Disclosure: brianvanderwaal.com is supported by our users. Some of the links in this article may be affiliate links, which can compensate me at no cost to you if you decide to make a purchase.
Eight recruiters. Fifty technical hires. Three months.
When TechCore Solutions (named changed) came to me, they weren’t just behind on hiring. They were losing candidates because their software was getting in the way.
“We’re spending more time fighting with our software than actually recruiting,” their Head of Talent admitted during our first meeting.
Here’s what we found.
Key Takeaways
- Manatal is currently the best-value AI recruitment software and ATS, earning my 9.7/10 rating.
- Pricing starts from $15/user per month (billed annually), with four tiers including a new Custom Plan, making it one of the most competitively priced ATS platforms on the market.
- The platform’s integration with 2,500+ job boards saved TechCore Solutions approximately 15 hours per week in posting time alone.
- AI-powered candidate scoring and recommendations identified high-quality candidates who would have been overlooked using traditional methods.
- Recent additions include an AI Interviewer for automated video screening, an AI Notetaker for meeting transcription, and direct integration with ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and Microsoft Copilot.
- The People-Match AI Chrome extension now sources candidates from 10+ platforms, including LinkedIn, Indeed, GitHub, SEEK, and Naukri, with access to a Sourcing Hub of over 700 million professional profiles.
- Manatal’s social media enrichment features automatically build comprehensive candidate profiles from 20+ platforms, providing recruiters with a 360-degree view of each applicant.
- After implementing Manatal, TechCore saw impressive ROI metrics: a 40% improvement in candidate quality, a 35% decrease in cost-per-hire, and a reduction in time-to-hire from 45 to 27 days.
- The intuitive drag-and-drop interface makes candidate management straightforward.
- Seamless synchronization with Gmail, Outlook, and Office 365 calendars reduced weekly interview scheduling by 80%.
- Implementation best practices include investing time in scorecard setup, utilising mass emailing features, and customising your candidate database structure.
What is Manatal?
Brian’s Take

Manatal
Manatal is the best AI recruitment tool overall in 2026. It offers various features to simplify the recruitment process. It automates mundane tasks so recruiters can focus on building relationships with potential candidates. Manatal offers the best value for money, AI-based solution to recruitment.
What are the Key Features of Manatal’s Recruitment Software?
TechCore found several of these features helpful, including recent additions and updates. They are described in further detail below.
The Integration Ecosystem
One of the earliest wins came during the first week of implementation. The talent acquisition team had been manually posting jobs across different platforms, burning hours of valuable time. Manatal’s integration with 2,500+ free and premium job boards transformed their process overnight. The ability to post to LinkedIn, Indeed, and specialised job boards with a single click saved them roughly 15 hours per week.
Candidate Sourcing (through LinkedIn, etc.) & Resume Parsing
Manatal offers powerful candidate sourcing capabilities through multiple channels:
- People-Match AI Chrome extension for sourcing directly from 10+ platforms (including LinkedIn, Indeed, GitHub, SEEK, Xing, and Naukri) straight into your ATS
- Access to a Sourcing Hub with a database of over 700 million professional profiles
- Contact discovery: retrieve verified email addresses and phone numbers from within the platform
- Resume parsing powered by large language models for accurate data extraction
- Career page integration with customisable application forms
- Referral programme management
- Multi-channel job board posting across 2,500+ free and premium channels
Cloud-Based Applicant Tracking System (ATS)
The core platform features an easy-to-use pipeline that transformed TechCore’s hiring process. The drag-and-drop interface made candidate management intuitive, while the API allowed seamless integration with their existing HR tools. The boolean search functionality proved invaluable for their technical recruiting team.
The platform is also GDPR, CCPA, and PDPA compliant, with built-in tools for managing candidate consent and data deletion requests.
The system also automatically detects duplicate candidates, keeping your database clean as it scales.
Recruitment CRM That Transformed Their Process
Before Manatal, TechCore had lost several prime candidates due to poor relationship management. The recruitment CRM features in Manatal helped them:
- Track all candidate interactions
- Manage client relationships (crucial for their agency division)
- Maintain comprehensive candidate profiles with up-to-date candidate information.
- Simplify the entire recruitment process
Social Media Enrichment and Candidate Profiles
The social media enrichment features went far beyond basic LinkedIn profile scraping. When candidates apply, Manatal automatically builds comprehensive candidate profiles that pull from over 20 platforms, providing a 360-degree view of each applicant.
AI Recommendations and Candidate Scoring
The most sceptical member of their team was Marcus (name changed), their veteran technical recruiter. His perspective shifted dramatically when Manatal’s candidate scoring system identified a brilliant developer who had been overlooked due to an unconventional background. The Artificial Intelligence recommendations feature:
- Automatically scores candidates based on job requirements
- Identifies the best candidates from the database
- Streamlines the screening process
- Reduces time-to-hire significantly
AI Interviewer (Beta)
High-volume hiring is where most teams feel the strain. Coordinating first-round calls across dozens of candidates is a scheduling nightmare, which is something TechCore’s team felt acutely when filling those 50 technical roles.
Manatal’s AI Interviewer tackles this directly. It conducts automated, standardised video screenings 24/7. Candidates receive a link, record their responses at their own convenience, and the platform generates an assessment summary and full transcript for each one. Your team only watches the recordings that matter.
It currently supports English, French, German, and Spanish, and is available as a beta add-on across all paid plans. Admin users can request access directly through the platform.
AI Notetaker (Beta)
The AI Notetaker joins your scheduled video meetings (on Google Meet or similar platforms) and automatically records, transcribes, and summarises the conversation. Notes land directly on the relevant candidate or contact profile in Manatal.
It’s a beta add-on that needs to be enabled by an admin user, but it’s one of those features that removes a genuine friction point from the interview process. No more scrambling to type notes mid-call.
AI Job Description Generator
Available across all plans, this tool drafts job descriptions from a job title and a few keywords. It won’t replace your judgement, but it cuts the blank-page problem down to nothing.
ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini & Copilot Integration (Enterprise Plus)
This one caught my attention. Enterprise Plus users can now connect Manatal directly to AI tools like ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and Microsoft Copilot Studio. The idea is simple but powerful. You can query your live recruitment data conversationally. Ask whether a specific candidate suits a role, get a summary of your talent pool, or draft outreach emails using real data from your account.
For recruitment teams already using AI tools day-to-day, this integration removes the copy-paste workflow between systems.
Manatal Features Summary
By using the above features, recruiters can prioritise building relationships with candidates while handling mundane tasks automatically. This is certainly what Techcore experienced.
Learn more about Manatal and its features in the video below:
What are Manatal’s Pricing and Plans?
TechCore evaluated all pricing options before settling on the Enterprise Plan below. TechCore found that Manatal has very reasonable pricing compared to other CRM software on the market. They provide excellent value for money.
Compared to other ATS platforms I’ve seen in nearly twenty years of consulting, Manatal’s pricing is refreshingly straightforward.
ProfessionalPlan
$15/user monthly on annual plan or $19/user on monthly plan
- Up to 15 jobs per account
- Up to 10,000 candidates
- Unlimited hiring managers
- Resume parsing
- Social media integration and enrichment
- People-Match AI Chrome extension (10+ platforms)
- Perfect for small teams or solo recruiters just getting started.
Enterprise Plan
$35/user monthly on annual plan or $39/user on monthly plan
- Unlimited jobs and candidates
- Unlimited hiring managers
- Workflow automation
- Advanced analytics
- Resume parsing
- Social media integration and enrichment
- The sweet spot for growing recruitment teams, and the plan TechCore went with.
Enterprise Plus Plan
$55/user monthly on annual plan or $59/user monthly plan
- Everything in Enterprise
- User Groups
- Advanced Report Builder
- Single Sign-On (SSO)
- ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini & Microsoft Copilot integration
- Manatal Open API
- Priority Support
- Access to Beta features (including AI Interviewer)
- The right choice for larger organisations wanting full API access, LLM integration, and priority support.
Custom Plan
Pricing on request
- Everything in Enterprise Plus
- Dedicated account manager
- Phone support
- Custom features and integrations
- Custom compliance and reporting
- For organisations with specific technical or compliance requirements, the Custom Plan is worth a conversation with the Manatal team.
User Reviews of Manatal ATS and CRM
Calendar Integration and Interview Management
Native integration with Gmail, Outlook, and Office 365 simplified TechCore’s entire scheduling process. The team went from spending 10 hours weekly coordinating interviews to just 2 hours, thanks to features like:
- Automated scheduling
- Calendar synchronisation
- Email templates
- Interview feedback collection
Career Page Builder and Customisation
One of TechCore’s major pain points was their inability to update their careers page quickly. Manatal’s career page builder eliminated their dependency on the IT team, enabling:
- Custom application forms
- Branded career pages
- Job posting automation
- Candidate tracking
Analytics and Reporting Tools
The customisable dashboards and reporting features provided:
- Real-time recruitment metrics
- Source effectiveness tracking
- Time-to-hire data
- Cost-per-hire calculations
- Pipeline performance metrics
What is Manatal’s Customer Support Like?
Manatal’s support team proved invaluable during TechCore’s implementation of their AI Recruitment tool.
What I like (Pros of Manatal)
What I dislike (Cons of Manatal)
The ROI Reality: A Year with Manatal
After a full year of use, TechCore’s metrics tell a compelling story:
- Time-to-hire reduced from 45 to 27 days
- Cost-per-hire decreased by 35%
- Candidate quality scores improved by 40%
- Team productivity increased by 60%
Data Source: based on 12 months of live use with TechCore Solutions
What are the Best Practices for Implementing Manatal?
1. Invest time in scorecard setup
2. Utilise mass emailing features strategically
3. Complete all training webinars
4. Customise your candidate database structure
5. Set up proper pipeline stages
Note: Having guided TechCore through their Manatal journey, the above are my top tips.
What are the Best Manatal Alternatives?
Every tool has its strengths, and the right choice depends on your team’s size, budget, and specific hiring challenges. Manatal leads on value for money and AI breadth, but if your needs are more specialised, one of the alternatives above may be a better fit.
Conclusion: Manatal Review – Best AI Recruitment Tool for Value for Money
After guiding TechCore through selection, implementation, and a year of active use, I can confidently say that Manatal offers the best combination of features, usability, and value. The transformation I’ve witnessed in their recruitment process, from struggling with basic tasks to operating a streamlined, AI-powered hiring machine, has been remarkable.
Whether you’re a growing start-up or an established enterprise, Manatal’s applicant tracking system provides the scalability and functionality needed for recruitment in 2026 and beyond. The platform’s easy-to-use interface, powerful features like social media enrichment, AI recommendations, an AI Interviewer for automated screening, and comprehensive analytics make it a brilliant choice for companies looking to modernise their hiring process.
Ready to transform your recruitment process? Start your free trial of Manatal today and experience the future of AI-driven talent acquisition.







