Pre-employment testing is crucial for a streamlined hiring process. It helps you determine which applicants will be a good culture add for your workplace and gives insights into a candidate’s personality, skills, and capabilities, which their resume may not reveal.
It also helps remove bias from the hiring process and saves time by replacing resume screening.
Selecting the right online pre-employment testing platform for your business can be tricky due to the choices available.
To support your decision-making, this article compares and contrasts two of the most popular pre-employment testing platforms – TestGorilla and HighMatch.
TestGorilla’s pre-employment testing platform can help save valuable time and money by helping you bypass the need to sift through countless resumes. There’s a range of tools to help you select the best candidates for your roles.
TestGorilla offers personality, aptitude, and skills tests that give you valuable insights into your candidates’ abilities.
In addition, you can customize assessments using our library of 400+ scientifically validated tests or add your own custom questions to suit your specific needs. Plus, it’s easy to send the assessment to multiple candidates all at once.
When taking tests, candidates can also choose from 12 different languages – perfect for international hiring campaigns.
Our tests are accessible from any device, and our team is always available to provide candidates with any support they need.
You can trust that our tests are reliable because we subject them to a rigorous 28-step quality-control process and use strict anti-cheating measures to ensure the results are accurate.
TestGorilla is committed to eliminating unconscious bias from the hiring process. That’s why every test adheres to theEqual Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) standards, which are designed to prevent bias and promote fair hiring decisions.
This helps improve diversity and inclusion in your organization, thereby boosting business success.
HighMatch works primarily by measuring candidates’ skills against predesigned job profiles that assign associated traits to job roles. The process begins with HighMatch’s I-O psychologists working to understand the unique challenges, goals, roles, and culture of your organization to create a personalized assessment.
This assessment measures candidates only against the qualities and skills that matter most to your specific role, which HighMatch determines through their job profiles.
The job profiles begin as broader templates, which are then vetted and validated by HighMatch’s team of psychologists who use proven market data.
You can then edit and configure the job profile based on the traits and abilities pertinent to the role. You’re also able to personalize assessments to measure the qualities of your created job profile. With HighMatch skills reports, you get a breakdown of candidates’ performance, including:
Single Score: a single roll-up performance score
Custom Ranges: flexible, client-defined score ranges
Topic Scores: tailored topic scores for key sections
Answers Summary: easy-to-review answers to questions
Higher-value skills are weighted more heavily, meaning that candidates are always scored on how well they match up with your unique hiring profile.
According to HighMatch, how well a candidate scores against those qualities indicates how successful they will be in your open role and organization.
For example, a marketing manager usually needs to be more creative than a computer engineer. Because of this, a marketing manager’s role profile will weigh creativity more heavily.
There are more than 700 fully customizable job profiles available on HighMatch. Users can also create custom hiring profiles tailored to their company culture and individual positions.
Both TestGorilla and HighMatch offer a range of tests to help you find the perfect candidate.
TestGorilla offers a library of 400+ pre-employment screening tests to help you find the perfect fit for your hiring needs, whether you’re looking for customer service skills or coding proficiency.
All tests are scientifically validated by psychometricians and subject-matter experts. These include personality tests, language tests, job-specific tests, situational judgment tests, and more.
You can also build your own assessments by combining tests covering a broad range of topics should you need to take a deeper look at an applicant.
You can tailor each test pertinent to the role you’re hiring for by adding custom questions in various question types – from multiple choice to video.
And we’re always adding new tests to our library. For instance, our library now includes competency tests for working with AI, including our Working with Midjourney test.
See how TestGorilla leads the way in skills assessments. Sign up for our free live demo and discover a better way to evaluate candidates.
HighMatch offers a range of pre-employment tests, including cognitive ability, situational judgment, and software tests.
The platform’s personality tests measure whether a candidate is a good fit for the job in terms of their work ethic, personality, and overall nature. This is a fast way to determine whether a candidate will fit your company’s culture.
However, HighMatch doesn’t offer language tests (beyond an English fluency test that’s coming soon) or a dedicated culture-add test – or allow users to combine multiple tests within one assessment.
TestGorilla | HighMatch | |
Cognitive ability tests | Yes | Yes |
Situational judgment tests | Yes | Yes |
Job-specific tests | Yes | Yes |
Software tests | Yes | Yes |
Programming tests (including coding challenges) | Yes | No |
Language tests | Yes | No (just one English fluency test that’s not yet available) |
Personality tests | Yes | Yes |
Culture-add test | Yes | No |
Motivation test | Yes | Yes |
Your own custom tests | Yes | |
Custom questions within an assessment | Yes | Yes |
Test recommendations for each job role | Yes | Yes |
Multiple tests within an assessment | Yes | No |
When hiring developers, it’s important to narrow down your applicant pool and hire a candidate who is a strong culture add and has the right skills for your business.
TestGorilla is geared to help you find your next developer. We offer a wide range of programming and debugging tests for many different coding languages, including HTML5, SQLite, Magento 2, and software engineering. These include custom coding challenges and algorithmic-thinking challenges.
You can easily tailor these tests to match your organization’s specific requirements. This ensures that candidates have the necessary skills and abilities to keep up with your development team’s workload.
We’ve also added a language-agnostic coding test that lets candidates choose from 20 different programming languages. This way, they can take tests in their preferred language.
Our coding timeline feature also gives users a detailed visual replay of a candidate's progress during a coding challenge, highlighting key actions like language switching and content pasting.
On top of that, we enable candidates to configure their development environment to match their preferences. For instance, they can choose the color theme and font size.
While HighMatch can assess personality traits associated with developer roles, the platform currently doesn’t offer any hard skills tests to help you pick your next developer.
TestGorilla | HighMatch | |
Coding languages | JavaScript, Java, Python, PHP, C, C#, C++, SQL, Kotlin, Ruby, TypeScript, Go, R, Scala, and Swift | None |
Web-development frameworks | Yes | N/A |
Mobile-development frameworks | Yes | N/A |
Algorithmic-thinking challenges | Yes | N/A |
Debugging challenges | Yes | N/A |
Language-specific concept challenges | Yes | N/A |
Language-agnostic coding test | Yes | N/A |
Your own custom coding challenges | Yes | N/A |
Code-playback function | Yes | N/A |
Automated scoring | Yes | N/A |
Video interviews provide you with firsthand insights into your applicants’ communication skills and personality types. You can use one-way video recordings or set customized questions to comprehensively understand each candidate.
Rather than inviting many candidates to interviews, you can use one-way video assessments to enable candidates to record responses to preset questions, streamlining the hiring process.
TestGorilla’s user-friendly one-way video interviews enable you to add up to 20 custom questions to effectively evaluate candidates’ skills, personalities, and abilities.
TestGorilla makes it easy for applicants to record personalized video answers to preset questions. You can set time limits of 30 to 120 seconds for responses, enabling you to conduct interviews at scale.
Candidates get three attempts at each question. Videos can be recorded and uploaded from any internet-connected device, and with our playback speed control feature, you can watch candidates’ responses at your desired speed.
HighMatch doesn’t offer any tools to support video interviewing at this time.
TestGorilla | HighMatch | |
One-way video interview | Yes | No |
Custom video questions | Yes | No |
Recording of candidates’ attempts | Yes | N/A |
Restrict maximum answer length | Yes | N/A |
Recording and playback on any device | Yes | N/A |
Playback speed control | Yes | N/A |
Rate and comment on video answers | Yes | N/A |
Creating a positive experience is key to ensuring candidates participate in the assessment process.
An engaging candidate experience starts with company branding, a streamlined user interface, and mobile-friendly software.
TestGorilla enables you to add your company branding to tests, including your organization’s logo, colors, and a personalized intro or outro video. This gives candidates a glimpse into your company culture and helps build brand recognition.
In addition, you can customize invitation and rejection emails to show candidates that you care about their experience. You can also ask a number of qualifying questions before inviting candidates to interview.
Test-taking can be stressful, which is why we’ve made sure our tests load quickly and are easy to navigate and complete – each test takes around just 10 minutes. If a candidate does encounter any issues, our support team is available to help. We also have a candidate FAQ section for troubleshooting.
All tests are designed to be mobile-friendly, giving candidates the flexibility to complete them on any device. However, it’s recommended that candidates use a desktop or laptop device for coding exercises.
Candidates also don’t need to register or create an account. But candidates completing tests in English are redirected to create an account to view their assessment results. You can also share results with candidates manually.
We also send candidates an automatic email confirmation once they submit an assessment, which can put them at ease.
Finally, candidates can use our in-depth guides to learn how to successfully complete assessments.
HighMatch lets you customize intro and outro videos. You can also customize assessments to include your company’s branding, logo, and colors. It offers mobile-friendly testing, and you can send customized invitation or rejection emails.
However, HighMatch doesn’t ask any qualifying questions before candidates start the assessments. This means the number of candidates who will gain access to the testing platform will be greater, increasing time-to-hire.
In addition, there’s no help and support for candidates who may not be familiar with pre-employment testing.
TestGorilla | HighMatch | |
Your company’s intro or outro video | Yes | Yes |
Assessments branded with your company logo and colors | Yes | Yes |
Customizable invitation and rejection emails | Yes | Yes |
No login required for candidates | Yes | No |
Mobile-friendly tests | Yes | Yes |
Help and support for candidates | Yes | No |
Typical assessment length | 30-60 minutes | No information |
Qualifying questions before the assessment | Yes | No |
Pre-employment testing can be a valuable asset for organizations of any size - helping them choose the best candidate for the job.
You need to find a robust testing platform that can grow with your business. A reliable testing platform should integrate seamlessly with your ATS, offer API access, and adhere to GDPR compliance regulations, among other essential factors.
By tracking candidates from application to hire, you can streamline your hiring process, maintain legal compliance, and find the right fit for your team.
TestGorilla offers many features to support enterprises and startups, including ATS integrations, GDPR compliance, API access, and the ability to track candidates at each stage of the hiring process.
You can access multiple candidate invitation options, like email invites, public links, and bulk invite candidates for large-scale hiring. This is a great tool if you’re a startup looking to scale your business or improve hiring processes as a large organization. You can also set deadlines for specific tests and customize rejection emails to keep the hiring process moving smoothly.
We have various bulk actions for managing candidates in addition to bulk invites. For instance, bulk reminders and rejections can really speed up your candidate communications and management.
For companies looking to grow faster, we also have a job board, which is available for all customers. Post remote job positions free of charge.
HighMatch offers ATS integrations and full API access. However, it doesn’t offer built-in GDPR compliance or bulk actions to manage candidates.
This can cause difficulties when trying to scale your business or during bulk hiring campaigns.
TestGorilla | HighMatch | |
ATS integrations | Yes | Yes |
Multiple users and role-based rights management | Yes | No |
GDPR compliant | Yes | No |
Multiple candidate invitation options | Yes | No |
Public link to invite candidates | Yes | No |
Public links for each candidate source | Yes | No |
Bulk invite candidates (CSV/XLSX upload) | Yes | No |
Track candidate stages from invited to hired | Yes | No |
API access | Yes | Yes |
Bulk actions to manage candidates | Yes | No |
The quality of your pre-employment testing is important for ensuring accurate results. Quality control of pre-employment tests includes using extensive quality checks before tests go live, replacing questions frequently, and listening to employer and test-taker feedback.
TestGorilla offers an extensive 28-step quality-check process as part of our science-backed hiring process. This includes collaboration with a team of psychometricians and peer reviewers, replacing questions after overexposure, and using customer and test-taker feedback to improve tests.
In addition, TestGorilla works closely with subject-matter experts to determine the appropriate test subjects and questions that gauge all the necessary skills required for success in a particular role.
HighMatch’s quality-control processes are primarily focused on two stages involving their in-house team of psychologists. First, they examine the individual components of the assessment by analyzing and comparing your organization’s hiring data with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOP) and the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP) standards. This helps their team determine whether assessment questions are accurate and relevant – and if they’ll lead to meaningful insights about candidates. The second stage involves HighMatch’s psychologists working with you to make sure your assessments measure only what’s most important to your particular role, before helping make sure test results are used correctly. HighMatch also performs adverse impact testing to ensure that your testing process doesn’t negatively impact candidates of any race, gender, age, or ethnicity.
The HighMatch site doesn’t detail any other quality control tactics.
TestGorilla | HighMatch | |
Proprietary algorithms that continuously improve the quality of each test | Yes | Unknown |
Extensive quality checks before tests go live | Yes | Unknown |
Questions automatically replaced after reaching an exposure limit | Yes | Unknown |
Customer feedback used to improve tests | Yes | Unknown |
Test-taker feedback used to improve tests | Yes | Unknown |
Unfortunately, not every candidate is honest when representing their skills, meaning some may attempt to cheat on pre-screening tests.
Cheating during pre-employment tests will produce unreliable results and give dishonest applicants an unfair advantage. Test results should precisely reflect a candidate’s abilities, expertise, and personality.
Ensuring your pre-employment tests have sufficient anti-cheating measures in place will help to even the playing field and give sound results. These measures may include time constraints and randomization of a large pool of questions.
TestGorilla provides a comprehensive set of anti-cheating measures to ensure the authenticity of test results. These measures include disabling copy and paste, tracking a candidate’s IP address, randomizing questions, and establishing time limits for tests.
TestGorilla automatically retires questions after they appear in a predetermined number of tests, reducing the likelihood of candidates finding them in advance.
In addition, TestGorilla’s full-screen mode detection and 30-second webcam snapshots (with permission) prevent candidates from clicking away from the test page or leaving the test environment to conduct research.
HighMatch personalizes each of its assessments. However, it's unclear how much these are personalized – for instance, it’s not clear if the platform ever re-uses test questions across separate tests.
High levels of personalization can prevent certain forms of cheating by making it difficult for candidates to share exact answers or benefit from prior candidates' experiences.
However, personalization alone isn't sufficient for preventing all forms of cheating because it doesn’t address other common cheating tactics like using outside help, searching for answers online during the test, or collaborating with others. HighMatch currently doesn’t advertise any anti-cheating measures to prevent these tactics.
TestGorilla | HighMatch | |
IP address tracking (to prevent multiple attempts by the same candidate) | Yes | No |
Tracking candidate location | Yes | No |
Webcam snapshots (with the option to turn on/off) | Yes | No |
Full-screen mode detection (to prevent research during the test) | Yes | No |
Randomized questions | Yes | N/A |
Large question pool for each test | Yes (100+) | Unknown |
Questions and answers not visible to employers to protect test integrity | Yes | No |
Time limit on tests | Yes (typically 10 minutes) | No |
Copy-paste disabled | Yes | No |
Mouse tracking | Yes | No |
Reporting and analytics help you understand and interpret candidates’ test results. These features let you dissect candidates’ test data, giving you a full overview of their abilities, skills, and suitability for the job.
Analyzing hiring data reveals potential challenges and assists in forecasting future hiring requirements.
TestGorilla lets you quickly and easily compare candidates’ test results. This helps you to understand who the top candidates are at a glance. In addition, TestGorilla offers a scoring benchmark system for analyzing test results within a specific group.
You can effortlessly download report data in PDF, XLSX, or CSV format and distribute it to your hiring team. Reports offer clear and concise explanations of the results, and you can supplement them with your own notes.
For instance, our Candidate PDF Reports offer insights into candidates' strengths and weaknesses in specific areas and let you share the results with team members. These individual reports let you focus on candidates’ overall performance, responses, and skills. Our weighted scores feature lets you personalize the impact each of the tests has on a candidate’s final score. Now, you can give more importance to specific skills or qualities crucial for a role.
TestGorilla also offers a comprehensive overview of all current and previous candidates. This provides insights into the number of candidates engaged in the hiring process for a specific role and shows any common or missing skills.
HighMatch offers assessment reports with a visual, intuitive dashboard that shows general or detailed scores for each skill or competency you want to measure.
These reports are also customizable for your preferred look and language and can be shared with an ATS solution for automated workflow. The HighMatch Details report offers summaries based on candidates’ scores and identifies areas of potential concern. For skills tests, the report shows candidates’ responses and correct answers.
TestGorilla | HighMatch | |
PDF reports of assessments and individual candidates | Yes | Unknown |
Excel and CSV reports of assessments and individual candidates | Yes | Unknown |
Comprehensive overview of all current and past candidates | Yes | No |
Scoring benchmarks for candidates (including percentile rank scoring) | Yes | No |
The option to add your ratings and personal notes to reports | Yes | No |
Detailed candidate analytics | Yes | Yes |
Having access to effective customer support is necessary for getting the maximum impact out of your pre-employment testing software.
Most providers offer support by phone, web chat, and email. However, some providers also offer more personalized support with live training and onboarding tours.
TestGorilla offers a comprehensive introduction to our platform via a free 45-minute live demo, as well as a training and onboarding tour for new customers. We show you the basics of using the platform, talk you through FAQs, and answer your queries about the software.
In addition, you can access our help center, which contains customer and candidate guides. We also offer support through web chat and email.
HighMatch provides customer support through live chat, a help center, and email. It also offers a training and onboarding tool.
TestGorilla | HighMatch | |
Live chat | Yes | Yes |
Help center | Yes | Yes |
Email support | Yes | Yes |
Training and onboarding tour | Yes | Yes |
The majority of pre-employment testing software is priced per user per month. However, some platforms – including TestGorilla – offer annual pricing, pay-as-you-go options, scalable subscription plans, or offer free plans or trials.
TestGorilla offers three transparent pricing plans with no hidden costs. Plans are based on the number of full-time equivalent employees (FTEs) at your business who will be using the platform. (Part-time employees who together work full-time hours “equal” one FTE.)
Here are our plans:
Free forever at $0: Full access to five free tests, plus up to five custom questions
Here are our paid plans (pricing scales based on how many FTEs you have):
Starter from $75 USD per month ($900 per year paid upfront). Access to all available tests and unlimited simultaneous assessments
Pro from $115 USD per month ($1,380 per year paid upfront). Access to everything in the Starter plan plus ATS integrations, video question capabilities, and the option for custom branding on assessments
Teams with 1-15 FTEs must sign up for an annual plan, while teams with 15 or more FTEs can pay either monthly or annually. With any plan, you can test as many candidates as required.
You can also take advantage of TestGorilla’s free trial.
HighMatch doesn’t publicly disclose its pricing model. To learn more about HighMatch’s pricing structure, contact its sales team.
TestGorilla | HighMatch | ||
Plan | Price | Plan | Price |
Free | $0 | Free | No free plan |
Small business package | Contact HighMatch | ||
Starter | From $75 USD per month ($900 per year paid upfront for teams of 1-15 FTEs) | Medium business package | Contact HighMatch |
Pro | From $115 USD per month ($1,380 per year paid upfront for teams of 1-15 FTEs) | Large business package | Contact HighMatch |
Pre-employment screening platforms must be easy for hiring managers and recruiters to use. This ensures that the recruitment process is efficient and that all users can navigate the system without requiring extensive training or technical support
Pre-employment screening tests also need to be simple and user-friendly. If they aren’t, the test-takers will simply click away, resulting in a high abandonment rate.
An intuitive interface with straightforward navigation, mobile-friendliness, and simple test-creation tools are all features of easy-to-use pre-employment screening software.
TestGorilla’s mobile-first strategy was created with customers and candidates in mind. Its intuitive user interface simplifies navigation, and test results are easy to find and understand.
In addition, the majority of TestGorilla’s pre-employment tests take just 10 minutes to complete. You can also choose to notify candidates of their progress at every stage of the hiring process through email notifications.
With our new test preview option, you can easily review each test before you decide to include it in your assessment. In addition, when you’re creating an assessment and you specify your job role, our system will recommend tests that could fit that role. This makes it super easy to put together assessments quickly.
Find out what sets TestGorilla apart in hiring. Sign up for our free plan and access comprehensive tools for effective candidate screening.
HighMatch is available on both mobile and desktop devices. If you ever need help using its platform, HighMatch offers many customer support features, including a web chat, a help center, and email support.
Although TestGorilla and HighMatch are both great options for pre-employment screening, TestGorilla stands out as the superior choice for businesses looking to streamline their hiring processes and find the best candidates.
Compared with HighMatch, TestGorilla offers substantially more features that enhance and simplify the user experience. These include anti-cheating measures, customer support features, reporting and analytics tools, and tests to help hire developers.
HighMatch’s lack of features to support hiring developers can’t be ignored. Programming tests are invaluable in a modern workplace. TestGorilla offers coding challenges in 20+ different programming languages, making it a more suitable option for those seeking to hire for these technical roles.
Overall, TestGorilla’s advanced testing features and user-friendly interface make it the ideal choice for organizations looking to simplify their hiring process and make data-driven hiring decisions.
Using pre-employment testing can help you hire better candidates and reduce employee turnover, saving your business time and money.
These tests also ensure that your hiring process is bias-free, leading to a more diverse and inclusive workforce.
If you’re interested in learning more about how TestGorilla’s pre-employment testing can enhance your hiring process, check out our pricing plans to find a package that suits your organization’s needs. With a free demo, you can learn even more about our software. You can also sign up for a free account to start using our platform today to find top talent for your business.
Why not try TestGorilla for free, and see what happens when you put skills first.
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