Best Performance Management Software in the UK 2026

Let’s be real: traditional performance reviews are often a box-ticking exercise that everyone, including you, dreads. They can feel forced, outdated and completely disconnected from the day-to-day realities of work. For ambitious business owners, this isn’t just frustrating, it’s a missed opportunity to inspire and grow your team.

Choosing the right tools to fix this shouldn’t be another chore. The market is flooded with platforms, making it tough to find a solution that really understands a growing UK business’s needs. 

In this guide, we look at top performance management platforms, breaking down real pros and cons to help you make an informed call.

What is Performance Management Software?

Performance management software helps you and your team work together to set goals, share feedback and track progress in ways that actually matter. It’s for business leaders who know their people are their greatest asset and want to ditch the one-off annual review for a continuous cycle of growth and development.

This software solves a big problem, turning awkward, administrative performance conversations into productive, motivating sessions. You get frameworks for clear objectives (like OKRs), regular check-ins and timely recognition for great work. The best performance management tools build a culture of feedback, not fear. Instead of admin for admin’s sake, you drive engagement, alignment and real business results.

Benefits of using Performance Management Software

Swapping spreadsheets and paper forms for real performance software is about more than getting organised. It’s about building a high-performing culture where your team feels valued, supported and connected to your mission.

• Team alignment: Get everyone pulling in the same direction. Set clear company, team and individual goals. Track progress transparently.
• More engagement: Regular feedback and recognition make people feel seen. When team members know how their work fits the bigger picture and are recognised for it, motivation shines through.
• Grow your people: Spot skills gaps and build development plans that help your team progress. If you’re invested in them, they’ll invest in you.
• Fair decisions: With continuous records of performance, feedback and achievements, you can make more objective calls about promotions, pay and development opportunities.

Best UK Performance Management Software platforms compared

We analysed the top options on the market to find the best performance management software for UK small businesses. Our review focused on ease of use, practical goal-setting tools, feedback features and overall impact on company culture.

Feature/Provider	Employment Hero	Lattice	15Five	Leapsome	Culture Amp	Clear Review	Personio
Free trial	✓	✘	✓	✓	✘	✘	✓
Core HR Software	✓	✘	✘	✘	✘	✘	✓
Core Payroll Software	✓	✘	✘	✘	✘	✘	✓
Applicant Tracking	✓	✓	✘	✘	✘	✘	✓
Integrated HR & Payroll	✓	✘	✘	✘	✘	✘	✓
Ease of Use	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
Pricing Transparency	✓	✘	✘	✘	✘	✘	✘
All-in-one Platform	✓	✘	✘	✘	✘	✘	✓
Integration Options	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓

Employment Hero

Employment Hero is more than just performance management software; it’s a complete employment platform. It was built with a simple goal: to make managing people easier so business owners can focus on growth. The platform combines HR, payroll, employee engagement, learning management and work benefits into one seamless system.

This integrated approach gets rid of multiple disconnected tools and gives you a single source of truth for all your employment data. For UK SMEs, it offers a powerful set of tools that are both easy to implement and a joy to use.

Pros of Employment Hero for Performance Management

• All-in-one solution: From recruitment and onboarding, to performance management and career development, everything is in one place. This saves time, reduces errors and provides a consistent employee experience.
• Drives connection: Features like 1:1s, OKRs, peer feedback and recognition are built-in, helping you create a positive and productive company culture where people feel valued.
• Designed for growth: Whether you have 5 or 500 employees the platform scales with you. You won’t need to switch systems as your business expands.
• Actionable insights: Customisable performance reviews and happiness scores give you the data you need to understand your team and make better decisions.

Cons of Employment Hero for Performance Management

• Comprehensive features: For a business with just a handful of employees and very simple needs the breadth of features might feel extensive at first.

Lattice

Lattice is a well-known performance management platform that aims to connect performance goals and engagement in one place. It’s a popular choice for tech-savvy companies that want to build a culture of continuous feedback.

• Description: The platform offers a suite of tools including performance reviews goal-setting (OKRs), 1:1 meeting agendas and employee engagement surveys.
• Pros: It has a clean user-friendly interface and strong features for managing goals and feedback cycles. Its engagement survey tools are also highly regarded.
• Cons: Lattice is a premium product and its cost can be a barrier for many SMEs. It is a standalone performance tool so it doesn’t offer native HR or payroll which means more manual work and data syncing.

15Five

15Five is built around the idea of lightweight weekly check-ins to keep managers and their teams connected. It champions regular communication as the key to unlocking team performance and engagement.

• Description: The platform’s core feature is a weekly check-in that takes about 15 minutes to complete and 5 minutes for a manager to review. It also includes tools for OKRs 1:1s and recognition.
• Pros: Its focus on frequent lightweight communication is great for building strong manager-employee relationships and keeping a pulse on the team.
• Cons: It is another standalone tool meaning you’ll need separate systems for core HR and payroll. For businesses looking for a single platform to run everything this creates extra admin. The pricing can also be high for small teams.

Leapsome

Leapsome is a platform that combines tools for performance management, employee engagement and learning. It’s designed to help businesses create a continuous cycle of development for their people.

• Description: Leapsome provides modules for performance reviews goals and OKRs surveys, 1:1 meetings and learning paths. Its goal is to tie all aspects of people enablement together.
• Pros: The platform is flexible and customisable allowing you to tailor processes to your company’s needs.
• Cons: As a modular system the costs can add up quickly as you add more features. Its complexity might be more than a small business needs.

Culture Amp

Culture Amp started as an employee engagement survey tool and has since expanded into performance management. It leverages data and analytics to help companies improve their culture.

• Description: The platform’s main strengths are in its powerful survey and analytics tools which provide deep insights into employee sentiment. It now includes features for performance reviews, goals and feedback.
• Pros: If data is your focus Culture Amp provides a good base of analytics for understanding and acting on employee feedback.
• Cons: It carries a premium price tag that puts it out of reach for most small businesses. Its performance management features can feel secondary to its core survey tools and it doesn’t offer a unified HR solution.

Clear Review

Clear Review is a UK-based performance management system that advocates for more meaningful and regular conversations over outdated annual appraisals. Its philosophy is centred on continuous performance development.

• Description: The platform encourages frequent check-ins, near-term goal setting and real-time feedback. It is designed to be simple and intuitive to drive high adoption among employees and managers.
• Pros: Its straightforward focus on improving conversations and feedback is effective and easy to implement. The user interface is clean and simple.
• Cons: It’s a specialist tool focusing only on performance management. This means you will have to manage core HR and learning in different systems creating disconnected processes and data silos.

Personio

Personio is a German-based company that offers a range of HR modules to businesses across Europe. It aims to be a comprehensive solution covering the entire employee lifecycle.

• Description: Personio’s platform includes modules for HR administration recruiting, onboarding and performance. This modular approach allows businesses to pick and choose what they need.
• Pros: It has a broad feature set suitable for companies operating in multiple European countries.
• Cons: The platform can be complex and time-consuming to configure. The pricing model based on modules can quickly become expensive. Users sometimes report that customer support can be slow to respond.

How Employment Hero supports businesses with Performance Management

Employment Hero steps up for SMEs by offering real, human support every step of the way. UK employers get 24/7 access to a knowledgeable help centre, fast responses from dedicated specialists and account managers who are genuinely invested in your growth. 

Performance management can feel overwhelming, but Employment Hero strips out the complexity. With built-in performance reviews, regular feedback, OKRs and recognition tools all in one place, you can lift your team and drive engagement without wasting hours on admin. 

It’s built for busy businesses, easy to roll out, simple to use and able to scale as you grow.

How to choose the right Performance Management Software

Start with: what does performance management mean for your business? Don’t chase after every shiny feature, focus on what will actually make an impact. Core functions like real-time feedback, easy-to-set goals and streamlined reviews often move the needle most.

Look for software that plays nicely with your existing tools and gives you proper, accessible support. The best performance management system fits into your workflow, not the other way around, and lifts the admin off your plate without creating new friction. Think beyond the price tag, true value comes from software that saves time, empowers leaders and helps your people grow.

Final thoughts

Don’t let old-school approaches put the brakes on your progress. Choose a platform that grows with you, simplifies the process and empowers your business. Employment Hero is on a mission to make employment easier and more valuable for everyone.

Ready to see how? Learn more about our all-in-one HR and payroll platform today.