IRIS Payroll Basics Review (2026): What You Need To Know

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IRIS Payroll Basics is a no-frills free payroll software solution ideal for UK small businesses and startups with fewer than 10 employees. If you’re tired of “free” providers that add hidden fees, this review explains whether IRIS Basics is truly free, what it can do, and whether it’s the right fit for your team.

If you’re undecided or comparing IRIS Payroll Basics with other payroll solutions, this guide covers everything you need to make an informed decision, from features and limitations to cost and compliance.

At Expert Market, we’ve spent over 15 years helping UK businesses compare software and services, including payroll solutions. To evaluate products like IRIS Payroll Basics, we follow a structured research methodology that examines 56 areas across five key categories. Jump to our methodology section to learn more about how we reviewed IRIS Payroll Basics.

IRIS Payroll Basics is a genuinely free, HMRC-approved tool for very small teams — it handles PAYE/NI calculations, pension auto-enrolment reporting, payslips, and direct RTI submissions for up to 10 employees.
It suits micro businesses and first-time payroll runners. The workflow is simple enough to keep payroll in-house without adding software spend.
The cost is £0 for eligible teams, but the cap is strict. Once you approach 10 employees or need more complex deductions and reports, you’ll outgrow the free plan.
Upgrading is straightforward within IRIS and moving to IRIS Payroll Business (from £39 per month) lifts employee limits and unlocks deeper reporting and stronger support.
Security and integrations are intentionally basic — it’s GDPR-compliant with backups, but lacks enterprise controls and doesn’t integrate with third-party accounting and HR tools.
If you need niche “free” features, alternatives differ: Primo can email payslips and talks to pension providers; EnrolPay is ultra-simple but requires manual Real Time Information (RTI); and HMRC Basic PAYE Tools offers NI lookups but no payslips or auto-enrolment.

IRIS Payroll Basics Review: Expert’s Summary

For a micro business, IRIS Payroll Basics can work as a very low-cost starter tool, but it helps to be clear on what it actually gives you.

It’s free only for businesses with under 10 employees and is advertised as HMRC-recognised, RTI-compliant and automatic enrolment-compliant for just the tax year 2025/26, with automatic PAYE, National Insurance and statutory payment calculations built in.

IRIS also describes it as suitable for simple payroll needs and encourages businesses looking for a longer-term solution to consider its paid Staffology Payroll product instead, which signals that Basics is positioned as an entry point, rather than a forever system.

Personally, I would treat those published limits — fewer than 10 staff and 2025/26 compliance only — as the hard lines in the budget spreadsheet, then cost in what moving to a paid IRIS product will look like once you reach either boundary.

Paul Thomas HR and organisational change consultant

Find out more about our Expert author

What Is IRIS Payroll Basics?

IRIS Payroll Basics is a free payroll software designed for very small UK businesses to run basic payroll processes for up to 10 employees. It provides the core tools required to handle simple processes like calculating wages, processing tax and National Insurance, and submitting payroll information to HMRC.

As its name suggests, IRIS Payroll Basics focuses on essential payroll functionality rather than advanced features, making it a practical option for startups and small businesses interested in streamlining payroll, rather than established businesses wanting to manage complex processes like multi-entity payroll and advanced HR administration.

IRIS Payroll Basics

Pricing Free

Strengths

HMRC compliant

Scalable plans for growing businesses

Robust customer support

Weaknesses

Fairly basic software

10 employee limit

No software integrations

How Much Does IRIS Payroll Basics Cost?

IRIS Payroll Basics is completely free for UK businesses with up to 10 employees. This makes it an ideal option for very small businesses or startups that need basic payroll functionality without paying for software.

However, since the software has a strict employee limit of 10, businesses with more staff will need to upgrade to a paid IRIS solution, such as IRIS Payroll Business, to handle a larger headcount and access advanced features, like multi-location support and in-depth reporting.

What Are IRIS Payroll Basics’ Key Features?

IRIS Payroll Basics focuses on essential features: automatic PAYE and NI calculations (including statutory payments), pension auto-enrolment reporting, payslip and report generation, and direct RTI submissions to HMRC.

Let’s take a look at the key features you can expect from the platform in greater detail. Although pretty basic, these features pull their weight, saving time and reducing errors.

Automatic compliance calculations: IRIS Payroll Basics automatically calculates tax and insurance withholdings, like PAYE and NI contributions. It creates pension reports for each employee to ensure compliance with the automatic enrolment requirement for eligible employees.
Report generation and printing: IRIS Payroll Basics can automatically generate nicely formatted employee reports at any time you need them. For the first 30 days after you download, it will even print these reports and any needed payslips for free.
Free software updates: Whenever necessary updates become available, IRIS allows you to download and install them for free — whether they’re operations or compliance-related.
HMRC-recognised and RTI-compliant: Not only is IRIS Payroll Basics compliant with HMRC, but it integrates directly with the HMRC government website via RTI technology. This means you can submit tax forms and other documents to HMRC online, in real-time, with no communication issues.

Although these features are undoubtedly helpful, they’re also just as undoubtedly expected from any payroll software provider in the modern age. As free software, IRIS Payroll Basics lacks many of the more innovative features — like customisable interfaces and HR software integrations — offered by paid competitors like MHR, ADP and Frontier.

If you want to unlock useful time-saving AI features, like tax anomaly detection and risk scoring, you’ll have to upgrade to one of IRIS’s paid accounting plans, like IRIS Elements or Accountancy Suite, instead.

Does IRIS Payroll Basics Offer Auto-Enrolment for Pensions?

Yes, IRIS Payroll Basics does offer auto-enrolment for pensions. The software assesses employees during each payroll run to determine whether they meet the eligibility criteria for enrolment. The plan then automatically enrols qualifying workers and calculates both employer and employee pension contributions.

The free plan can also generate the relevant reports and employee communications needed to help employers comply with the UK’s workplace pension rules set by The Pensions Regulator.

By automatically generating the required documents, IRIS Payroll Basics reduces the administrative workload for small businesses, helping them stay compliant and avoid potential financial penalties.

What Security Features Does IRIS Payroll Basics Offer?

IRIS Payroll Basics is fully GDPR-compliant and performs automatic data backups. Its security features entail:

Data minimisation: IRIS Payroll Basics collects and stores only the data necessary for payroll processing.
Consent and transparency: The software ensures that clear consent is obtained before data is processed and that users are aware of how their data will be used.
Secure data processing: Although encryption isn’t a must under GDPR, IRIS Payroll Basics takes all necessary security measures to protect user data from unauthorised access.
Breach notification: If a breach happens, the software will automatically notify users, managers, and potentially even authorities, immediately. It also backs up any new data every time it’s used, which means breaches won’t result in any significant operational downtime.

Of course, GDPR compliance is a commendable minimum standard for a payroll software solution. But if your employees’ personal data is especially sensitive and preventing a data leak is a top priority for you, we highly recommend you look through our other top payroll software solutions.

ADP, for example, is compliant with GDPR and ISO 9001 and 27001 certifications, SOC 1 and 2 reports, PCI DSS, and Sarbanes-Oxley regulations. If you’d like to find out more, check out our ADP review.

If you need stronger controls, consider upgrading within IRIS’ paid range or to a provider with published certifications.

What Support Resources Are There With IRIS Payroll Basics?

IRIS maintains a large knowledge base, guides, webinars, case studies, and podcasts. Most resources cover IRIS products broadly. Payroll Basics-specific articles exist, but are fewer, so for edge cases, you may need to use live chat or call support.

For specific problem-solving help, its ‘knowledge base’ contains hundreds of detailed instructional guides for common roadblocks. For more general information, you can find blog posts, case studies, business guides, events webinars, and even four separate IRIS podcast channels, with advice and insight from industry experts.

All that said, we couldn’t find many other support resources dedicated to the Payroll Basics software. This means that you’ll need to directly contact customer support for help with any specific issues you encounter.

How Scalable Is IRIS Payroll Basics?

As may seem obvious, IRIS Payroll Basics isn’t particularly scalable. After all, it’s a free payroll software solution for businesses with fewer than 10 employees.

That said, it is scalable in two ways:

If you’re just getting a startup off the ground, you might be paying just a single employee. In that scenario, Payroll Basics can assist you as you scale up from one employee to nine.
IRIS enables the seamless transition of all your employee data and payment information from IRIS Payroll Basics up to the first tier of paid software — IRIS Payroll Business. This plan supports payroll for up to 100 employees, upgraded online and phone support, and much more in-depth reporting capabilities.

What Are The Customer Support Options With IRIS Payroll Basics?

For a slimmed-down, free payroll software, IRIS offers a surprisingly dense customer support network.

The company provides a live chat option for all customers, regardless of the software they use. It also delineates separate, dedicated phone support numbers for each of the different software solutions — including IRIS Payroll Basics.

The only concern we found is that IRIS doesn’t provide email support channels for all of its software products — and Payroll Basics is one of them.

Still, this is a step up from a payroll software provider like MHR, which strangely offers no email help channels at all.

How Does IRIS Payroll Basics (Free) Compare With IRIS Payroll Business (Paid)?

Here’s a quick comparison of IRIS Payroll’s free Basics package and its cheapest paid option, Payroll Business.

Area	IRIS Payroll Basics (Free)	IRIS Payroll Business (Paid)
Employee cap	Up to 10 employees	Typically supports up to 100 employees
RTI submissions to HMRC	Yes (RTI-compliant submissions)	Yes
Payroll calculations	Automatic PAYE, NI, and statutory pay calculations	Same calculations plus more advanced payroll configuration
Pension auto-enrolment	Basic compliance and reporting	More advanced pension workflows and reporting
Payslips and reporting	Payslips and limited payroll reports	Broader reporting, payroll analysis, and management reports
Corrections and adjustments	Limited rollback/editing functionality	Advanced rollback tools and payroll correction features
Support	Phone and online support (more limited than paid plans)	Priority phone and online support
Product lifecycle	Scheduled to be discontinued after the 2025/26 UK tax year	Actively supported paid payroll product
Pricing	£0 (for businesses with ≤10 employees)	Paid licence (pricing depends on employee count)
Best for	Micro-businesses running simple payroll	Small-to-medium businesses needing more flexibility and higher employee limits

How do I upgrade from IRIS Payroll Basics?

You can move to a paid IRIS plan (e.g. IRIS Payroll Business) without starting from scratch. Do this between pay cycles for a smooth switchover.

Confirm the need: Approaching the 10-employee cap or need deeper reporting/support.
Prepare data: Back up and tidy employee records, pay elements, and pension settings in Basics.
Start upgrade: Begin the upgrade in your IRIS account or contact IRIS; your data is carried across.
Validate and switch: Check calendars/deductions, run one parallel pay run, then switch fully to the paid product.

What Are Some Free Alternatives to IRIS Payroll Basics?

There are three free alternatives to IRIS Payroll Basics that we’d suggest looking at if you are a small business. All the options are HMRC-approved and best suited to businesses with up to around 10 employees.

Let’s compare them below, so you know exactly where it stands in the pecking order.

Payroll Software/Features	IRIS Payroll Basics	Primo Payroll Essentials Free Plus	EnrolPay Employee Self Service	HMRC Basic PAYE Tools
Max number of employees	10	10 (includes leavers)	9	10
HMRC approved	✅	✅	✅	✅
Scalable (possibility to upgrade)	✅ from £39/month	✅ from £24.99/month	✅ from £6/month	❌
Integrates with HMRC	✅	✅	✅	✅
Auto-enrolment	✅	✅	❌	❌
Payslip generation	✅	✅	✅	❌
Software integrations	❌	❌	❌	❌

When to choose IRIS Payroll Basics and when to choose a competitor

Pick IRIS if you want the broadest “free” coverage for micro businesses: auto-enrolment, payslips, and automatic RTI, plus a clean upgrade path to paid IRIS software as you grow.
Pick Primo if pension auto-enrolment with direct pension-provider communication and emailing payslips on the free tier are your priorities (accept the leavers-counting limit and lighter support).
Pick EnrolPay if you prefer a very simple, low-touch tool and don’t mind manual RTI on the free plan or the nine-employee cap. Upgrades unlock automatic RTI, too.
Pick HMRC Basic PAYE Tools if you want a government-made tool and need NI lookups/EPS/EYU direct to HMRC. You’ll have to accept no payslips or auto-enrolment, no upgrade path, and an under-10 employee cap, however.

How We Reviewed IRIS Payroll Basics

We regularly research a wide range of market-leading payroll products and services to evaluate them in terms of functionality, usability, data security and customer support, so we can make the most useful recommendations for UK businesses.

Our rigorous research process means these products have been scored and rated in five main categories of investigation and 10 subcategories — in fact, we covered 56 areas of investigation in total. We then gave each category score a ‘relevance weighting’ to ensure the product's final score perfectly reflects the needs and requirements of Expert Market readers.

Our main testing categories for payroll products and services are:

Control: The level of customisation and flexibility provided by the payroll software in managing and processing payroll, such as the ability to define pay periods, set up tax withholding rules and manage employee data.
Data security: The measures and protocols implemented by the payroll software to ensure the confidentiality, integrity and availability of sensitive payroll information.
Expertise: The level of knowledge and guidance provided by the payroll software vendor or support team. This can include resources such as documentation, tutorials and training materials.
Scalability: The ability of the payroll software to accommodate the growth and changing needs of a business, including the capacity to handle an increasing number of employees and support multiple locations or entities.
Customer support: The various channels and methods available for users to seek assistance and support from the payroll software vendor, such as email or ticket-based support, phone support, or live chat.

Verdict: Is IRIS Payroll Basics a Good Option for You?

IRIS Payroll Basics is a free payroll solution designed for very small UK businesses with fewer than 10 employees. It covers the essential payroll tasks most startups need, including automatic PAYE and National Insurance calculations, workplace pension support, and RTI-compliant submissions to HMRC.

For businesses with extremely tight budgets that simply need to run payroll and stay compliant, it can serve as a straightforward short-term solution.

However, although GDPR-compliant, the software’s security protocols are not up to par with those of some of its paid competitors, nor is its scalability. More importantly, the software is scheduled to be discontinued after the 2025/26 UK tax year, meaning businesses using it will need to migrate to another payroll system anyway.

IRIS Payroll Basics FAQs

Who is IRIS Payroll Basics for?

IRIS Payroll Basics is a free payroll software solution that provides only the most basic and necessary payroll features. As such, it’s ideal for businesses with under 10 employees and relatively straightforward payroll requirements.

Does IRIS Payroll Basics support RTI submissions to HMRC?

Yes. Since IRIS Payroll Basics integrates directly with HMRC, you can submit forms and other information online using RTI (Real-Time Information) technology. This means your submissions to HMRC will happen more frequently, take less time, and contain only fully updated information.

What does IRIS do?

IRIS is a software company that provides solutions for businesses of all sizes. It specialises in accounting and financial management software, payroll software, HR and education management software, and biometric systems and technology.

Meet our Expert author

Paul Thomas

Paul Thomas is an organisational development specialist with more than 20 years of senior HR and change management experience at global companies, including Morgan Stanley, HelloFresh and Babbel. He designs practical, behaviour-driven systems that improve workforce operations, leadership capability and digital tool adoption. His work aims to bridge strategy and execution, helping organisations create the conditions for smoother workflows, clearer communication and sustained performance.