🏅Workhuman vs Bonusly: Comparing Reward & Recognition Platforms in 2025

 

What is Workhuman?

✅ “Make Work More Human”

Workhuman is an employee recognition and engagement platform designed to create human-centered workplaces and measure recognition.

Workhuman aims to create a positive work environment, enhance employee morale, and drive better business outcomes by using career development tools and fostering a culture of appreciation and recognition.

Its social recognition program enables employees to recognize and celebrate each other’s achievements in a social, transparent, and public manner. Fostering a sense of community lets team leaders create a more inclusive and supportive work environment where employees feel connected and valued.

 

Notable Features [Bonusly vs Workhuman]

The two platforms are similar at first glance. So we’re taking a deeper dive into the fundamental similarities and differences between a Workhuman vs Bonusly comparison. This way, you won’t miss out on any essential use cases when you first compare the two employee recognition platforms.

  1   Rewards

Reward systems provide tangible acknowledgment of employees’ efforts and achievements.

The result?

Higher motivation, increased employee engagement, and higher employee loyalty levels. Simply put, rewards are perfect for delighting your team, and making them feel valued and appreciated.

👉 Bonusly

Here are some of the reward options available to employees on the Bonusly platform:

• 💳 Gift cards
• 💵 Cash-out options
• 🧢 Company swag
• 🎗 Donation opportunities
• 🏟 Custom rewards (like event tickets or even an extra day off)

Bonusly offers over 1,200+ rewards in 200+ countries with utilitarian options like Kroger, Target, CVS, Whole Foods,  Amazon, Walmart, and beyond.

👉 Workhuman

Workhuman offers a global catalog with a variety of options including:

• 🎁 Gifts from top brands like Nike, Le Creuset and Sony
• 🌎 International experiences
• 🎗 Charity donations

The Workhuman Store is constantly updating with new ideas to deliver a tailored experience for companies.

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  2   Automated Milestones

Ever missed out on a birthday? Nobody wants to be left out. Especially when you’re throwing parties for most employees only to realize you forgot about one or two birthdays.

Plus, there are loads of other events and achievements you can (and should) celebrate. Let’s see what you can set up with each of the two employee rewards and recognition tools.

👉 Bonusly

Automated employee milestones in Bonusly allow employers to set up specific recognition messages and highlight key values for these milestones, making the employee recognition program feel personalized. Employees and their peers receive notifications about these milestones which encourages a stronger company culture.

Bonusly is particularly strong when it comes to automation.

To ensure that long-term service is appropriately recognized and rewarded, you can create automated workflows with predefined messages and rewards being triggered by the system based on the employee’s start date.

And let’s not forget about performance-based milestones. These were built for peer-to-peer recognition, but the platform can automate recognition for performance milestones to trigger bonuses for specific achievements or goals met.

👉 Workhuman

You can technically use both platforms for any type of milestone. However, Workhuman comes with a stronger focus on celebrating life events like weddings or a new pet in the family (besides birthdays and performance-based results).

You can set up custom messages and offer custom rewards applicable only for these events, adding a personal touch to the recognition. With this stronger focus on life events, Workhuman can help you provide a holistic approach to employee recognition.

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  3   Incentive Programs

Imagine your workplace as a magical kingdom, and your employees are the valiant knights, clever wizards, and brave adventurers who keep it thriving. Now, what’s a kingdom without some epic quests and glittering treasures at the end of a quest?

That’s where incentive programs come in. You need them to:

• Boost morale for the crew
• Increase productivity
• Ensure talent retention
• Improve teamwork and fellowship
• Keep bringing in new talent
• Improve employee engagement
• Make sure your employees are happy at work and truly appreciate each other’s company!

👉 Bonusly

While peer-to-peer recognition programs and rewards alone can be decent incentives, with Bonusly you get a dedicated feature for building incentive programs. The process works by choosing from three different types of awards you want to offer:

1. Automated: Awards for welcomes, birthdays, work anniversaries, and more by automatically distributing points and public recognition based on specific dates.
2. Manual: Customize pre-set templates or create your personalized message with full control over the budget and who can distribute these awards.
3. Claimable: Allow employees to nominate themselves for claimable awards for specific reasons such as stellar work results.

👉 Workhuman

Despite no standalone features for incentives, you can incentivize your employees with Workhuman through the capabilities we’ve already mentioned:

• Social Recognition
• Life events celebration
• Service Milestones

It’s also worth noting the platform has a Community Celebrations feature that unites people within an organization to celebrate shared interests, events, and milestones.

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  4   Peer-to-Peer Recognition

Want to support a more inclusive culture? Peer-to-peer recognition helps you ensure everyone’s contributions are acknowledged, regardless of their role or position within the company.

This is one of the most effective ways to appreciate employees since it allows for immediate recognition that will ultimately culture of employee appreciation and recognition, enhance motivation, and reinforce positive behavior.

👉 Bonusly

With Bonusly, each employee is allocated a certain number of points or “bonus currency” every month that they can distribute to their peers. Team members can also give small bonuses to their colleagues through the Bonusly platform.

Recognition given through Bonusly is visible to the entire organization. This transparency recognizes employee recognition and allows others to see and celebrate their colleagues’ achievements, creating a culture of appreciation and acknowledgment.

👉 Workhuman

Workhuman’s Social Recognition feature empowers employees to recognize and reward one another for great work, promoting positive behaviors and fostering a sense of community. It does so by bringing organizational values to life through customizable recognition moments and team awards, which program leaders can highlight for broader acknowledgment.

The platform ensures equitable awards regardless of location or currency. It uses a proprietary standard of living index to manage differences in exchange rates and purchasing power parity, simplifying the process for nominators.

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  5   Employee Pulse Surveys

Pulse surveys are a tool you can use to get quick and clear insights into how happy your employees are as well as what concerns or challenges they have. They can be used to track trends over time, identify patterns in employee sentiment, and assess employee engagement.

Why do you need them above all other survey types?

They’re simply better for promoting a transparent and responsive work environment. Plus, you can use them to ask for anonymous feedback when the employee performance management tool allows for it.

👉 Bonusly

Bonusly doesn’t have a native pulse survey feature but you can connect it to third-party tools such as SurveySparrow or SurveyMonkey to conduct employee engagement surveys and gather insights from your team.

👉 Workhuman

Workhuman’s Moodtracker product helps businesses monitor employee progress or sentiments. It offers pre-configured surveys developed by behavioral scientists, requiring no complex integration or additional resources.

Moodtracker features Smart Sampling AI to prevent survey fatigue and provides actionable insights through easy-to-read dashboards and expert recommendations.

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  6   Customizations

The perfect employee recognition platform should match your own employees’ needs before all else. This said, you should look for a platform you can customize to better suit your own HR policies and use cases.

Sure, one way of customizing your app is visually to suit your own branding and make for a fun, colorful interface. But for this comparison, we’re looking at the hands-on customization options for actual features and workflows.

👉 Bonusly

Most incentives and rewards can be customized in Bonusly. In particular, admins can add custom rewards to personalize your company’s reward catalog.

Unlike standard rewards, which are electronically fulfilled by Bonusly, custom rewards are managed and fulfilled by you offline.

Being able to personalize rewards means you’ll be in full control of the costs, save time, and better integrate company culture into the rewards you share with employees.

👉 Workhuman

Besides being able to customize rewards, Workhuman also supports Report Customization to give you a behind-the-scenes look at the effectiveness and value of a meaningful recognition program.

You can enhance your reporting dashboards with advanced data visualization and customization options, all while managing access to specific data sets for precise control over information.

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  7   Integrations

The most expansive rewards platforms tend to be limited when it comes to their functionality.

So, if you’re looking to expand beyond recognition and access employee engagement features, you’ll want to integrate your tool of choice with the other solutions you’re using for diverse HR operations [and even go beyond human resource needs].

👉 Bonusly

Bonusly comes with one of the largest varieties of apps you can connect to, including: Dayforce, BambooHR, Okta, OneLogin, Slack, ScreenCloud, Gusto, Paycor.

👉 Workhuman

Connects with a handful of tools like: Microsoft Teams and Outlook, Yammer, Slack, and Workday.

  8   Analytics and Reporting

👉 Bonusly

Bonusly’s Employee Analytics help you uncover frequent recognition trends within your team. The analytics dashboard provides immediate visibility into team connections, participation trends, and recognition frequency.

The platform also supports weekly one-on-ones and annual performance reviews. With native participation analytics, leaders can track Bonusly’s adoption and view organization-wide recognition trends. This highlights potential silos and shows how connected or disconnected teams are within the organization.

👉 Workhuman

Workhuman’s analytics product, Workhuman iQ, promises to deliver a comprehensive AI-powered social analytics solution.

With machine learning, AI, and natural language processing, iQ identifies pain points, opportunities for improvement, and real challenges. Each interaction—nominations, feedback, assessments, and more—provides unique data points revealing trends in employee behavior, inclusion, and company culture.

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  9   Notable Companies that Use Bonusly/Workhuman

Here’s a walk through some big names for each:

👉 Bonusly

Wrike	MongoDB	Headspace
Nexthink	Toast	SurveyMonkey
Chobani	Care.com	BigCommerce

👉 Workhuman

Cisco	IBM	BP
LinkedIn	Intuit	Qlik
Merck	Pfizer	CAA

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  10   Customer service

Efficient customer support ensures that any concerns or issues are promptly resolved, minimizing interruptions to the employee recognition process. Given the specific deadlines for many employees rewards events, timely customer service is crucial for swiftly resolving any issues and ensuring rewards are delivered punctually.

👉 Bonusly

The support team can be reached through various channels listed on their contact page, including email and possibly other communication platforms. Customer service for setup, launch, and ongoing support is only available with their Connect and Achieve plans though.

👉 Workhuman

Users can contact them through various channels as detailed on their contact page, including email and possibly other communication methods. There are few public details on how their support services work so I recommend inquiring about these when you talk to their sales team. You might just get yourself real-time emergency support.

Both Bonusly and Workhuman have extensive help centers to help you fix issues yourself for emergency scenarios when no support agent is available.

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  11   Free Trial

Not sure which option out of Bonusly and Workhuman to go for? Try a free trial.

👉 Bonusly

• Bonusly offers a 14-day free trial for teams to take a test drive of their platform and use it in real-time.

👉 Try a 14 day FREE trial of Bonusly

👉 Workhuman

• There’s no mention of a free trial but you can get a free demo to inquire about the trial. Some past reviews mention trial periods so you might get one as well.

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  12   Pricing

Worried about hidden costs? Let’s see what you need to pay attention to when it comes to each tool’s fees.

👉 Bonusly

Bonusly offers three transparent pricing plans:

• Appreciate: $2 per seat/month, billed yearly + cost of rewards
• Connect: $5 per seat/month, billed yearly + cost of rewards [includes the peer-to-peer recognition feature]
• Achieve: $7 per seat/month, billed yearly + cost of rewards [comes with features such as weekly or bi-weekly 1:1 scheduling, collaborative 1:1 agenda, and real-time meeting note taking]

Notice how I emphasized you have to pay for the rewards besides thesubscription cost. You will pay the full face value of rewards when your employees redeem them. Bonusly keeps rewards spending separate from subscription costs so you won’t face hefty upfront expenses to begin using the platform.

👉 Workhuman

The Workhuman pricing isn’t publicly displayed so you’ll have to negotiate it with your sales team.

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  13   Testimonials and Reviews

Time to look at what the long-term users are saying about Workhuman and Bonusly.

👉 Bonusly

“I love that the Bonusly product is very intuitive to use with our team and offers excellent features that allow us to drive our engagement efforts. The platform integrates with our other HR tools and makes for a great tool to capture our team WINS and milestones! The level of support from the Bonusly team is incredible and we are very pleased with the product features.” — David G.

“I love that it allows everyone in the office to recognize their peers, supervisors, direct reports, and anyone else that helped to make the office better in some way. Recognition in our office has increased 100 times over, simply because we use Bonusly.” — Nick O.

“Bonusly is a great tool to incentivize co-workers to work harder and help each other out. It is so easy to use, and it’s like having a social media page to recognize each other at work and it’s fun to use. You can use Bonusly as often as you want and really let your co-workers know that you appreciate them while being rewarded in return for your hard work. I really like the feature that allows you to add GIFs to express your appreciation. Implementing this into your work day is as simple as scrollling your newsfeed for a minute or two.” — Joanna M.

 

👉 Workhuman

“I love being able to recognize my peers in a way that makes sure their leader also knows how well they’ve done. I also love getting recognition and being able to shop for items with my points. I’m a few days away from my 15th anniversary and excited for that gift! The platform itself is easy to use and didn’t require a lot of training. The one time I had to call customer service, they were incredibly helpful and even gave me a tip that ended up saving me points!” — Jessica S.

“It’s a great way for employees to give each other recognition in supplement to verbal recognition. It helps democratize appreciation (and rewards), so gets people looking at each other for examples of great work to recognize.” — Zachary S.

“This is by far the most robust recognition and engagement platform I’ve ever used. It’s quick and easy to provide someone with the recognition they deserve. And let’s face it…we could all do a better job at that. This platform makes it easy, provides meaningful feedback, and the options for redemption are quality items that people actually want! Can’t say enough good things about it.” — Timothy O.

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People Also Ask These Questions About Workhuman vs Bonusly

Q: Why should I use a platform like Bonusly or Workhuman?

• A: Think of these platforms as an extra helping hand on your HR team. In fact, even if you don’t yet have a human resources manager, the two will make it easier for employees to give and receive recognition in real time. This fosters a culture of appreciation and can motivate employees who will feel valued for their contributions. In return? Higher job employee satisfaction and reduced turnover.

Q: How much do Bonusly & Workhuman cost?

• A: The costs for both platforms depend on the exact features you need as well as the budget you have for rewards. Note that Bonusly is transparent when it comes to its pricing while Workhuman gatekeeps the costs.

Q: How do Bonusly and Workhuman work?

• A: The two employee recognition and engagement platforms can help enhance employee engagement with simple but frequent recognition that involves employee participation. There are different use cases but, most commonly, you’ll automatically allocate points monthly to multiple employees who access peer to peer milestone recognition.