§ The result
Stepstone leads SeekOut on all 7 criteria.
Stepstone finishes 15 points clear of SeekOut under rubric v1.0 — 49 against 34 — across the Screening and Sourcing cohorts. Stepstone leads every one of the 7 criteria and 3 of them by 20 raw points or more, Article 11 Technical Documentation among them; SeekOut leads none. Customer Documentation is the widest raw gap (SeekOut 35, Stepstone 58) but not the heaviest weighted swing, which is Article 11 Technical Documentation at 20% (SeekOut 35, Stepstone 55), 28% of the weighted advantage Stepstone builds across the 7 criteria it leads.
Vendor profile
SeekOut
Sourcing platform aggregating public profile data into a searchable talent index, with AI-assisted candidate matching and outreach.
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
SeekOut is filed under Candidate sourcing AI, Stepstone under Screening AI. They record no secondary category in common.
Both are in scope of EU AI Act, Colorado AI Act and NYC LL 144. Only Stepstone is in scope of Illinois HB 3773.
| Record | SeekOut | Stepstone |
|---|---|---|
| Price tier | Enterprise | Mid |
| Headquarters | US | DE |
| Founded | 2017 | 1996 |
§ What decides it
The criteria that move the gap, heaviest swing first.
20% weight · 28% of the movement so far
Article 11 Technical Documentation
SeekOut 35 · Stepstone 55
4.0 weighted points to Stepstone
15% weight · 48% of the movement so far
Data Governance Disclosure
SeekOut 35 · Stepstone 55
3.0 weighted points to Stepstone
8% weight · 61% of the movement so far
Customer Documentation
SeekOut 35 · Stepstone 58
1.8 weighted points to Stepstone
18% weight · 73% of the movement so far
Bias Audit Transparency
SeekOut 40 · Stepstone 50
1.8 weighted points to Stepstone
12% weight · 84% of the movement so far
Human Oversight Design
SeekOut 45 · Stepstone 58
1.6 weighted points to Stepstone
12% weight · 95% of the movement so far
Post-Market Monitoring
SeekOut 25 · Stepstone 38
1.6 weighted points to Stepstone
15% weight · 100% of the movement so far
FRIA Support
SeekOut 25 · Stepstone 30
0.8 weighted points to Stepstone
Weighted delta is the raw difference times the criterion weight, so the 7 figures above sum to -14.5 — the difference between the two totals before either is rounded. Shares are of 14.5 points of movement counted without direction. The table below rounds each side to a whole number first, so its Δ raw total reads -15 beside that -14.5.
§ Category-by-category
Raw score per criterion, with weighted delta.
Δ is SeekOut minus Stepstone.
| Category | Weight | SeekOut | Stepstone | Δ raw | Δ weighted |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Article 11 Technical Documentation | 20% | 35 | 55 | -20 | -4.0 |
| Bias Audit Transparency | 18% | 40 | 50 | -10 | -1.8 |
| FRIA Support | 15% | 25 | 30 | -5 | -0.8 |
| Data Governance Disclosure | 15% | 35 | 55 | -20 | -3.0 |
| Human Oversight Design | 12% | 45 | 58 | -13 | -1.6 |
| Post-Market Monitoring | 12% | 25 | 38 | -13 | -1.6 |
| Customer Documentation | 8% | 35 | 58 | -23 | -1.8 |
| Total | 100% | 34 (F) | 49 (F) | -15 | -14.5 |
§ 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 | SeekOut | Stepstone | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cited | Absences | Audit / hosting | Cited | Absences | Audit / hosting | ||
| Article 11 Technical Documentation | 20% | 1 | 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% | 1 | 1 | — | 3 | 1 | Audit reportSources on a separate domain |
| FRIA Support | 15% | 0 | 1 | — | 2 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| Data Governance Disclosure | 15% | 1 | 0 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 6 | 0 | Sources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain |
| Human Oversight Design | 12% | 1 | 0 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 5 | 0 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| Post-Market Monitoring | 12% | 0 | 1 | — | 3 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain |
| Customer Documentation | 8% | 1 | 0 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 5 | 0 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| All criteria | 100% | 5 | 4 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 29 | 4 | Audit reportSources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain |
SeekOut has 9 evidence rows across 7 of 7 criteria — 5 with a source URL, 4 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 42 evidence rows on file for these two vendors: 9 for SeekOut, across 1 distinct source domain, and 33 for Stepstone, across 6 distinct source domains.
- Rubric
- v1.0
- SeekOut last reviewed
- May 21, 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