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Cost per Hire

A recruiting metric that estimates hiring cost by dividing recruiting spend by the number of hires.

businessPublished 2026/06/06Last verified 2026/06/06

FAQs

What can affect cost per hire?
Source mix, role difficulty, agency use, job advertising, recruiter workload, assessment tools, background checks, and market conditions can all affect it.

Related Terms

  • Time to Hire

    A recruiting metric that measures how long it takes to move a candidate from application or contact to hire.

  • Quality of Hire

    A recruiting outcome metric for how well a hire performs, stays, and fits the role after joining.

  • Sourcing

    The process of finding, identifying, and engaging potential candidates before or during a hiring process.

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What it means

Cost per hire estimates the average cost of making hires over a period. It may include job ads, agency fees, recruiting tools, background checks, referral bonuses, events, and internal recruiting costs.

Buyer checks

  • Confirm which cost categories are included.
  • Compare cost per hire by role type, location, source, and seniority.
  • Use it with quality and retention metrics to avoid cheap-but-poor outcomes.

Software should make assumptions clear instead of hiding cost logic.