§ The result
Stepstone leads ZipRecruiter by 9 points.
Stepstone scores 49 and ZipRecruiter 40 under rubric v1.0, a 9-point gap across the Screening and Sourcing cohorts. ZipRecruiter takes 1 of the 7 criteria, Post-Market Monitoring among them, against 6 for Stepstone, whose share includes Bias Audit Transparency. One criterion, Bias Audit Transparency, is both the widest raw gap (Stepstone 50, ZipRecruiter 24) and the heaviest weighted swing, and at 18% weight it makes up 51% of the weighted advantage Stepstone holds across the 6 criteria it leads.
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.
Vendor profile
ZipRecruiter
ZipRecruiter is an online employment marketplace whose AI matching engine sends employers' job postings out, alerts matched job seekers and invites them to apply, and labels and ranks applicants (for example as 'Great Match') in the employer's candidate dashboard.
§ The record
Stepstone is filed under Screening AI, ZipRecruiter under Candidate sourcing 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 | Stepstone | ZipRecruiter |
|---|---|---|
| Price tier | Mid | Mid |
| Headquarters | DE | US |
| Founded | 1996 | 2010 |
§ What decides it
The criteria that move the gap, heaviest swing first.
18% weight · 49% of the movement so far
Bias Audit Transparency
Stepstone 50 · ZipRecruiter 24
4.7 weighted points to Stepstone
20% weight · 81% of the movement so far
Article 11 Technical Documentation
Stepstone 55 · ZipRecruiter 40
3.0 weighted points to Stepstone
15% weight · 86% of the movement so far
FRIA Support
Stepstone 30 · ZipRecruiter 27
0.4 weighted points to Stepstone
15% weight · 90% of the movement so far
Data Governance Disclosure
Stepstone 55 · ZipRecruiter 52
0.4 weighted points to Stepstone
12% weight · 94% of the movement so far
Human Oversight Design
Stepstone 58 · ZipRecruiter 55
0.4 weighted points to Stepstone
8% weight · 97% of the movement so far
Customer Documentation
Stepstone 58 · ZipRecruiter 54
0.3 weighted points to Stepstone
12% weight · 100% of the movement so far
Post-Market Monitoring
Stepstone 38 · ZipRecruiter 40
0.2 weighted points to ZipRecruiter
Weighted delta is the raw difference times the criterion weight, so the 7 figures above sum to +9.0 — the difference between the two totals before either is rounded. Shares are of 9.5 points of movement counted without direction. The table below rounds each side to a whole number first, so its Δ raw total reads +9 beside that +9.0.
§ Category-by-category
Raw score per criterion, with weighted delta.
Δ is Stepstone minus ZipRecruiter.
| Category | Weight | Stepstone | ZipRecruiter | Δ raw | Δ weighted |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Article 11 Technical Documentation | 20% | 55 | 40 | +15 | +3.0 |
| Bias Audit Transparency | 18% | 50 | 24 | +26 | +4.7 |
| FRIA Support | 15% | 30 | 27 | +3 | +0.4 |
| Data Governance Disclosure | 15% | 55 | 52 | +3 | +0.4 |
| Human Oversight Design | 12% | 58 | 55 | +3 | +0.4 |
| Post-Market Monitoring | 12% | 38 | 40 | -2 | -0.2 |
| Customer Documentation | 8% | 58 | 54 | +4 | +0.3 |
| Total | 100% | 49 (F) | 40 (F) | +9 | +9.0 |
§ 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 | Stepstone | ZipRecruiter | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cited | Absences | Audit / hosting | Cited | Absences | Audit / hosting | ||
| Article 11 Technical Documentation | 20% | 5 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain | 5 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain |
| Bias Audit Transparency | 18% | 3 | 1 | Audit reportSources on a separate domain | 3 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain |
| FRIA Support | 15% | 2 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 3 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain |
| Data Governance Disclosure | 15% | 6 | 0 | Sources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain | 4 | 0 | Sources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain |
| Human Oversight Design | 12% | 5 | 0 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 6 | 0 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| Post-Market Monitoring | 12% | 3 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain | 3 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| Customer Documentation | 8% | 5 | 0 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 4 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| All criteria | 100% | 29 | 4 | Audit reportSources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain | 28 | 5 | Sources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain |
Stepstone has 33 evidence rows across 7 of 7 criteria — 29 with a source URL, 4 documented absences; ZipRecruiter has 33 evidence rows across 7 of 7 criteria — 28 with a source URL, 5 documented absences; some documentation or audit rows for Stepstone and ZipRecruiter sit on a domain separate from the vendor's own site.
Provenance
The scores above are documented by 66 evidence rows on file for these two vendors: 33 for Stepstone, across 6 distinct source domains, and 33 for ZipRecruiter, across 6 distinct source domains.
- Rubric
- v1.0
- Stepstone last reviewed
- September 25, 2026 · HireAIScore editorial team
- ZipRecruiter 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