Alva Labs
Alva Labs sells a science-backed hiring platform whose core is a suite of proprietary psychometric assessments - an adaptive logic (general mental ability) test, a Five-Factor Model personality test, and coding tests - wrapped in candidate management, CV screening, and structured-interview tooling.
HireAIScore rates Alva Labs 61 out of 100 (grade D, Concerning) under rubric v1.0, last reviewed August 2, 2026. Alva Labs ranks 3 of 49 vendors rated in Assessment AI, against a category average of 48. That score is drawn from 35 evidence items across 7 rubric criteria for Alva Labs — 28 with a cited source, 7 recording that nothing was located.
§ 01 - Company facts
- Legal name
- Alva Labs AB
- Founded
- 2017
- Headquarters
- Sweden · SE
- Pricing tier
- Mid
- Market side
- Employer-side (AEDT)
- Categories
- AssessmentScreeningATS-integrated
- Website
- alvalabs.io
These are company details, not findings. They are editable by a verified representative and carry no weight in the score, which is built only from the cited evidence below.
§ 02 - Score breakdown
§ Score breakdown
Category scoring
Weighted contribution shown to the right of each bar.
- 01
Article 11 Technical Documentation
Weight 20%78
+15.6 · category avg 53
- 02
Bias Audit Transparency
Weight 18%58
+10.4 · category avg 47
- 03
FRIA Support
Weight 15%38
+5.7 · category avg 32
- 04
Data Governance Disclosure
Weight 15%68
+10.2 · category avg 55
- 05
Human Oversight Design
Weight 12%63
+7.6 · category avg 55
- 06
Post-Market Monitoring
Weight 12%52
+6.2 · category avg 39
- 07
Customer Documentation
Weight 8%68
+5.4 · category avg 59
Category avg is the mean raw score on that criterion across the 49 Assessment AI vendors in scope of this rubric, this one included.
§ 03 - Strongest · weakest
Strongest category
Article 11 Technical Documentation
Raw score 78 · contributes 15.6 to total.
78 against a 53 category average
Weakest category
FRIA Support
Raw score 38 · contributes 5.7 to total.
38 against a 32 category average
§ 04 - Cited evidence
Download diligence record→§ Evidence
Cited per category
Every score is backed by at least one cited piece of evidence.
Evidence ledger
- Items
- 35
- Documentation
- 26
- Audit report
- 1
- Public statement
- 1
- Absence
- 7
- With a source URL
- 28 of 35
- Source hostnames
- 4
- Fewest items
- 3
- FRIA Support
These figures measure how thoroughly Alva Labs was reviewed, not how Alva Labs performed — an absence row, recording that nothing was located, is counted like any other item.
Article 11 Technical Documentation
6 items78
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Dedicated Safe AI page states Alva is 'among the first companies in the world to be certified according to ISO/IEC 42001', names DNV as the certifying body, links a DNV certificate checker entry, and scopes certification across the proprietary psychometric tests, candidate platform AI layer, customer platform and internal AI governance systems.
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Help article documents an AI Management System (AIMS) built on ISO/IEC 42001 and the EU AI Act, enumerates the seven EU AI Act trustworthy-AI values Alva has adopted, and records that Unidot audited the AIMS implementation in February 2025 ahead of DNV certification.
https://help.alvalabs.io/en/articles/10654836-safe-ai-at-alva
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
'How AI Is Used in Your Hiring Processes' (dated 28 February 2025) gives feature-level explainability, describing LLM use for job-title cleaning and taxonomy matching, interview-question generation from personality traits, and automatic coding-test scoring against a 0-2 scorecard.
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
'AI in Alva's Psychometric Tests' documents the modelling stack - machine learning for response-pattern trends, Item Response Theory for item effectiveness, and Bayesian inference via NumPyro for difficulty, validity and reliability estimates.
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Public help-center page offering the Alva Logic Test technical manual as a downloadable PDF, last updated 26 February 2025.
https://help.alvalabs.io/en/articles/4510873-technical-manual
- AbsenceCaptured Aug 2, 2026
No Annex IV technical documentation pack, model card, or system card was found across alvalabs.io/trust/safe-ai, alvalabs.io/trust/science, the help center, or web searches for 'Alva Labs model card / system card / instructions for use'.
Bias Audit Transparency
5 items58
- Audit reportCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Personality test product page states the test is 'DNV-certified' and 'Certified to ISO 10667-2', describing this as 'Independent third-party validation of scientific rigour and practical utility'.
https://www.alvalabs.io/hiring-system/assessments/personality-test
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Science page states Differential Item Functioning (DIF) analysis is performed on all items before deployment with biased items flagged, revised or removed, and cites calibration on 1.5 million candidates with full item-bank recalibration every 18 months.
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Product page asserts 'Personality assessments show minimal group differences across gender, ethnicity, and age' but publishes no impact ratios, effect sizes, or demographic sample sizes to support it.
https://www.alvalabs.io/hiring-system/assessments/personality-test
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Publicly downloadable PDF confirmed as 'Alva's Logic Test - Technical Manual.pdf', linked from the help center; the PDF body could not be parsed by the fetch tool, so its adverse-impact contents could not be independently verified.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rtSwbtF-tPJ0t0rTYJf6BLhXQbMvEgpY/view
- AbsenceCaptured Aug 2, 2026
No NYC Local Law 144 bias audit summary and no independent algorithmic bias audit by a named auditor (BABL AI, Warden AI, Holistic AI, ORCAA, DCI, Credo AI) was found on alvalabs.io/trust/safe-ai, the security page, the science page, the help center, or via targeted searches pairing 'Alva Labs' with those auditors and with 'bias audit' / 'adverse impact' / 'Local Law 144'.
FRIA Support
3 items38
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
States Alva's AI Task Force 'conducts risk and impact assessments on our AI systems' to identify how they could negatively impact individuals and communities and to explore mitigations - a provider-side impact assessment, not a deployer FRIA.
https://help.alvalabs.io/en/articles/10654836-safe-ai-at-alva
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Assigns customers a concrete obligation to review and, if needed, correct AI feature outputs for accuracy, relevance and fairness, and provides ai@alvalabs.io as the channel for reporting AI-related harm - partial deployer guidance.
https://help.alvalabs.io/en/articles/10654836-safe-ai-at-alva
- AbsenceCaptured Aug 2, 2026
No Article 27 Fundamental Rights Impact Assessment template, checklist, or deployer-obligation guidance was found on alvalabs.io/trust/safe-ai, alvalabs.io/trust/security-gdpr, alvalabs.io/trust/science, the help center, or via searches pairing 'Alva Labs' with 'Fundamental Rights Impact Assessment', 'Article 27' and 'deployer'.
Data Governance Disclosure
5 items68
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
States candidate data stays in the EU and 'is never used to train third-party models'- an explicit training-data exclusion - alongside ISO/IEC 27001 and GDPR compliance.
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Security page documents AES-256 encryption at rest, TLS 1.2+ in transit, third-party key management via Thales with Key Access Justifications, annual external penetration testing, and a 24-month default data retention window, and links an ISO 27001 certificate and a security practices PDF.
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Sets out the data categories collected, distinguishes Alva's three GDPR roles (processor, joint controller, independent controller) with the legal basis for each, and confirms processing is governed by a Data Processing Agreement.
https://help.alvalabs.io/en/articles/14594840-how-alva-labs-protects-and-processes-your-data
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Documents a 24-month default retention clock from candidate creation with admin-configurable, country-specific retention periods and anonymisation of names, emails, test results and interview notes at expiry.
- AbsenceCaptured Aug 2, 2026
The sub-processor list linked from the security page (app.alvalabs.io/data-processors) did not render any sub-processor names publicly when fetched, so the roster appears gated behind the application; no SOC 2 report was found anywhere on the site.
Human Oversight Design
5 items63
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
States 'It is 100% optional to use these AI features', lets users customise coding-review scorecards and regenerate interview questions if unsatisfactory, giving concrete per-feature opt-out and override controls.
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Frames AI as 'built to support, not replace, human decision-making', names Human Agency and Oversight as the first of its seven adopted values, and requires users to review and correct AI outputs before relying on them.
https://help.alvalabs.io/en/articles/10654836-safe-ai-at-alva
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Confirms ML models surface item-level trends but that Alva's psychometricians retain authority to adjust or remove test questions, keeping a human in the loop on model changes.
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Candidate-facing page states 'You receive the full report immediately after completing the test. It's the same report the recruiter sees. No hidden scores.', giving candidates symmetric visibility into the output used to evaluate them.
- AbsenceCaptured Aug 2, 2026
No per-jurisdiction compliance toggles, override audit logs, or documented candidate right to request human review of an assessment outcome were found on the candidates page, the Safe AI pages, or the help center.
Post-Market Monitoring
5 items52
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Live public status page monitoring the Alva App (5 components, 99.97% uptime), Integrations (9 components) and email delivery, with viewable incident history and subscribe-to-updates notifications.
- Public statementCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Publishes ai@alvalabs.io as a dedicated channel for reporting AI features that may harm individuals, and describes ongoing supplier and tooling review by the compliance team.
https://help.alvalabs.io/en/articles/10654836-safe-ai-at-alva
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
States continuous monitoring of assessments with full item-bank recalibration every 18 months, giving a published cadence for model revalidation.
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Documents annual penetration testing by external security experts as a recurring post-deployment assurance activity.
- AbsenceCaptured Aug 2, 2026
No continuous fairness-monitoring dashboard, model-update changelog for assessment scoring, or published vulnerability disclosure policy was found on status.alvalabs.io, the security page, the Safe AI pages, or the help center.
Customer Documentation
6 items68
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Trust hub page consolidating certifications, encryption, retention and GDPR posture, and linking out to the ISO 27001 certificate, a security practices PDF, data retention docs and the sub-processor list.
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Help-center page (last updated 13 November 2025) offering the personality test technical manual as downloadable PDFs in English, Swedish and Norwegian plus an example candidate report.
https://help.alvalabs.io/en/articles/4522026-technical-manual-for-alva-s-personality-test
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Full public product page for the adaptive logic test explaining the IRT and Bayesian methodology, single calibrated scale, per-question timing and DNV certification.
https://www.alvalabs.io/hiring-system/assessments/logic-test
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Dedicated candidate-facing page covering report access, data ownership, result portability across employers, and retake options.
- DocumentationCaptured Aug 2, 2026
Customer-facing data processing explainer confirming DPA-governed processing and setting out Alva's controller/processor roles.
https://help.alvalabs.io/en/articles/14594840-how-alva-labs-protects-and-processes-your-data
- AbsenceCaptured Aug 2, 2026
No NYC Local Law 144 guidance, Illinois HB 2557 / AI Video Interview Act guidance, Colorado SB 24-205 guidance, or EU AI Act deployer checklist was found across the trust pages, help center, or targeted searches.
§ 05 - Editorial notes
Company overview
Alva Labs AB is a Stockholm-based assessment vendor founded in 2017 by Malcolm Burenstam Linder, Peter Schierenbeck and Bjorn Strom, and reports 650+ hiring teams as customers. Its product is an adaptive logic test built on Item Response Theory and Bayesian statistics, a Five-Factor Model personality test, coding tests, and structured interviews, now surrounded by candidate management, CV screening and analytics modules. The company describes assessments calibrated on roughly 1.5 million candidates with the full item bank recalibrated every 18 months. Pricing is published as a per-job-position model across 'Grow' and 'Scale' plans (with stated overage rates of EUR 370 and EUR 320 per additional position), though base plan prices are not statically listed, placing it in the mid tier rather than enterprise-only.
Regulatory exposure
As an EU-established provider of AI systems used to evaluate candidates, Alva sits squarely in Annex III high-risk territory under the EU AI Act, and it engages that exposure more directly than almost any peer: it is certified to ISO/IEC 42001 by DNV, covering its psychometric tests, candidate platform AI layer, customer platform and internal AI governance, and it explicitly states it built its AI Management System on ISO/IEC 42001 and the EU AI Act, adopting the seven trustworthy-AI values. It also holds ISO/IEC 27001 and ISO 10667-2, keeps candidate data in the EU, and states candidate data is never used to train third-party models. The clearest gaps are US-facing: no NYC Local Law 144 bias audit summary, no independent algorithmic bias audit from a named auditor (BABL AI, Warden AI, Holistic AI, DCI), and no Illinois or Colorado deployer guidance. Fairness claims such as 'minimal group differences across gender, ethnicity, and age' are asserted on product pages without published impact ratios or demographic sample sizes on the open web.
Path to a higher score
The single highest-leverage move is publishing an independent algorithmic bias audit with actual numbers - impact ratios by sex, race/ethnicity and intersectional categories, with sample sizes - as a downloadable summary rather than leaving fairness evidence inside PDF technical manuals and unquantified marketing claims. Surfacing the adverse-impact and differential-item-functioning results as an HTML page (and repeating it annually) would move the bias score materially. Second, Alva should publish EU AI Act deployer-facing material: an Article 27 FRIA template or walkthrough, an Annex IV-style instructions-for-use / system card per AI feature, and jurisdiction guidance for NYC LL 144, Illinois and Colorado. Third, make the sub-processor list publicly readable (it currently sits behind app.alvalabs.io) and add a fairness-monitoring surface alongside the existing uptime status page, so continuous bias monitoring is externally observable rather than asserted.
§ Regulatory frame
What applies to assessment ai.
Assessment is the most-regulated surface in AI hiring. NYC LL 144, EEOC and OFCCP frameworks, Illinois HB 3773, and EU AI Act Annex III §4 all apply, with overlap on bias-audit obligations.
§ Compare
Build any comparison→Alva Labs against its nearest-scoring peers.
In Assessment AI.
§ Others rated in Assessment AI
All assessment vendors→Ranked 3 of 49 by weighted total under rubric v1.0. The ordering is arithmetic on the rubric and carries no view on which tool suits a given hiring process.
- 01Maki People62D
- 02HiPeople61D
- 03Alva LabsThis profile61D
- 04HireVue58F
- 05Bryq57F
Conflicts of interest
No vendor pays for placement, scoring, or removal. Casework - the consulting firm that operates this directory - provides paid services to some vendors. Any active or recent (within 24 months) commercial relationship is disclosed on the affected vendor profile and the review is reassigned to an independent reviewer. See the full policy on About.
Casework has no commercial relationship with this vendor.