# Rise review (2026): is it worth $49 a month? > Global contractor, EOR and US payroll paid in fiat or crypto Checked Nov 13, 2026 ยท graded Nov 13, 2026 by ToolGPA. Rise is a payroll and workforce platform that pays global contractors, acts as agent of record or employer of record, and runs direct payroll in the US. Workers can be paid in fiat or crypto. The company is based in Ohio. - **Category:** Payroll - **Made by:** Rise Works Inc. - **Website:** https://www.riseworks.io - **Runs on:** Web - **Who should skip it:** Pricey if you pay many people, since every price is per worker per month. - **Facts last checked:** Nov 13, 2026 ## Pricing As of Nov 13, 2026, Rise is a paid product, starting at $49 per contractor / month. - **Pricing model:** Paid - **Free plan:** None. - **Free trial:** None listed. | Plan | Price | What you get | | --- | --- | --- | | Global Contractor | $49 per contractor / month | Fiat and crypto payments, compliance checks, annual tax reporting and compliant global contracts. The page mentions discounts for startups and nonprofits. | | Direct Payroll | $49 per month and up | US payroll with same-day paychecks in all 50 states, payroll taxes paid, unlimited payrolls and year-end W-2s and 1099s. Priced as starting at. | | Agent of Record | $299 per contractor / month | Rise acts as the legal contracting entity to reduce misclassification risk. | | Employer of Record | $399 per employee / month | Hire employees without local entities, with payroll, benefits, insurance and HR support. | Read from https://www.riseworks.io/pricing on Nov 13, 2026. Prices change, so confirm with Rise before buying. ## Ways to pay less - **Discounts for startups and nonprofits** (Startups): The pricing page lists discounts for startups and non-profits on the contractor plan without giving terms. Source: https://www.riseworks.io/pricing ## Key features - **Fiat and crypto payouts:** Contractors can be paid in 90+ local currencies or in crypto, and the site cites support for 100+ cryptocurrencies. - **Global contractor pay:** Compliant contracts, compliance checks and annual tax reporting for contractors. - **Agent and employer of record:** Rise can act as the contracting entity for contractors or as the legal employer for employees, with coverage the vendor states for 190+ countries. - **Direct US payroll:** Payroll for US employees with tax payments, new hire onboarding and year-end forms. ## Good for - Startups paying a distributed team in stablecoins or crypto - Web3 companies mixing contractors and employees ## Worth knowing - The $49 Direct Payroll price is shown as a starting price; the page does not say what it scales with. - Direct Payroll covers US payroll only. - The $399 EOR and $299 AOR prices are per worker per month. - Rise Works Inc. says it is registered as a Money Service Business in the United States. ## ToolGPA grades **GPA: 1.6 out of 4**, graded Nov 13, 2026. Rise pays contractors around the world in fiat or crypto, and also acts as agent or employer of record and runs US direct payroll. It starts at $49 per contractor a month, and direct payroll covers the US only. - **Value for money: C.** $49 per contractor a month, $299 for agent of record and $399 per employee for employer of record. Those are far above plain payroll software, but this is a different kind of service, and the EOR price is below Toku's $599. - **Free plan and trial: F.** Nothing is free: no free plan and no trial are listed, so the way in is paying. - **Features: C.** Global contractor pay, agent and employer of record, and US direct payroll. Direct payroll is US only, and its $49 starting price does not say what it scales with. - **Ease of use: C.** No store rating is on record, and paying across countries means setting up contracts and payout methods. - **Platforms and integrations: C.** Web only, with no apps and no integrations on the listing. These are ToolGPA's own grades. Graded from this listing, whose facts were read from Rise's own pages on 13 November 2026. Not based on using the product, and shorter than our full reviews. ## Where it stands among payroll services - Rise's GPA of 1.6 is higher than 0 of the 61 other payroll services we grade, and level with 9. - It stands best on value for money (C, above 3 of 61) and worst on free plan and trial (F, above 0). - Its paid plans start at $49 a month for each person, against a middle price of $29 for the category: 22 of the 32 others that charge start lower. - On features, ease of use and platforms it scores 2.0 out of 4. 18 tools score higher and cost less. The category's chart of price against score: https://toolgpa.com/charts/payroll ## Keep it, or make your own? **Keep it.** To replace Rise you would be making payroll taxes worked out and filed with the government for you. That is not a weekend's work, with an AI app builder or without one. That makes this kind of software worth paying for, not this one in particular: 52 of the 61 other payroll services grade higher. It costs $588 a year. - You could make: Employee records: an app builder makes this well. - You could not: Payroll taxes worked out and filed with the government for you. - You could not: Payouts to partners in many countries, with their tax forms. - You could not: It is priced for each person, which means accounts and billing for a team. A judgement by ToolGPA from this listing, by rules that are the same for every tool. Nothing was built to test it. **Tags:** Payroll, Partner payouts, Employee records ## Alternatives - [Deel](https://toolgpa.com/tools/deel): Global payroll, contractor payments and employer of record. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/deel-vs-rise-works) - [Toku](https://toolgpa.com/tools/toku): Global payroll, EOR and contractor pay in local or stablecoin. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/rise-works-vs-toku) - [Remote](https://toolgpa.com/tools/remote): Employer of record, global payroll and contractor payments. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/remote-vs-rise-works) - [Niural](https://toolgpa.com/tools/niural): US payroll, PEO, employer of record and global payments in one. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/niural-vs-rise-works) ## Sources The prices, plans, platforms and features above were read from these pages on Nov 13, 2026: - https://www.riseworks.io/pricing - https://www.riseworks.io - https://www.riseworks.io/about-us Page: https://toolgpa.com/tools/rise-works Listed by ToolGPA (toolgpa.com).