The best employer of record in Singapore: a 2026 buyer's guide

Searches for the best employer of record in Singapore return mostly ranked listicles, many ordered by affiliate commission rather than how well a provider actually employs here. We take a different line: no numeric ranking, no invented review scores, and “best for” labels tied to a stated use case. The shortlist below is eight providers we could confirm, from their own pages, will employ staff in Singapore — global platforms and one Asia-Pacific specialist — plus one Vietnam-only option for the Vietnam side of a regional team. The honest first question is not which provider tops a list, but which one employs through a structure that fits your role, headcount and budget, and handles Singapore's CPF, levies, leave and work passes correctly.

The 2026 shortlist of EOR providers in Singapore

Each provider below publicly offers EOR employment in Singapore. For each we record a use-case label, whether it states it uses its own entity or a partner, the published starting price (or “Quote on request”), and one watch-out. Prices are each provider's own list figure on the date accessed and sit on top of gross salary and the statutory costs described later. Where a provider does not say whether it uses an owned entity or a local partner, we write “Not stated” rather than guess — it is worth asking, because an owned entity removes a third party from the chain.

How we chose, and what to verify yourself

“Best” is not a single answer, so we did not rank. We included a provider only if its own page confirmed EOR employment in Singapore, and we tagged each with the use case it fits rather than a score. When you compare them, four things separate a sound provider from a risky one. First, the employing entity: does it employ through its own Singapore entity (as Remote states it does11) or a local partner — and who signs the contract and holds the liability? Second, price transparency: a flat, visible per-employee fee (Deel and G-P from US$599; Remote and Oyster at US$699; Remofirst from US$199) is easier to compare than a quote-only model, and the fee is always additional to salary and statutory costs.101113 Third, statutory depth: can it run CPF, the Skills Development Levy and pass levies, and show a compliant Singapore payslip? Fourth, work-pass capability: can it sponsor an Employment Pass (with COMPASS) or an S Pass, and is it ready for the scheduled 2027 salary increases?78

Singapore employer essentials an EOR must handle

Whichever provider you pick is taking on the duties of a Singapore employer. These are the figures it must apply, from official sources and dated October 2026. The headline change for 2026 is in the Central Provident Fund (CPF): the Ordinary Wage ceiling rose to S$8,000 a month on 1 January 2026, and senior-worker rates stepped up again on the same date.5

CPF contributions (Singapore citizens and permanent residents)

CPF is paid only for Singapore citizens and permanent residents — foreign employees on an Employment Pass or S Pass do not contribute at all. For a citizen or third-year-onwards PR, the shares from 1 January 2026 are below, charged on Ordinary Wages up to the S$8,000 ceiling; total wages for the year are capped at S$102,000.5

The rest of the employer checklist

Beyond CPF, a Singapore employer carries a small training levy, must respect the Employment Act's statutory minimums, and — for foreign hires — pays pass levies. The table below gathers the essentials an EOR handles on your behalf.

Work passes for foreign employees

To employ a foreigner, an EOR sponsors the right pass. The Employment Pass is for professionals and managers and also requires at least 40 points on the COMPASS framework (unless exempt); the S Pass is for mid-skilled staff and carries a S$650 monthly employer levy (harmonised across tiers since 1 September 2025) within a sub-Dependency-Ratio-Ceiling quota. Both salary floors are scheduled to rise again for applications from 1 January 2027, so plan renewals around that. The 2026 figures are below.789

Why Singapore is the regional hub — and when an EOR beats a Pte Ltd

Singapore is the default Asia-Pacific base for many companies: an English-language business and legal environment, a deep professional talent pool, a dense network of double-tax treaties, and straightforward, digital company registration. That is also why it is a common place for a regional headquarters while the delivery work — engineering, operations, support — sits in lower-cost markets nearby.

Incorporating a Singapore private limited company (Pte Ltd) is quick, but running one is not free: it generally needs at least one director ordinarily resident in Singapore, a company secretary, and ongoing filings with the corporate registry and the tax authority. For a one-to-few-person presence, that fixed overhead and the resident-director requirement are the real friction, not the incorporation itself.

An EOR tends to win when you want to employ within days, have only a handful of hires, are testing the market, or face an uncertain horizon — because it already holds the entity, payroll and pass sponsorship. Your own entity tends to win once headcount and permanence justify the overhead, you want full control of benefits and intellectual-property consolidation, or the per-head fee across a larger team exceeds the cost of running a company. Using an EOR first and incorporating later is a common, sensible sequence; our explainer on how an EOR works covers the mechanics.

What an EOR in Singapore costs

Your monthly outlay has three parts: gross salary, statutory employer costs, and the provider's fee. The statutory layer differs sharply between a local and a foreign hire — a citizen or PR attracts employer CPF (up to the S$8,000 ceiling) while a foreigner on a pass attracts no CPF but may carry a levy; the Skills Development Levy applies to everyone. The provider fee is on top: roughly US$599–US$699 per employee a month for the published platforms, or a quote for the others.

Two points follow. A senior local hire is cheaper to carry above the CPF ceiling than the 17% headline suggests, because the employer contribution is capped; and a foreign professional on an Employment Pass carries almost no statutory on-cost beyond SDL, though the salary floor and COMPASS raise the bar to hire one at all. Add the EOR fee to whichever row matches your hire for the all-in figure.

A choosing checklist

Use these questions with any provider on the shortlist. One that answers them in writing, and names its Singapore employing entity, is one you can properly assess.

1. Do you employ through your own Singapore entity or a local partner, and which entity signs the contract?
2. Is your fee a flat amount per employee or a percentage of payroll, and what does it include — onboarding, offboarding, benefits administration, expenses?
3. How do you run CPF for citizens and PRs, the Skills Development Levy for all staff, and the S Pass levy where it applies?
4. Can you sponsor an Employment Pass (including COMPASS) and an S Pass, and how do you handle the 2027 salary increases on renewal?
5. Can we see a sample Singapore payslip and a monthly cost breakdown that separates your fee from salary and statutory costs?
6. How do you apply Employment Act leave and the statutory notice table on offboarding, and what exit charges, if any, apply?
7. What are your local HR support hours, and who is our point of contact in the region?

Hiring in Singapore and Vietnam?

A common pattern is a Singapore hub — sales, finance, regional management — with the build-and-operate team in Vietnam, often engineers in Ho Chi Minh City. Any of the Singapore providers above can employ the Singapore side. For the Vietnam headcount, EOR Vietnam (the publisher of this guide) is a Vietnam-only specialist. To be clear: EOR Vietnam does not and cannot employ anyone in Singapore — use a Singapore EOR for the hub and EOR Vietnam only for staff physically employed in Vietnam.

For the Vietnam side, our fee is a flat US$149 per employee per month for Vietnamese nationals, whatever the salary, role or headcount; foreign nationals who need a Vietnamese work permit are quoted separately. There are no setup, onboarding, offboarding, contract or payslip fees. Gross salary and the statutory employer contributions (about 23.5% on-cost for Vietnamese staff) are passed through at cost, and we employ through a Vietnam-registered entity named in your written quote. A refundable deposit equal to two months of the employee's employment cost is held for the engagement and returned at the end, less any unpaid amounts.

If that fits your plan, see employing in Ho Chi Minh City, hiring developers in Vietnam, the Vietnam employer-cost breakdown, and choosing an EOR in Vietnam. For regional comparisons, see the best EOR services overall, the Philippines and Indonesia guides, or Deel alternatives.