Humaans

Humaans: the API-first HRIS that put an agent layer on People Ops

Humaans is an HR system of record built for companies that outgrew spreadsheets but do not want a legacy HR suite. Founded in London in 2020 by Giovanni Luperti and Karolis Narkevicius (Y Combinator alumni), it covers the core — employee database, onboarding, absence, timesheets, performance, people analytics — with an API-first architecture that plugs into the rest of the stack rather than trying to replace it.

What separates the 2026 product is Athena, an agentic AI platform for People Ops: pre-built agents for common HR work, a natural-language agent builder, and intelligent triaging of employee requests. An AI Companion answers policy and document questions instantly and helps HR admins draft documents and query workforce data. Customers include Poolside, Juro, Manyone, and Threecolts; the company cites a 75% reduction in admin work and 55% faster onboarding.

Key Features

• Athena agentic AI platform: pre-built People Ops agents plus a natural-language agent builder
• AI Companion for instant policy answers and workforce data insights
• Onboarding automation the company credits with 55% faster onboarding
• Absence, timesheets, and approval workflows across 300+ global locations
• People analytics with compensation and headcount planning add-ons
• Enterprise controls: SAML SSO, Okta/Entra ID, audit logs, sandbox, 99.9% uptime SLA

Ideal Use Case

Scale-ups and mid-size global companies — roughly 20 to 1,000+ employees — running people operations across multiple countries. HR teams get a fast system of record with automation for the repetitive work; employees get instant answers instead of tickets; leadership gets clean people data through the API and analytics layer.

How Humaans differentiates

Against Personio, HiBob, and BambooHR, Humaans leads with two things: an API-first design that treats HR data as a platform rather than a silo, and an agent layer (Athena) that goes beyond chatbot Q&A into actually executing People Ops workflows. The backing is notable for the segment — a $15M Series A led by Lachy Groom with participation from Tobias Lütke (Shopify) and Stewart Butterfield (Slack) — and its 4.8/5 G2 score across ~105 reviews is among the strongest in the category.

FAQ

What is Humaans? An AI-powered HRIS for growing, multi-country companies: a system of record for people data with onboarding, absence, performance, and analytics, plus the Athena agent layer that automates People Ops work.

How much does Humaans cost? Pricing is quote-based across Growth and Enterprise tiers, with Athena and other AI modules priced as add-ons. Third-party data puts it around $5-15 per employee per month.

Who is Humaans for? Scale-ups that have outgrown spreadsheets or legacy HR tools; customers include Poolside and Juro.

Does Humaans replace my whole HR stack? No — it is deliberately API-first, acting as the system of record while integrating with payroll, recruiting, and IT tools you already use.

tl;dr

Humaans is a modern, API-first HRIS with a real agent layer: Athena runs People Ops work while the core system keeps multi-country employee data, onboarding, and analytics in one place.