§ The result
Handshake leads softgarden on 5 of the 7 criteria.
Under rubric v1.0, Handshake, filed under Screening, finishes on 50 and softgarden, filed under ATS-integrated, on 42, 8 points apart. softgarden is ahead on none of the 7 criteria: Handshake takes 5, the remaining 2 are level, and the nearest of those 5 is Customer Documentation, Handshake 60 to softgarden 58. Bias Audit Transparency is both the widest raw gap and the heaviest weighted swing — Handshake 52, softgarden 22 — and at an 18% weight it carries 70% of the weighted advantage Handshake holds across the 5 criteria on that side of the table.
Vendor profile
Handshake
Handshake is an early-career recruiting network whose employer tools use AI to rank applicants against employer-set criteria, find and message matching students and graduates, and target job promotions.
Vendor profile
softgarden
softgarden is a German cloud applicant tracking system (multiposting, career sites, applicant management and onboarding) with optional AI features: AI-Assisted Applicant Matching, which highlights applicants who closely match a job's requirements, and a newer LLM-based Screening Assistant, which scores each applicant against screening criteria.
§ The record
Handshake is filed under Screening AI, softgarden under ATS-integrated AI. They record no secondary category in common.
Both are in scope of EU AI Act, NYC LL 144, Colorado AI Act and Illinois HB 3773.
| Record | Handshake | softgarden |
|---|---|---|
| Price tier | Mid | Mid |
| Headquarters | US | DE |
| Founded | 2014 | 2001 |
§ What decides it
The criteria that move the gap, heaviest swing first.
18% weight · 70% of the movement so far
Bias Audit Transparency
Handshake 52 · softgarden 22
5.4 weighted points to Handshake
20% weight · 86% of the movement so far
Article 11 Technical Documentation
Handshake 48 · softgarden 42
1.2 weighted points to Handshake
12% weight · 92% of the movement so far
Post-Market Monitoring
Handshake 48 · softgarden 44
0.5 weighted points to Handshake
15% weight · 98% of the movement so far
Data Governance Disclosure
Handshake 57 · softgarden 54
0.4 weighted points to Handshake
8% weight · 100% of the movement so far
Customer Documentation
Handshake 60 · softgarden 58
0.2 weighted points to Handshake
Weighted delta is the raw difference times the criterion weight, so the 5 figures above sum to +7.7 — the difference between the two totals before either is rounded. Shares are of 7.7 points of movement counted without direction. The table below rounds each side to a whole number first, so its Δ raw total reads +8 beside that +7.7.
§ Category-by-category
Raw score per criterion, with weighted delta.
Δ is Handshake minus softgarden.
| Category | Weight | Handshake | softgarden | Δ raw | Δ weighted |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Article 11 Technical Documentation | 20% | 48 | 42 | +6 | +1.2 |
| Bias Audit Transparency | 18% | 52 | 22 | +30 | +5.4 |
| FRIA Support | 15% | 30 | 30 | - | - |
| Data Governance Disclosure | 15% | 57 | 54 | +3 | +0.4 |
| Human Oversight Design | 12% | 58 | 58 | - | - |
| Post-Market Monitoring | 12% | 48 | 44 | +4 | +0.5 |
| Customer Documentation | 8% | 60 | 58 | +2 | +0.2 |
| Total | 100% | 50 (F) | 42 (F) | +8 | +7.7 |
§ 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 | Handshake | softgarden | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cited | Absences | Audit / hosting | Cited | Absences | Audit / hosting | ||
| Article 11 Technical Documentation | 20% | 4 | 1 | Audit reportSources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain | 6 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| Bias Audit Transparency | 18% | 5 | 1 | Audit reportSources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain | 3 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| FRIA Support | 15% | 3 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 3 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| Data Governance Disclosure | 15% | 4 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 7 | 0 | Audit reportSources on the vendor's own domain |
| Human Oversight Design | 12% | 4 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 5 | 0 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| Post-Market Monitoring | 12% | 3 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 5 | 1 | Audit reportSources on the vendor's own domain |
| Customer Documentation | 8% | 4 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 2 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| All criteria | 100% | 27 | 7 | Audit reportSources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain | 31 | 5 | Audit reportSources on the vendor's own domain |
Handshake has 34 evidence rows across 7 of 7 criteria — 27 with a source URL, 7 documented absences; softgarden has 36 evidence rows across 7 of 7 criteria — 31 with a source URL, 5 documented absences; some documentation or audit rows for Handshake sit on a domain separate from the vendor's own site.
Provenance
The scores above are documented by 70 evidence rows on file for these two vendors: 34 for Handshake, across 2 distinct source domains, and 36 for softgarden, across 3 distinct source domains.
- Rubric
- v1.0
- Handshake last reviewed
- September 25, 2026 · HireAIScore editorial team
- softgarden 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