Equip positions itself as a budget-friendly B2B assessment solution with a DIY setup. While the platform has gained popularity among universities and early-stage startups for academic and quiz-based evaluations, there’s more to the story.
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Though Equip offers value in specific use cases, recruiters assessing enterprise-grade hiring platforms often express concerns about scalability, compliance, and flexibility.
Still seeing the “₹85 or $1 per candidate” claim from Equip and wondering if it truly fits your enterprise hiring needs? This blog breaks down the facts to help you decide whether it is a sustainable long-term choice or if switching to a better Equip alternative like “Xobin” makes more sense.
TL;DR – Key Takeaways!
- Expensive at Scale: Equip charges ₹85 or $1 per test. So, assessing 10,000 candidates with one single test can cost between ₹7,22,500 ($8,500) and ₹8,50,000 ($10,000).
- High Cost for Multi-Test Assessments: To evaluate a candidate’s behaviour, skills, and coding ability, you must create three separate tests (Skills test with quiz, psychometric test, and coding test). That means ₹255 or $3 per candidate. Testing 10,000 candidates would then cost between ₹21,67,500 ($25,500) and ₹25,50,000 ($30,000), hardly sustainable for growing teams.
- Weak compliance: No visible GDPR, SOC 2, or DPDP certifications, a red flag for data privacy and enterprise trust.
- Few integrations: Only integrates with Lever ATS; no support for Greenhouse, Workday, or Zapier
- Small test library: Few pre-built tests, focusing more on academic quizzes than enterprise-ready skills assessments.
- More Academia-Friendly: Despite having some enterprise clients, Equip’s design still caters more to academia but struggles with enterprise-scale hiring.
- Low Transparency: No clarity on question quality, difficulty levels or psychometric validation.
- Verdict: A better Equip alternative is Xobin with 3,400+ validated and customizable skill tests, 2,500+ job role-based assessments, full compliance, seamless integrations, advanced AI-based proctoring, employee skill gap analysis, and much more.
What Is Equip?
Equip is cloud-based assessment software, offering tests across quizzes, coding, psychometric, and video formats. It’s widely adopted by educational institutions and early-stage startups for basic evaluations.
However, for companies relying on Equip for critical hiring decisions, it’s important to assess its transparency, compliance, and feature limitations before scaling.
If you’re seeking an Equip alternative that ensures predictable pricing, airtight compliance, and in-depth assessments, explore Xobin, a platform built for modern enterprise hiring challenges.
Book A Demo7 Must-Know Insights Before Choosing Equip
If you’re hiring at scale across multiple roles and departments, the following insights highlight key limitations of Equip you should be aware of.
1. Expensive at Scale
Equip is marketed as affordable, but the numbers tell a different story!
For example:
If you are assessing 10,000 candidates with a single test, Equip charges approximately 10,000 x 85 x 1 = ₹8,50,000 ($10,000) and ₹7,22,500 ($8,500) with a 15% discount. Hardly budget-friendly for scaling teams!
For organizations hiring at scale, this pricing structure quickly adds up, making the total cost of ownership far higher than initially perceived.
2. High Cost for Multi-Test Assessments
Equip advertises pricing at ₹85 or $1 per test per candidate. It adds up quickly when you run multi-skill assessments with many candidates.
It means creating one Assessment/Test that includes three tests (skill test with quiz, programming test, psychometric test) requires three credits.
With each credit costing ₹85 or $1, the total becomes ₹255 or $3 per candidate. As their website explicitly states, “Credits needed depend on the number of tests, not test types.”
So, to assess 10,000 candidates, the total cost becomes 10,000 x 85 x 3 = ₹25,50,000 ($30,000) and ₹21,67,500 ($25,500) with a 15% discount. A significant investment for a supposedly “budget” solution. And that’s without advanced integrations or compliance features.
This pricing model can strain recruitment budgets, especially for fast-growing teams managing bulk hiring.
So the question arises, is Equip a good value for money?
Recruiters switching from Equip to Xobin have pointed to this volatile pricing as a budgeting risk, especially for teams managing large hiring volumes or multi-quarter contracts.
3. Weak Compliance and Data Protection Framework
For enterprise hiring, data protection and compliance (GDPR, CCPA, SOC2, DPDP) matter a lot. Equip’s privacy policy describes standard security measures (SSL and malware scans).
It collects sensitive candidate data such as IP addresses, webcam feeds, and video recordings. Yet, their website shows no mention of compliance certifications such as GDPR, SOC2, CCPA, or India’s DPDP Act. These standards are crucial for global and Indian organizations that prioritize handling candidate data responsibly, ensuring data protection and global privacy laws.
Without these certifications, Equip’s data security remains unverified, creating potential risks for employers that operate in regulated industries.
In today’s world, where data privacy defines trust, this omission is a significant red flag.
4. Integration Gaps and Workflow Compatibility
Equip’s official blog confirms its only ATS integration is with Lever, announced in July 2022. No updates or new partnerships have been added since then.
That means:
- No support for LinkedIn, Naukri, or leading job boards
- No connections to Zapier, Greenhouse, Workday, or HCM tools
Source: Equip blog on its ATS integration with Lever!
Moreover, for organizations relying on automated hiring workflows, this means more manual work and reduced productivity.
Why settle for manual steps when automation is the norm?
With Xobin, your favorite HR tools connect effortlessly! No extra hassle and no wasted time. The result? A smarter, faster hiring process. Explore Xobin’s Integration Partners to see how easily it fits into your existing hiring stack.
5. Limited Pre-Built Tests
Equip mentions a “vast question bank” across 100+ skills, but it doesn’t specify the number of ready-to-use pre-built tests or assessments. This makes it unclear how comprehensive or customizable their existing tests truly are.
They have mentioned that many recruiters “add a single quiz with up to 25 questions across 6 skills.”
For organizations requiring assessments across 15+ skills, coding simulations, or psychometric tests, this setup is limiting.
The Equip’s test library primarily focuses on basic aptitude and academic content, which falls short for enterprise-grade hiring that demands validated, role-specific assessments.
In contrast, Xobin provides validated and customizable 3,400+ skills assessments and 2,500+ job role-based assessments, all curated by industry experts and psychometricians, enabling recruiters to start hiring in minutes, not hours.
6. More Academia-Friendly than Enterprise-Ready
Equip supports up to 10,000 concurrent candidates, making it suitable for controlled academic settings. However, for high-volume enterprise hiring, especially if multiple large clients assess candidates simultaneously, performance issues such as timeouts and lag may occur.
While Equip does serve some enterprise customers, its design and origins make it better suited for academia and small teams. That makes it less viable for enterprise-grade bulk hiring.
7. Limited Transparency in Test Content
Hiring teams need clarity and control. Right?
Equip mentions that each quiz can have up to 25 questions across 6 skills, and users can combine multiple tests to expand coverage. However, recruiters have no clear visibility into question difficulty, topic mapping, or psychometric validation standards.
In enterprise hiring, lack of test transparency can result in misaligned evaluations and inconsistent candidate benchmarking.
Xobin vs Equip: A Transparent Comparison
| Feature | Equip | Xobin |
| Pricing Transparency | ₹85 per test, not per assessment. Costs multiply for multi-test evaluations. Assessing 10,000 candidates with 3 tests (skill test with quiz, programming test, psychometric test) costs over ₹21,67,500 ($24,412.81) | Flat, predictable pricing per candidate, with no hidden credits or test-based add-ons. |
| Compliance & Certifications | No public mention of GDPR, SOC 2, CCPA, or DPDP Act compliance. | Fully compliant with GDPR, ISO 27001, and SOC 2, ensuring top-tier data security and privacy. |
| Integration Support | Only one ATS integration (Lever) as of July 2022. No updates since. | 20+ integrations with top ATS, HRMS, and job boards like LinkedIn, Naukri, Greenhouse, Workday, and Zapier. |
| Pre-Built Test Library | No clear count; offers a “vast question bank” for 100+ skills, mainly academic and basic aptitude. | 3,400+ customizable skill tests and 2,500+ job-role-based assessments with 180,000+ extensive question library validated by subject matter experts. |
| Customization Flexibility | Limited. Requires credits for each additional test type. | Fully customizable. Add sections like coding, psychometric, and situational judgment at no extra cost. |
| Target Users | Primarily designed for universities and academic assessments. | Built for enterprises, startups, mid-size businesses, universities and high-volume hiring teams across industries. |
| Test Transparency | Question difficulty and psychometric validation are not clearly defined. | Scientifically validated customizable tests with clear skill mapping, different difficulty levels, and AI evaluation. |
| Support & Service | Email-based support, limited responsiveness. | 24×7 dedicated support with account managers and priority SLAs for enterprise clients. |
Is Equip Right for Your Hiring Needs?
If you are running a smaller hiring campaign, using one test per role, Equip can be a viable choice. However, if you face multi-skill roles, high-volume hiring across geographies, and need strong data governance, wide systems integration and deep customization, you should seriously evaluate whether Equip meets your enterprise needs.
In many such cases, switches are made to platforms built for scale like Xobin, which provide clearer value, fewer surprises and a stronger fit for enterprise hiring workflows.
Xobin is purpose-built for high-volume, compliant, and scalable hiring, delivering predictable pricing, richer analytics, and seamless automation.
Ready to move beyond limited, unpredictable solutions? Book a personalized demo with Xobin today and see how predictable pricing, deep assessments, and compliance-ready features can empower your recruitment team.
Disclaimer: This article is based on publicly available information, independent research, and recruiter feedback at the time of writing. While we strive for accuracy, features and pricing may change. Readers are encouraged to verify details directly with Equip.co for the latest updates.
