Best for
Best for restaurants, from a single cafe to multi-location groups and franchises, that schedule front and back of house against sales and labor laws.
- Small and mid-sized
- Enterprise
Shift Scheduling Comparison
At a glance
Best for
Best for restaurants, from a single cafe to multi-location groups and franchises, that schedule front and back of house against sales and labor laws.
Best for
Best for Canadian small and mid-sized businesses that schedule shift staff and send hours to a Canadian payroll system.
Cataleo does not name a winner. Both statements come from the vendors themselves.
| Criterion | 7shifts | Agendrix |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | Free for 1 location and up to 15 employees Comp is the free plan. The paid plans are Essentials (up to 30 employees, unlimited locations), Pro and Premium (unlimited employees and locations), paid monthly or annually; companies that joined before July 2, 2025 keep the earlier plans Entrée, The Works and Gourmet. | From 3.50 dollars / user / month Essential plan billed monthly, or 3.15 dollars a month billed yearly. The pricing page shows the amounts with a dollar sign and does not name the currency. Time and Attendance is an add-on at 2.35 dollars per user per month. |
| Free trial | 14-day free trial with access to the features of The Works plan, no credit card needed; afterwards the free Comp plan or a paid plan | Up to 21 days of free trial, no credit card required |
| Users | Quick-service and full-service restaurants, cafes and coffee shops, bars and breweries, pizzerias, bakeries, juice bars, pubs, caterers, franchises and multi-location groups | Small and mid-sized businesses with shift staff; the vendor names retail, restaurants, clinics and health, pharmacies, retirement homes, hospitality and leisure |
| API | Yes, a REST API at api.7shifts.com/v2 with OAuth for partners, webhooks and a read-only MCP server; API access depends on the plan | Yes, a documented API with OAuth access through a developer portal |
| Hosting | Cloud, on the web with a free mobile app and the 7punches time clock app | Cloud on AWS in the ca-central-1 region, with iOS and Android apps |
| Made in | Not stated | Canada |
| Shift planning and templates | Drag-and-drop schedule builder with availability and time off shown while planning, unlimited customisable templates per role, season or location, any published schedule reusable as a template, and auto-fill of shifts from past schedules and availability | Drag-and-drop schedule editing, copying from the latest schedule, mass editing, rotating shifts, reusable shift and work week templates, day, week and month views, multilocation management, training shifts, tasks within shifts, and automatic shift assignment that accounts for availability and leave |
| Shift swaps and open shifts | Shift Pool lets employees offer up shifts or pick up open ones, with manager approval on every change, and shows which staff are available to cover sick, late or no-show shifts | Shift transfers and swaps as employee requests, and open shifts that qualified employees can offer to take, assigned by the manager or first come first served, with an option to offer open shifts by seniority |
| Availability and time off | Employees submit availability changes and time-off requests in the app, managers approve them from anywhere, and PTO and sick time are tracked for scheduling and payroll | Availability and preferred work hours, absence, vacation and paid or unpaid leave requests, and vacation and overtime banks per employee |
| Time clock and attendance | Clocking in and out with the 7punches app on a smartphone or a tablet at the restaurant, break and approaching-overtime notifications, timesheet approval, punch audit reports of missed clock-ins and timesheet edits, and a live view of who is clocked in | Time and Attendance add-on: clocking in and out on a computer, a tablet with or without photo verification, a phone with GPS, an RFID card or a barcode, automated timesheets checked against the schedule with discrepancies highlighted, and rounding and approval rules |
| Labour cost and forecasting | AI sales forecasting from historical sales and labor data to predict staffing needs, labor budgets set and tracked while scheduling, and real-time labor against sales once a POS is connected | A labour cost calculator that works out labour costs and scheduled hours automatically, plus a daily weather forecast on the schedule |
| Breaks, overtime and labour rules | Real-time alerts for local labor law violations while scheduling, required breaks set up and enforced, overtime alerts, fair workweek support for California, DC, Nevada, New York and Philadelphia, scheduling restrictions for minors under 16 and 18, tracking of expired certifications, and tip credit calculations and reporting | Paid and unpaid break management, an overtime tracker, automatic conflict detection when shifts overlap, availability is not respected or approved leave is forgotten, and in the add-on automatic overtime and break calculations |
| Payroll export and integration | Approved punches and tips exported to the existing payroll provider, or paid through 7shifts Payroll, with tip pooling fed by synced sales and time data and on-demand pay offered alongside | Timesheets exported to payroll through integrations with EmployerD, Nethris, Sage 50, Acomba, QuickBooks, Ceridian Powerpay, ADP Workforce Now, Payworks and Easypay; approved expenses can be exported with hours and premiums |
| Team messaging and notifications | Direct and group messaging with attachments, one-way announcements with read receipts, automated reminders for shifts, breaks and tasks, a manager log book, task management, shift feedback and training videos sent through the app | One-on-one and group chat, an internal news feed for announcements and documents with read receipts, push notifications when a schedule is published or changed, and a confirmation that an employee has seen an assigned shift |
| Platforms and mobile app | Web app, a free mobile app for managers and employees, and the 7punches time clock app on a smartphone or a tablet at the location | Web app, mobile apps for iOS and Android, and kiosk apps for iOS and Android that turn a tablet or PC into a punch clock |
| Integrations and API | Integrations with POS, payroll, analytics, hiring, back office and training tools; a REST API at api.7shifts.com/v2 for sales, time punches, employees, schedules and reports, with webhooks, an embed SDK, OAuth for partners with endpoint access tied to the plan, and a public read-only MCP server | API access with developer support listed in the plan comparison, OAuth access managed in the developer portal, and integrations with Lightspeed, BeLocum, Hopem and Azur besides the payroll systems |
| AI features | Yes | Yes |
| MCP-ready | stated Yes | No |
| Deployment | more entries Cloud (SaaS), Browser-based | Cloud (SaaS) |
| Support | Not stated | Chat, Phone, Email helpdesk |
| Onboarding | Documentation and knowledge base | more entries Documentation and knowledge base, Video tutorials, Guided onboarding |
| Company size | more entries Small and mid-sized, Enterprise | Small and mid-sized |
| Integrations | Not stated | EmployerD, Nethris, Sage 50, Acomba, QuickBooks, Ceridian Powerpay, ADP Workforce Now, Payworks, Easypay, Lightspeed, BeLocum, Hopem, Azur |
Adds a column to the table, from the tools in this category.
Row where the values differ The small markers point at the lower number, the longer list or the stated feature. They describe the data, they are not a verdict.
The short version
Every line is one datapoint from the table above, picked automatically. Nothing here is written text.
The trade-offs
7shifts
Strengths
Limitations
Agendrix
Strengths
Limitations
Plans
7shifts
Agendrix
What users say
7shifts
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Agendrix
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Where this comes from
7shifts https://www.7shifts.com · checked against the official source on 2026-11-05
Agendrix https://www.agendrix.com/ · checked against the official source on 2026-11-07
This table lists factual criteria taken from information the vendors publish themselves. For how we put it together, see the methodology.