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HR tech trends for 2026: global all-in-one HRIS reality, embedded payroll results, up-market PEO models, and the evolving HR team. What’s viable vs hype in HR software.
Every January brings a fresh batch of predictions, hot takes, and bold claims about what will happen next. Instead of trying to forecast winners and losers, I prefer to focus on the underlying questions that still feel unresolved.
As we head into 2026, there are a handful of themes that keep coming up in our client conversations, vendor briefings, and internal debates. How they shake out will shape the next decade of HR technology.
Here’s what I’ll be paying the closest attention to this year.
We are constantly talking to buyers who are deep into a global HRIS and global payroll search and are completely exhausted.
They’ve seen dozens of demos, heard countless pitches, and are convinced they must be missing something because they can’t find a single system that does everything well.
When we finally tell them the truth, that there really isn’t a true all-in-one today, it’s almost always a relief. They weren’t going crazy.
The “all-in-one” buyers are looking for is incredibly ambitious:
Delivering at a high level across all three of those areas is a massive technology and services undertaking.The race to solve it is happening across three very different camps.First, the ambitious unicorns. Rippling and Deel are going straight at this problem. Rippling has made impressive progress on the full-suite HRIS side, but their global payroll and EOR footprint is still expanding country by country. Deel is the mirror image. Their global payroll and EOR capabilities are extremely strong, but they’re still working to build a more complete, enterprise-grade global HRIS.Second, the HCM powerhouses deciding how far to go. Dayforce, ADP, UKG, and Paylocity already have robust, scalable HCM platforms and large global payroll networks through acquisitions. Where they’re still coming up short is EOR/global employment and true localization. These systems still skew heavily US-centric. Dayforce has had a first-mover advantage here, but ADP Lyric is one I’m watching closely too.
Third, the HRIS-first vendors choosing their global payroll strategy. Workday, HiBob, and Darwinbox are excellent HR and talent platforms with strong global HR and compliance tooling. But none of them are payroll-centric. Each only supports payroll in a few countries, and none offer an EOR services. The open question is whether any of these vendors decide to acquire a global payroll provider to accelerate the roadmap, or whether they’re content being the system of record that integrates with whatever payroll or EOR solution a customer needs.
I don’t expect this question to be fully answered in 2026. But we’ll learn a lot about which paths are viable.
If you’ve been reading this newsletter for a while, you know I have a possibly unhealthy obsession with embedded payroll.
Last year was all about announcements. HiBob rolled out US payroll, powered by Gusto. BambooHR and Workday announced embedded global payroll and EOR, powered by Remote. And on the other end of the spectrum, Lattice exited the embedded payroll and HRIS space entirely.
The press releases were fun. Now I want to hear from actual users.
In 2026, I’m far less interested in vendor roadmaps and far more interested in day-to-day reality. Does embedded payroll actually reduce friction? Does the service experience feel cohesive, or disjointed? When something goes wrong, who owns it, and how fast does it get resolved?
The technology is only half the story. Payroll is still a zero-fail business. The winners here will be the vendors who figure out how to deliver the best of both worlds:
This is the year where embedded payroll either proves it can scale beyond marketing slides or quietly retreats into niche use cases.
We’ve written before about why PEOs remain so popular despite their limitations. They’re not always scalable. They can get expensive. The tech is rarely best-in-class. And yet, clients stick with them.
Why? Because PEOs simplify complexity. One throat to choke for 1.) HCM technology, 2.) compliance and outsourcing, and 3.) insurance and benefits.
Now the market is responding with something more flexible and more scalable.
Benefit brokers are driving a big part of this shift. When a company leaves a PEO, the broker gets the insurance business back, but that creates new problems. The client still needs a new HRIS. They still need help with compliance and administration. Someone still has to do the work.
So we’re seeing alliances form across the ecosystem. Brokers acquiring or partnering with managed services firms. Some building those practices internally. Some leaning on platforms like OutSail to solve the tech selection problem. Others, like Acrisure, going as far as acquiring technology outright.
The endgame is clear. Someone wants to say, “We can do everything your PEO did, but at a much higher scale.” That means mainstream HCM technology, robust managed services to fill staffing gaps, and strategic benefits consulting, all bundled together without forcing companies into a rigid co-employment model.
This race is very real, and it’s one we’re not just observing but actively participating in. I’ll keep sharing what we learn, and I promise to try not to be too self-serving while doing it.
The final theme I’m watching is how HR teams themselves evolve.
AI, managed services, and new operating models are all converging here. Niel Robertson’s “Ops triangle” framework from our Winslow interview stuck with me: strategic leadership at the top, execution supported by automation and services underneath, and a growing People Ops function that composes tools, workflows, and vendors into something that actually works.
I’m bullish on this vision, but I’m also realistic. The AI impact in 2026 will likely be smaller than the hype suggests. The data, systems, and processes simply aren’t ready in most mid-to-large organizations for AI to drive reliable, transformational change overnight.
Where we will see progress is at smaller companies with strong ops leaders who are willing to experiment with AI-native tools. They’ll give us glimpses of what’s coming next.
At the same time, I think managed services and outsourcing will have a bigger impact on HR staffing decisions in 2026 than AI will. People still want people. They’re just increasingly unsure whether those people need to be full-time W-2 employees.
My working hypothesis is this: more internal HR staff focused on strategy, culture, and employee-facing work. More fractional and outsourced support for tactical, back-office functions. Fewer fixed headcount bets. More flexibility to scale up and down as the business changes.
If there’s a common thread across all of this, it’s pragmatism. Buyers are tired of promises. They want things that work, scale, and adapt.
2026 won’t be the year everything gets solved. But it will be the year we separate what’s aspirational from what’s actually viable. And that, frankly, is when the real progress starts.
We’ll be watching closely.
