being checked against qualifications or rest periods before approval, offline clock-in, language coverage, or staff viewing and exporting the data held about them in the app itself.
Works council & employee data
Shiftbase
Rights and roles exist, retention is stated (data deleted from all systems 30 days after the subscription ends, backups held 60 days), and the vendor commits not to sell employee data, with the subprocessor list retrievable behind a password. We found no public information on an audit log of who viewed or changed an individual's data, configurable deletion periods, works-council documentation, or whether geofencing can be switched off — the first questions a Betriebsverein under § 87 BetrVG will put on the table.
Staffomatic
Roles and rights exist from the Professional tier, and the privacy policy gives concrete figures — server logs deleted after fourteen days, application data kept six months — alongside an external data protection officer, periodic staff training and named subprocessors. We found no public information on configurable visibility of sensitive items such as absence reasons, an audit trail of who viewed or changed an individual's data, or any documentation offered for works-council approval.
Payroll handoff & integrations
Shiftbase
Approved hours go out in DATEV format and to Personio over the API, the POS returns revenue to the roster, and a documented open API exists on the Enterprise plan — the month does not leave as a spreadsheet someone retypes. But the pages say nothing about surcharges: we found no public information on night, Sunday or holiday wage types in the export, absences on their way to Lohn und Gehalt, or corrections after the month has closed, which is where my month actually breaks.
Staffomatic
The handoff has the right shape: DATEV export, surcharges, an overtime account and a working-time account sit together in the Premium tier, time tracking is billed as preparation for payroll, and a named Personio interface plus API access cover the HR side. We found no public information on wage types mapped per surcharge, a lock step before transmission, corrections after the month closes, or whether the DATEV connection is maintained by the vendor.
European sovereignty
Shiftbase
The contracting entity is Shiftbase B.V. in Zoetermeer with KVK and VAT numbers published on the vendor's own pages, and data leaks are reported to the supervisory authority responsible in Germany. We found no public information on where employee data is hosted or which data-centre provider stands behind it, and the subprocessor list sits behind a password, so the chain a works council or DPA reviewer would want to inspect is not published openly.
Staffomatic
The contracting entity is a Hamburg company with a German register number and VAT ID, and the privacy policy names its subprocessors by provider and country, with US services such as Celonis' Make.com, HubSpot and Microsoft carried on EU standard contractual clauses. We found no public information on where the servers themselves are hosted or who the data-centre provider is — a German server-management partner is the only indication.
Pricing transparency
Shiftbase
Every tier is public with the per-employee arithmetic spelled out — "30 € / Monat" with 6 included and "4 €/Monat" per additional head, up to Enterprise at "336 € / Monat" with 48 included — plus priced add-ons and four onboarding packages, and monthly billing is stated. VAT treatment, minimum term and how inactive or seasonal staff are counted are unstated, and the chat module is "t.b.d.", so the true annual invoice needs one conversation to pin down.
Staffomatic
All three tiers are priced per person per month with a ten-person minimum, the feature-to-tier mapping reaches down to the DATEV export and API access, net prices plus VAT are stated, and the fourteen-day trial requires no payment data. The annual saving is quoted only as up to 17 percent rather than as an exact annual price, and we found no public information on how inactive or seasonal staff are counted or on the minimum contract term.
Sovereignty, side by side
Dimension
Shiftbase
Staffomatic
Legal entity
Incorporated in NL
Incorporated in DE
Ownership
Not determined
Not determined
Data residency
Not determined
Not determined
Subprocessors
US CLOUD Act reach
EU only
Facts, side by side
Only facts both products carry under the same definition — anything else would not be a fair row.