§ The result
2 points separate BrightHire and Stepstone.
Under rubric v1.0, BrightHire and Stepstone finish 2 points apart, 51 to 49, as two Screening entries. BrightHire leads 5 of the 7 criteria, including FRIA Support, while Stepstone leads 1, including Article 11 Technical Documentation, and 1 is level. The advantage BrightHire holds is spread out: FRIA Support is both the widest raw gap and the heaviest weighted swing (BrightHire 36, Stepstone 30, 15% weight), yet it supplies only 33% of the weighted points BrightHire gains across the 5 criteria it leads.
Vendor profile
BrightHire
BrightHire is an interview intelligence platform that records, transcribes and analyzes hiring interviews into competency-structured notes and ATS scorecards, and additionally runs AI-led screening interviews (BrightHire Screen) that score and rank candidates against customer-defined rubrics.
Vendor profile
Stepstone
Stepstone is a German job marketplace whose Stepstone Recruit employer platform includes an AI Screening Agent, which rates each application against requirements taken from the job ad, and a Talent Finder, which recommends candidates from a CV database of more than 4 million profiles.
§ The record
BrightHire and Stepstone are both filed under Screening AI. They record no secondary category in common.
Both are in scope of EU AI Act, NYC LL 144, Illinois HB 3773 and Colorado AI Act. Only BrightHire is in scope of Mobley v. Workday.
| Record | BrightHire | Stepstone |
|---|---|---|
| Price tier | High | Mid |
| Headquarters | US | DE |
| Founded | 2019 | 1996 |
§ What decides it
The criteria that move the gap, heaviest swing first.
15% weight · 27% of the movement so far
FRIA Support
BrightHire 36 · Stepstone 30
0.9 weighted points to BrightHire
15% weight · 50% of the movement so far
Data Governance Disclosure
BrightHire 60 · Stepstone 55
0.8 weighted points to BrightHire
20% weight · 68% of the movement so far
Article 11 Technical Documentation
BrightHire 52 · Stepstone 55
0.6 weighted points to Stepstone
12% weight · 83% of the movement so far
Post-Market Monitoring
BrightHire 42 · Stepstone 38
0.5 weighted points to BrightHire
8% weight · 93% of the movement so far
Customer Documentation
BrightHire 62 · Stepstone 58
0.3 weighted points to BrightHire
12% weight · 100% of the movement so far
Human Oversight Design
BrightHire 60 · Stepstone 58
0.2 weighted points to BrightHire
Weighted delta is the raw difference times the criterion weight, so the 6 figures above sum to +2.1 — the difference between the two totals before either is rounded. Shares are of 3.3 points of movement counted without direction. The table below rounds each side to a whole number first, so its Δ raw total reads +2 beside that +2.1.
§ Category-by-category
Raw score per criterion, with weighted delta.
Δ is BrightHire minus Stepstone.
| Category | Weight | BrightHire | Stepstone | Δ raw | Δ weighted |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Article 11 Technical Documentation | 20% | 52 | 55 | -3 | -0.6 |
| Bias Audit Transparency | 18% | 50 | 50 | - | - |
| FRIA Support | 15% | 36 | 30 | +6 | +0.9 |
| Data Governance Disclosure | 15% | 60 | 55 | +5 | +0.8 |
| Human Oversight Design | 12% | 60 | 58 | +2 | +0.2 |
| Post-Market Monitoring | 12% | 42 | 38 | +4 | +0.5 |
| Customer Documentation | 8% | 62 | 58 | +4 | +0.3 |
| Total | 100% | 51 (F) | 49 (F) | +2 | +2.1 |
§ Evidence
Cited sources and documented absences, criterion by criterion.
An absence is a finding, not a blank: the reviewer looked for a named artefact and recorded that it is not located. Where a source sits is a fact about hosting only.
| Criterion | Weight | BrightHire | Stepstone | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cited | Absences | Audit / hosting | Cited | Absences | Audit / hosting | ||
| Article 11 Technical Documentation | 20% | 2 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 5 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain |
| Bias Audit Transparency | 18% | 2 | 1 | Audit reportSources on the vendor's own domain | 3 | 1 | Audit reportSources on a separate domain |
| FRIA Support | 15% | 2 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 2 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| Data Governance Disclosure | 15% | 3 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 6 | 0 | Sources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain |
| Human Oversight Design | 12% | 3 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 5 | 0 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| Post-Market Monitoring | 12% | 2 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 3 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain |
| Customer Documentation | 8% | 2 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 5 | 0 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| All criteria | 100% | 16 | 7 | Audit reportSources on the vendor's own domain | 29 | 4 | Audit reportSources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain |
BrightHire has 23 evidence rows across 7 of 7 criteria — 16 with a source URL, 7 documented absences; Stepstone has 33 evidence rows across 7 of 7 criteria — 29 with a source URL, 4 documented absences; some documentation or audit rows for Stepstone sit on a domain separate from the vendor's own site.
Provenance
The scores above are documented by 56 evidence rows on file for these two vendors: 23 for BrightHire, across 2 distinct source domains, and 33 for Stepstone, across 6 distinct source domains.
- Rubric
- v1.0
- BrightHire last reviewed
- August 2, 2026 · HireAIScore editorial team
- Stepstone last reviewed
- September 25, 2026 · HireAIScore editorial team
HireAIScore scores are editorial research, not legal advice, and no vendor pays for placement, scoring or removal — see the methodology, conflicts policy and terms.
§ Where next