Employee engagement levels peaked during the global pandemic but dropped after 2020, likely due to burnout and the challenges of adapting to hybrid work models.
Now more than ever, you need the right tools to keep employees motivated, connected, and engaged. From recognition platforms to real-time feedback tools, there are various types of employee management software designed to meet different workplace needs.
In this article, we'll review some of the most popular tools to help you find the best employee engagement software for your needs.
What is an employee engagement software?
Employee engagement software is a tool that helps you create a positive workplace culture by keeping your team motivated, connected, and satisfied. You can use it for different things, from gathering anonymous feedback through surveys to recognizing great work with shoutouts or rewards.
It helps you understand your employees, their feelings, concerns, needs, and desires. Engaged employees are more likely to stay in your company, perform better, and contribute to the overall growth and success of your business.
Key features to look for in the best employee engagement software
As we already mentioned, employee engagement tools can serve various purposes, but here are the key features they should have.
Employee surveys
Employee surveys are one of the best feedback tools because they provide a direct way for employees to share their thoughts, feelings, concerns, and ideas.
They provide you with valuable insights into workplace culture and employee experience.
If you don't have time to create employee surveys from scratch, you can choose platforms with pre-made templates and question libraries. Here are some Google Form templates to get you started.
Plus, you can use employee surveys to create tests and quizzes for employee skills assessment both for new hires and existing employees. That way, you can quickly assess their competencies and identify areas for growth.
Employee net promoter score surveys
Employee net promoter score shows how likely your employees are to recommend their workplace to others, which is a strong indicator of their job satisfaction.
It can be calculated quickly and easily by asking employees to rate on a scale of 0-10 how likely they would be to recommend your company as a great place to work.
You can categorize employees into three groups based on their responses:
- Promoters – Highly engaged and satisfied employees who are likely to act as your brand advocates.
- Passives – Moderately satisfied employees who are neutral most of the time. They don't actively promote your company, but they also don't criticize it.
- Detractors – Disengaged or dissatisfied employees who are more likely to share negative feedback about your company.
A high eNPS score on a company level means that your employees are happy and engaged, while a low score signals there is room for improvement.
Employee pulse surveys
Employee pulse surveys are short check-ins that can be done frequently, unlike annual reviews, which have to be prepared in advance, making them more time-consuming. They can be focused on one particular topic and usually don't take more than a few minutes to complete.
Pulse surveys are great for tracking changes in employee engagement over time and spotting trends. For example, you may discover that stress levels rise during busy season,s so you can take action to prevent it.
Real-time feedback and recognition
Although important, annual performance reviews are no longer enough. Real-time feedback and recognition are essential for keeping employees engaged and motivated.
Real-time feedback allows you to spot issues early on and prevent them from turning into big problems. Instant feedback helps employees to adjust and improve which is essential for creating an agile workplace culture.
At the same time, real-time recognition makes employees feel valued at the moment. Instead of waiting months to acknowledge great work and celebrate successes, talent management tools with instant recognition allow you to reinforce positive behaviors and boost motivation.
Gamification elements
Gamification is one of the most effective ways to increase employee engagement, no matter how serious your industry may be.
When surveys and feedback feel less like a chore and more like a game, people naturally stay more engaged. Plus, it builds a sense of community and team alignment.
Look for features like badges, leaderboards, achievement milestones, social recognition walls, and similar.
User-friendly interface
An intuitive interface makes a big difference and significantly increases participation rates. No one wants to struggle with clunky, complicated software, especially when the goal is to boost engagement.
The best employee experience management software is those that are simple to navigate and come with intuitive dashboards and clear instructions. This reduces barriers to use, ensuring that everyone can participate – even those who aren't tech-savvy.
When tools are easy to understand and use, employees are more likely to engage with them regularly, helping you create a company culture based on continuous feedback and recognition.
It's also important to pick the tools that let your HR teams easily generate reports and interpret analytics.
How we evaluated and chose the best employee engagement software for small businesses
Two-thirds of this evaluation is based on user feedback from the past year on platforms like G2, Capterra, and Trustpilot, which rated the tools using the following criteria:
- Features: While some tools focus only on engagement tracking, others offer a wide range of features like performance management, employee recognition, or time-tracking.
- Ease of use: We focused on tools with user-friendly and intuitive interfaces, with a special focus on mobile-first employee engagement apps.
- Customization: Engagement surveys, employee recognition, and reports are at your disposal.
- Integration capabilities: Look for a tool that integrates with your existing apps. If you don't want to burden your team members with another employee engagement app to install, choose tools that integrate with communication platforms like Slack or Microsoft Teams so you can run your engagement surveys there.
We also analyzed all the latest features by going through their release notes, when available.
The best employee engagement software in 2025
Here's a list of the best employee engagement tools we've picked for you:
Connecteam
Connecteam is a people management software designed to help keep teams connected, especially for companies with a lot of field or remote workers.
With its mobile-first approach, it's a go-to choice in industries like hospitality, on-site services, and event management
Pros:
- Mobile-first design: Its employee engagement app for iOS and Android is a great option for managing communication with non-desk and remote workers, who may not always have access to their laptops.
- Comprehensive features: Its key features include employee scheduling, time tracking, and communication tools.
- Customization: The platform is quite flexible and you can customize everything depending on what your business needs.
Cons:
- Learning curve: Some portion of the users found its features a bit overwhelming initially, as there are quite a few of them. The tool comes with a learning curve for users who aren't tech-savvy or familiar with similar tools.
- Pricing structure: Some useful features, like scheduling repeating shifts and adding additional fields and sub-tasks require higher-tier subscriptions, which may not be convenient for smaller businesses.
Bonusly
Bonusly is an employee recognition platform that focuses on micro-bonuses to keep employees motivated and engaged. It serves as a great way to build a culture of continuous feedback and recognition.
Pros:
- Peer-to-peer recognition: Bonusly makes it possible for employees to quickly and easily express appreciation to other team members. There's also an employee recognition feed that resembles social media by allowing people to add comments and reactions.
- Diverse rewards catalog: Bonusly offers a wide range of employee rewards, including gift cards and charitable donations. You can also add custom rewards like a paid day off, coaching session, etc.
- Integration capabilities: Bonusly can work directly within Slack and Microsoft Teams, so your employees can stay engaged without needing to switch to yet another app.
Cons:
- Reward fulfilment delays: Some users have said that there are occasional delays in reward processing.
- Limited customization: Some users mentioned that there's room for improvement in terms of flexibility and customization to fit unique company cultures.
Matter
Matter App is a modern employee recognition known for it’s mobile approach. Its interface resembles social media and uses game-like elements to improve employee engagement.
Pros:
- Real-time feedback: This app lets employees provide instant peer-to-peer feedback and celebrate each other's successes quickly and easily, thanks to features like Feedback Friday and automated reminders.
- User-friendly interface: The Matter App is super easy to use with its intuitive features and interactive elements (likes, kudos, reactions), which leads to employees quickly adopting the app.
- Integration with communication tools: If you don't want to add another app to your tool stack, you can integrate Matter with Slack and Microsoft Teams with only a few clicks.
Cons:
- Feature limitations: There's room for improvement when it comes to in-depth analytics and reporting, so you might need to combine it with some other performance-tracking tool to get deeper insights.
- Scalability concerns: Matter is good if you're looking for a simple recognition app, but it may not be the best option for larger organizations searching for a comprehensive solution with a wide range of features.
Motivosity
Motivosity is a recognition and reward tool designed to make gratitude and peer-to-peer recognition effortless and meaningful. Its main goal is to improve employee satisfaction and bring a modern approach to how people are recognised in the workplace.
Pros:
- Holistic engagement platform: Motivosity is a workforce management software that focuses on employee engagement, recognition, rewards, and communication in a single platform.
- User-friendly interface: Its intuitive design, including profiles and feeds that resemble social media, makes this tool accessible to all employees.
- Customization options: It's one of the most flexible employee reward and recognition tools that allows you to set up your own recognition system. Also, there are hundreds of gift cards to choose from, including Amazon, local shops, and charity donations.
Cons:
- Integration limitations: Some users have reported challenges integrating with certain existing HR systems.
- Mobile app functionality: Users mentioned that some features aren't fully available in the mobile app and that the app could be improved.
Workleap Officevibe
Workleap Officevibe can be a good option if you're looking for a quick and simple way to implement continuous feedback in your company culture.
Pros:
- Employee feedback tools: This tool offers multiple ways to monitor employee sentiment, including engagement surveys, performance reviews, pulse surveys, and 360 feedback for managers.
- Actionable insights: Its advanced analytics give you in-depth insights into your employees' engagement and performance. It even provides you with suggestions for improvement and the next steps you can take.
- User-friendly design: Workleap Officevibe is one of the most intuitive employee engagement tools on the market, and even team members who are not as tech-savvy find it easy to use.
Cons:
- Limited integration options: Many users wish there were more ways to connect the platform with other workplace tools.
- Feature depth: Its core features are reliable, but some advanced users desire more in-depth functionalities that go beyond the basics.
WorkTango
WorkTango is a holistic employee engagement and performance management tool. It combines features like feedback, recognition, engagement surveys, and actionable development plans into a single platform.
Pros:
- Comprehensive engagement solutions: It’s possible to measure engagement not only through employee engagement surveys but other solutions as well. It all depends on how detailed you want to go with the surveys.
- Integration capabilities: You can integrate it with HR, communication, and payment tools.
- User-friendly interface: WorkTango is available on all devices, and according to our research regular users have said it’s easy to use.
Cons:
- Pricing considerations: Some users mentioned that the starting price might be too high, especially for smaller businesses who have the limited budget.
- Customization constraints: Some users mentioned that the platform could be more flexible and customizable.
Trends in employee engagement software for 2025 and beyond
As workplace conditions shift, employee engagement software is also evolving and improving in order to keep up with employee needs. Here are some trends to keep an eye on.
Integration with AI and predictive analytics
Instead of just collecting feedback, the new generation of employee engagement software uses AI to spot patterns and correlations in your data and predict potential issues before they arise.
Predictive analytics allows you to make data-driven decisions and shift from being reactive to proactive. For example, some tools are able to predict employee disengagement based on work patterns and feedback allowing you to implement targeted engagement strategies before they negatively impact team performance.
Focus on well-being and mental health
Employee engagement isn't just about increasing employee productivity. It's about making sure people feel good at work because we all know that satisfied employees tend to work better and create a more positive atmosphere at work.
That's why many engagement platforms are integrating well-being features such as stress management tools, guided meditations, wellness programs, and mental health resources.
Of course, this goes beyond engagement software, and you should make sure your company culture supports work-life balance because the benefits will come back tenfold in terms of productivity, retention, and overall employee happiness.
Enhanced personalization and adaptive tools
Modern employee engagement platforms are shifting toward personalized experiences because we all know people value recognition and support that feel tailored to their individual needs. This can look like receiving feedback in a preferred format, getting custom rewards, or having the flexibility to customize their own learning paths.
For example, Effy AI's employee development software can generate personalized development plans with actionable insights for all your employees, with the help of AI.
Mobile-first design and accessibility
With more employees working remotely or on the go, mobile-first engagement tools are becoming the norm, especially in industries that require on-site work, like hospitality and different types of services.
Apart from having a dedicated employee engagement app, it's important to make sure it connects to the tools your employees are already used to checking every day, like Slack or Microsoft Teams.
The goal is to help employees stay connected whether they're on the job site, commuting, or working from home. Plus, better accessibility makes sure that everyone can engage easily, even team members who are not as tech-savvy.
The future of employee engagement is flexible, inclusive, and always within reach.
Conclusion
We hope that you now have a better understanding of different types of employee engagement platforms and all the features they offer.
If you're looking to enhance employee engagement while also increasing productivity and performance, Effy AI is the right employee engagement software for you.
Let us help you by crafting personalized feedback and development plans for all employees and providing actionable insights based on AI analysis.
