Best job posting sites in India (2026): 15 free and paid

If you are hiring in India, the shortlist starts with Naukri for reach, LinkedIn for professional roles, and Indeed India for volume with a free way in.

This guide ranks 15 sites with verified pricing where each one publishes it, an honest "ask their sales team" where it does not, and a simple way to route each role to the right board.

The shortlist then splits by role: apna and WorkIndia for blue-collar roles, Internshala and Freshersworld for freshers, Cutshort and Hirist for tech, and iimjobs for senior roles.

Here is what the ranking listicles skip. The best teams stop betting on one board. They post to several at once, then track which one actually delivers a hire.

Every price and free limit below was checked in October 2026 on each site's own employer pages, using India pricing where a site shows prices by location.

Key takeaways

• Naukri is the default for volume hiring, and it now publishes prices. Company accounts get one free job a month, Hot Vacancy posts cost ₹3,300 for 2 (₹1,650 each), and small-business packs start at ₹3,500, plus GST.
• Real free options exist. Freshersworld posts are free, Indeed has a free tier, LinkedIn gives you one free post, Internshala gives one free listing a month, Naukri gives company accounts with valid documents one free job a month, and TCS iON BizHub and the government's National Career Service advertise free posting.
• Segment beats brand. Route by the role you are filling, not by which name you recognize.
• Roles in India often draw large application counts. Employers on Indian forums describe hundreds of Indeed applicants for a single role with only a small share worth calling, so screening matters more than posting.
• One workflow beats a stack of dashboards. Posting through an ATS once and tracking each source beats logging into a pile of recruiter panels and guessing which one worked.

Quick comparison: 15 job posting sites in India at a glance

Prices are the current public rates from each site's own employer pages, checked October 2026. Where a site shows a sale price next to a list price, we quote the price it charges today. Where a site hides pricing behind a sales form, the table says so plainly.

Free job posting sites in India: what each free plan gets you

"Free" means very different things across these sites. Here is what each one actually offers before any upsell.

Here is the same picture in plain terms, starting with the options most employers use.

• Freshersworld promises unlimited free posting in its FAQ, and TCS iON BizHub and Wellfound also advertise unlimited free posts.
• Indeed has a free tier, though it runs quality checks and agencies are not eligible.
• LinkedIn gives you one free job post at a time, visible in search and to your connections.
• Internshala includes one free listing a month, with up to 20 applications.
• TCS iON BizHub advertises fully free posting with unlimited posts and AI features. It also ranks near the top for this search, so it is worth a look if your budget is zero.
• Job Hai offers free posting for local staff and claims hires within 48 hours.
• MyAMCAT lets you post for free and pitches pre-assessed candidates.
• Naukri gives company accounts with valid documents one free job a month, live for 7 days with up to 50 applies.
• National Career Service, the government portal, says posting is free at every stage; you register with a phone OTP, DigiLocker and your PAN.

Is WorkIndia free? Its plans start at ₹2,350, and the site mentions a first-time free post that we could not confirm. Budget for the paid tier and treat any free post as a bonus.

On Indeed, the posting flow includes a step where you choose to sponsor the job or post it for free, so read that screen before you click through.

A few other free pages surface for this search. Workable and similar ATS free-trial pages rank here, but they are full recruiting suites rather than Indian job boards, so they sit outside this list.

Jobaaj, Just.jobs, and HireMee appear too, though none publish employer pricing or carry much practitioner feedback, so they remain mentions rather than full picks.

Two quick warnings. TimesJobs no longer runs a working employer portal, its recruiter subdomains do not resolve and the surviving site is candidate-only, so do not budget for it.

Quikr Jobs is still active, with rate-limited free posts plus Bulk Ad Packs from ₹999 to ₹4,999, but it stays classifieds-grade in quality.

Free hiring in India also happens off the portals. Employers on Indian forums describe WhatsApp and Telegram job groups, referrals, college and ITI placement cells, and local newspaper classifieds as their cheapest channels.

How to post a job in India, step by step

• Pick the portal by role, using the guide below, rather than by brand.
• Get your documents ready. Several portals verify the employer before a post goes live: Naukri's free job needs a company or proprietorship account with valid documents and no Gmail or Yahoo address, Shine asks for KYC within 3 days, and National Career Service uses DigiLocker and your PAN.
• Write the post to fit the free limits. A Naukri free job allows a 250-character description and one location, so free posts reward short, specific copy.
• Expect review time. Indeed's post-a-job page says it typically reviews postings within 12 to 24 hours, and Freshersworld free jobs go live in 24 to 48 hours.
• Track every source. Give each channel its own trackable link where it accepts an external application link, so you can see which one produced the hire.

Match the board to the role you are hiring

Google's own AI answer for this search sorts these sites by hiring need, and that is exactly how experienced recruiters talk about them. Start with the role, then pick the board.

• Mass or corporate hiring, plus Tier-2 and Tier-3 reach: start with Naukri, which says it has more than 10 crore registered job seekers.
• Professional, leadership, or product-company roles: start with LinkedIn, strongest when you pair a post with direct outreach, weak when you rely on cold applies alone.
• Tech roles where mass spam kills signal: start with Cutshort, then Instahyre or Hirist.
• Blue-collar, frontline, or local staff: start with apna, then WorkIndia, and Job Hai for hyper-local free posts.
• Interns or freshers: start with Internshala, then Freshersworld for free reach.
• Mid-management generalists: foundit leans into this band.
• Senior management and specialist roles: iimjobs is the usual first stop.

Here is the catch. Most real hiring plans span two or three of these at once. That is where a single-dashboard, measure-everything setup earns its keep, which brings us to the first pick.

The 15 best job posting sites in India for employers

1. 100Hires: post once to multiple boards and screen the flood

Full disclosure first. 100Hires is our product, and it is not a job board. It is the distribution and screening layer that sits above the boards on this list.

You fill in one job form, and 100Hires publishes it to 13 named job boards in a click. For India specifically, the two that matter are Indeed and LinkedIn, plus a branded career site included on every plan.

The Indian boards without an integration, like Naukri, apna, and foundit, are handled a different way.

Trackable links give each board, campus placement cell, and WhatsApp group its own URL, with visitors, candidates, and conversion reported per source, wherever the channel accepts an external application link.

You still see which channel delivered the hire, even when there is no API.

Then there is the volume problem. One hiring manager described 150 applications landing in a day for a single startup role, and reading only the first 20 before giving up.

AI Score reads all of them against criteria you set per job and scores each 0 to 100, so the strongest applicants surface first. 100Hires also drafts job descriptions with AI, and AI Copilot answers questions about each candidate.

Now the honest limits. Pricing is in USD from $49 a month billed annually ($99 month-to-month) for companies with up to 20 employees.

There is no free plan, but the 14-day trial posts to boards once your company is verified, capped at 10 candidates from external boards across the account.

There is no direct posting to any Indian job board, and the built-in job board integrations are strongest for US and global hiring.

In India, the value is the workflow, the screening, and the per-source measurement, not raw board reach.

Best for: teams running several boards who want one dashboard and real screening. Watch out: if you only ever post to Naukri, a standalone ATS layer is more than you need. G2 rating: 4.8 out of 5 across 1,391 reviews.

2. Naukri: the default for volume hiring in India

Naukri is the default for mass and corporate hiring, and in our read it is just as strong in Tier-2 and Tier-3 cities. Recruiters mine its Resdex database and cold-contact candidates as often as they post jobs.

Posting now comes in three shapes on its job posting page. The free job, for company or proprietorship accounts with valid documents, allows one post a month, live for 7 days with up to 50 applies.

Small-business packs with CV recommendations cost ₹3,500 for 2 jobs over 30 days, ₹4,500 for 3 over 45 days and ₹6,000 for 5 over 60 days, and Hot Vacancy posts cost ₹3,300 for 2 (₹1,650 each), all plus GST.

Volume comes with noise. Recruiters on Indian forums describe heavy third-party agency spam and, in some threads, roughly one relevant response in ten.

One older Naukri employer walkthrough shows a repost using up a credit, and Naukri's terms say Hot Vacancy credits must be used within 30 days of purchase, or within a year for packs of 5 or more.

The Resdex resume database is still quoted on request, so get that number in writing.

Fake walk-in scams that impersonate big brands are a known problem on the candidate side, which is one more reason applicants look for company accounts that supplied valid documents. Best for: volume across every experience level.

Watch out: Resdex is still sales-quoted, and spam management is real overhead.

G2 rating: 4.4 out of 5 across 226 reviews.

3. Indeed India: free entry, pay only for reach

Indeed runs a large Indian operation at in.indeed.com, and its free posting is a genuine way in. Sponsored listings run on a budget model, billed on the first day of the month or once your spend reaches ₹500, whichever comes first, per Indeed's pricing page.

You pay for clicks or started applications rather than a flat fee. Indeed's post-a-job page says it typically reviews postings within 12 to 24 hours, and free posters get tripped up at the step where it asks whether to sponsor the job or post it for free.

Employer walkthroughs show free listings pulling applicants within a couple of days on a modest promoted budget.

Best for: high-volume roles and startups testing a channel cheaply. Watch out: the free tier has quality gates, and applicant quality swings a lot by role. G2 rating: 4.3 out of 5 across 615 reviews.

If you run Indeed often, connecting it to your ATS keeps the listing, screening questions, and applicants in one pipeline. Indeed notes that jobs published through an ATS or job feed may be eligible only as sponsored jobs, so budget for that.

4. LinkedIn: professional, leadership, and remote roles

LinkedIn is the white-collar default, and the results are genuinely split. Recruiters who pair a post with active outreach report their best hires here. Rely on the free post alone, with no outreach, and you mostly collect low-intent applications.

You get one free job post at a time, visible in search and to your connections. Paid posts run on a daily budget. On its India pricing page, LinkedIn's example is a ₹100 daily budget, or up to ₹3,000 over 30 days.

A free post stays active up to 14 days before it pauses, with an application limit that is typically 10 to 30.

LinkedIn's posting flow can also auto-send a rejection email when a candidate fails your screening questions, which saves you from clearing out obvious mismatches by hand.

Best for: product companies and senior or remote roles. Watch out: the one-free-post cap, and applications that pile up fast. One talent leader described 100 to 300 profiles landing on a single post. LinkedIn Recruiter G2 rating: 4.5 out of 5 across 442 reviews.

5. apna: blue-collar and frontline hiring at scale

apna is the leader for blue-collar and frontline hiring. One employer put it plainly on social media, rating it above WorkIndia for ground-level staff.

It is also one of the few Indian boards that publishes real pricing. Posts start at ₹699. Jobs-plus-database bundles run ₹1,949 for one month and three credits, ₹3,649 for three months, and ₹7,099 for six months, with each credit keeping a post live for 15 days.

The site claims coverage across 800-plus cities and 7 lakh-plus small businesses.

Each credit keeps a post live for 15 days, and apna adds free tools such as bulk WhatsApp messages to up to 320 candidates a day.

Best for: frontline and local roles at scale. Watch out: it is not built for tech or white-collar hiring. G2 rating: 4.7 out of 5, though across just 24 reviews, so read that as a small sample.

6. WorkIndia: fast local and operational hiring

WorkIndia competes with apna for blue-collar and local hiring, and it publishes its rates. Plans run ₹2,350 for 30 days with one active job and 100 database unlocks, ₹4,999 for 90 days, and ₹11,000 for a full year.

The site advertises a first-post-free offer that we could not confirm, so plan around the paid tier.

WorkIndia claims more than 2 crore monthly candidates across 750-plus cities, and hiring within three days for most roles. The reality check from recruiters: at this end of the market, ghosting and no-shows are common.

One staffing founder raced a 48-hour deadline to fill restaurant roles and still lost candidates who never showed.

Best for: local and operational roles you need filled fast. Watch out: no-show rates, and a blue-collar-only focus.

7. Internshala: freshers and interns

Internshala is the go-to for interns and freshers, with deep active-fresher supply that fills entry-level roles when broader boards go quiet. It gives you one free listing a month with up to 20 applications.

Paid plans start at ₹2,999 for one month with 1 + 1 premium listings, and ₹13,999 for three months with 5 + 5, before GST.

Employers that hire often can buy Growth at ₹11,999 a month or Scale at ₹89,999 a year, with unlimited listings, talent database invites and AI resume matching, before GST.

Internshala draws heavy student and fresher traffic, which is why entry-level roles tend to fill quickly here.

Best for: entry-level and internship-to-hire pipelines. Watch out: fresher volume needs real screening, and it hits a ceiling for experienced roles.

8. Freshersworld: unlimited free postings for entry-level

Freshersworld leads with something most sites ration: its FAQ promises unlimited free posting. If your budget is zero and you are hiring freshers, start here.

Paid options add reach. Hot postings run ₹750 for a single 30-day listing up to ₹7,499 for 180 days, with 18% GST added at checkout. Combo packs that bundle database access run ₹1,750 to ₹14,750, and database-only plans start at ₹2,999.

Best for: budget-zero fresher and campus hiring. Watch out: its presence thins out fast outside the entry-level segment.

9. Cutshort: AI-matched tech hiring

Cutshort is a tech-only platform built to cut the mass spam that buries tech roles on general boards.

It relaunched pricing in 2026 with flat price bands by company size and unlimited postings plus resume views in each band, from ₹10,000 a month for companies with 1 to 19 employees, ₹20,000 for 20 to 99, and ₹30,000 for 100 to 499.

One customer on its site credits the platform with about 60 percent of their hires, which is a vendor claim worth testing against your own funnel.

Best for: startup tech hiring without the spam. Watch out: it is tech-only, and the new pricing model is still settling. G2 rating: 4.6 out of 5 across 43 reviews.

10. Instahyre: curated tech matching

Instahyre splits opinion among engineers. Some say most of their recruiter calls come from it. Others find the matching hollow. Both camps are loud on Indian tech forums, so employer branding carries weight here.

It now offers free job slots: up to 3 tech and 10 non-tech jobs, with free tech roles capped at 6 years of experience and ₹50 LPA. Premium pricing is still not public, so ask for numbers up front.

Best for: reaching passive tech talent in metro cities. Watch out: premium pricing is not public, and candidate skepticism you will need to counter with a strong company profile. G2 rating: 4.5 out of 5 across 30 reviews.

11. iimjobs and Hirist: senior management and tech, same family

iimjobs and Hirist are template twins from the same parent, with near-identical employer pages. iimjobs handles senior management and finance roles, Hirist handles tech.

Neither publishes pricing. Both run a callback-request sales model and pitch premium posts with, in their words, 20 times more views than a free listing.

The clearest sign they are standard tools: executive-search job ads that list hands-on iimjobs and Hirist experience as a requirement.

Best for: senior management and specialist tech hires. Watch out: opaque pricing and niche volume.

12. foundit: mid-management reach

foundit is the platform formerly known as Monster India, and plenty of recruiters still search for "Monster" out of habit. It leans into business and mid-management hiring with AI skill-matching.

Pricing is not public. Its Job Posting and Comprehensive plans are named on the recruiter site, with custom plans on request, but the actual numbers come through a lead form.

Best for: mid-career generalist roles. Watch out: opaque pricing, and stick to the official employer channel rather than third parties who invoke the foundit name.

13. Shine: the volume second-stringer

Shine positions itself as a large second option, and third-party writeups place it among India's bigger portals.

Shine now publishes a Starter plan: 2 job posts for ₹999 with 30 days of validity, taxes included, and KYC must be completed within 3 days. Larger Smart Search and Smart Match plans are listed on its package page.

Best for: extra volume alongside Naukri rather than as a sole channel. Watch out: the KYC deadline, since the Starter package expires without it.

14. Wellfound: startup and global-remote roles

Wellfound is a global startup board that matters for India's remote and startup segment, and Indian founders use it in real numbers. The free tier lets you post jobs, review applicants, and run a light built-in ATS.

Job Ads start at $200, and its paid Reach plans start at $135 per seat a month. Pricing is USD only, with no India-specific rate.

Best for: startups hiring globally-minded talent. Watch out: USD pricing and a thinner India-local pool. G2 rating: 4.2 out of 5 across 108 reviews.

15. Google for Jobs: the free channel everyone forgets

Google for Jobs is not a board. It is the Google Search feature that surfaces jobs directly in search results, and almost no one covering this topic mentions it.

Google's documentation describes no fee. Your jobs qualify when your career page carries JobPosting structured data, with required fields for date posted, description, hiring organization, job location, and title.

A valid-through date and salary are recommended, and valid-through matters most when the listing has an expiry.

Google's job posting structured-data guide lists the full spec.

Any Indian employer with a career site can earn organic reach here without a per-post fee. If your ATS builds a career site that outputs the schema automatically, as the 100Hires Google Jobs integration does, this becomes a channel you set up once; Google still decides placement.

Best for: every employer with a careers page. Watch out: there is no direct posting, so it only reflects pages that are marked up correctly.

Running several India job boards without losing track

A real hire in India rarely comes from one board alone. It might involve Naukri, LinkedIn, Indeed, a niche site, a campus placement cell, and a couple of WhatsApp groups. That is a stack of channels and candidate piles, with no clean answer to which one produced the hire.

India's application volume makes the manual version worse. When a single role pulls hundreds of applicants across several sources, tracking cost per hire by hand stops being realistic.

Our recommendation: instead of posting on every site by hand, push one listing out through a distribution tool and manage applicants from a single dashboard. The operating pattern looks like this:

• Post natively where an API exists, which in India means Indeed and LinkedIn.
• Use trackable links for the channels with no API, such as apna, foundit, campus cells and WhatsApp or Telegram job groups, wherever the channel accepts an external application link.
• Publish a career site with JobPosting schema so your jobs are eligible for Google for Jobs; Google's documentation describes no fee, and Google decides placement.
• Let AI screening triage the combined flood so wider posting does not mean more resume reading.
• Read per-source reporting and renew only the channels that actually convert.

100Hires runs exactly this workflow, with the caveat that its built-in job board integrations target global and US hiring, so in India the main benefit is the single dashboard and the screening rather than board reach.

For the global version of this same playbook, see our guide to the best job posting sites for employers worldwide.

How we evaluated these sites

We checked every official employer pricing page in October 2026, pulled current G2 ratings, and read Indian recruiter and HR threads plus employer walkthroughs.

Where a platform publishes no pricing, we say sales-quoted rather than repeat third-party guesses that we could not verify.

One disclosure, stated plainly. 100Hires is our product. It leads the list because the article's whole thesis is distribution plus screening, and that is what 100Hires does. It is not an Indian job board, it prices in USD, and it does not integrate natively with Naukri.

If those trade-offs do not fit, the other 14 entries stand on their own.

Frequently asked questions

Which job posting site is free in India?

Naukri (one free job a month for company accounts), Internshala (one free listing a month), LinkedIn (one free post at a time), Indeed, Freshersworld and the government's National Career Service all offer free posting. Many teams add 100Hires to see which one delivers.

Is WorkIndia free for employers?

WorkIndia's paid plans start at ₹2,350 for 30 days. The site advertises a first-time free post we could not confirm, so budget for the paid tier. 100Hires does not post to WorkIndia, but a CSV import puts its applicants next to other boards'.

Which is better for employers, Naukri or LinkedIn?

Naukri wins on volume, Tier-2 and Tier-3 reach, and IT-services hiring. LinkedIn wins for product companies and senior roles. Most recruiters use both. 100Hires posts to LinkedIn natively, and you can import Naukri applicants by CSV or bulk resume upload.

What is the number one job site in India?

Founded in 1997, Naukri says it has more than 10 crore registered job seekers. But the best site depends on the role, since blue-collar and tech roles often belong on other boards. 100Hires AI Score helps triage the volume these boards generate.

How much does it cost to post a job in India?

Shine charges ₹999 for 2 jobs (tax included) and apna starts at ₹699 per post, while Naukri (₹3,300 for 2 Hot Vacancies) and Internshala (₹2,999 starter plan) add GST. 100Hires starts at $49 a month billed annually ($99 month-to-month), USD, for up to 20 employees.

Can I post a job to multiple sites in India at once?

Yes, through an ATS with multiposting. With 100Hires you fill one job form and send it to Indeed, LinkedIn and other global boards, then use trackable links for Indian boards that accept an external application link. AI Score triages the combined pool.

Does Naukri allow free job posting?

Yes. Company or proprietorship accounts with valid documents get one free job a month, live 7 days with up to 50 applies; Gmail or Yahoo addresses are not eligible. 100Hires does not post to Naukri, but you can import Naukri applicants by CSV or bulk resume upload.

The setup that outlasts the board reshuffle

The names keep shifting. Monster became foundit, and TimesJobs quietly retired its employer side. The durable setup does not depend on any one of them.

Post through one workflow, cover the boards that fit each role, and keep per-source numbers so you always know which channel to renew. Start a 14-day 100Hires trial or book a demo to run your next job requisition in India through a single dashboard.