Spark Hire

What it is

Spark Hire is a Chicago-based video interviewing vendor that has turned into a three-product hiring suite. The original product, now called Meet, runs one-way (recorded) and live video interviews. In 2023 the company merged with Comeet, an applicant tracking system, and acquired Chally, a behavioral assessment provider. Comeet now sells as Spark Hire Recruit, and the Chally assessment ships as the Predictive Behavioral Assessment. You can buy the video product on its own, the assessment on its own, or the ATS with video and assessment bundled in.

The category leader it most resembles is HireVue, at a fraction of the price and with less assessment science behind the scoring.

What changed in 2026

The July 2026 product update moved Spark Hire from “recorded video” toward “recorded video that the software triages for you”:

• Role-Aligned AI Video Review. AI Video Review launched in August 2025 and scored one-way answers on six generic factors (communication, execution, comprehension, English fluency, enthusiasm, motivation). The 2026 version scores answers against the job’s requirements and scorecard traits and returns a strong, moderate or not-fit read per candidate.
• AI-generated question sets. It drafts 4-7 behavioral questions from a job description, all editable before sending.
• Proctoring. It flags one-way answers that look AI-generated or read like a script: unusual phrasing, overly formal wording, inconsistent delivery. Flags do not block a submission or change a score. Proctoring is on by default for any account that has AI Video Review enabled.
• AI Notetaker for live interviews, with an hour cap per Recruit plan: 50 hours/year on Pro, 100 on Growth, 150 on Enterprise.

Pricing reality

Spark Hire publishes its list prices:

• Video interviews only: from $249/month billed annually (unlimited jobs and users), or $299/month on a monthly plan capped at 5 jobs and 5 users. Both include one-way and live interviews, transcription and auto-summaries.
• Behavioral assessment only: same structure, $249/month annual or $299/month monthly.
• Recruit Pro (ATS + video): $335/month billed annually, about $4,020/year. Includes one-way video, AI video review, automated reference checks and 6,000 AI resume reviews/year. There is no monthly option.
• Recruit Growth: $499/month billed annually, about $5,988/year. Adds the Predictive Behavioral Assessment, custom scorecards, panel-interview scheduling, requisition and offer approvals, and 24,000 AI resume reviews/year.
• Recruit Enterprise: quote only. API access, custom fields, data-retention settings and the DocuSign integration sit here.

The video-only plan costs about 3.3× Hireflix’s $75/month entry tier. Spark Hire Recruit Pro costs about the same as running Hireflix plus a mid-market ATS. If you already have an ATS you like, the bundle buys you nothing; the $249 video plan is the comparison that matters.

Best for

In-house TA teams of 1-10 recruiters at companies with 50-1,000 employees, hiring for volume roles (customer support, sales development, retail management, staffing) where a recorded first-round screen replaces 20-minute phone screens. Spark Hire wins this segment if you need one-way and live interviews from one vendor, or if you are replacing a spreadsheet or a weak ATS and want video and assessment in the same system.

Don’t buy it if you already run Greenhouse, Lever or Ashby and only need async video. The bundle duplicates your ATS, and Hireflix covers that job for under a third of the price. Skip it too if your volume is 1,000+ hires a year and procurement wants validated psychometric scoring. That is still HireVue territory.

Versus the alternatives

• HireVue: the enterprise incumbent, with custom pricing that typically lands in the mid five figures a year. Pick HireVue for high-volume enterprise hiring that needs IO-psychology-validated assessments and an enterprise contract. Pick Spark Hire under that scale, or when you want published pricing and a same-week launch.
• Hireflix: async-only, $75-$150/month flat, no AI scoring. Pick Hireflix if you already have an ATS, only need one-way video and have humans doing the evaluation. Pick Spark Hire if you need live interviews, AI triage of large applicant pools, or an ATS.
• Vervoe and TestGorilla: skills-test-first platforms with video as one question type. Pick them when the screen should test job skills (writing, spreadsheets, code) rather than how a candidate presents.
• AI interviewer agents such as Ribbon: the newest competitor, voice agents that run the first-round conversation themselves instead of recording answers for a human or model to review. Pick one for very high-volume frontline hiring where even reviewing video is a bottleneck. Spark Hire still keeps a human reviewer in the loop.

Watch-outs

• AI Video Review puts you under AI-hiring laws. If you hire for any role based in Illinois, the Illinois AI Video Interview Act requires notice, an explanation of how the AI works, and consent before AI analyzes an applicant’s video. It also requires deleting the video within 30 days when the applicant asks. If the strong/moderate/not-fit output substantially drives who advances, it can count as an automated employment decision tool under NYC Local Law 144, which requires a bias audit. Guard: before turning AI Video Review on, add the AIVIA notice and consent text to the interview invitation. Decide in writing whether the AI rating gates advancement or only orders the review queue. If it gates, commission the bias audit first.
• Proctoring flags are probabilistic, and they are on by default. A non-native speaker reading prepared notes can look like an AI-generated answer. Guard: write a policy that a flag sends a candidate to a live follow-up question, never to automatic rejection. Spot-check the first 50 flagged answers before trusting the signal. See AI interview fraud for the wider pattern.
• ATS integrations stop at a link. Reviewers on G2 (4.7/5 across 700+ reviews) single out clunky access to videos from inside the ATS. The Greenhouse, Lever and Workable integration pages describe the ATS sending the invite and getting back a link to the recording. None of them documents the AI rating or Proctoring flags syncing back as structured fields. Guard: during the trial, run one candidate end to end through your ATS. Confirm where the AI rating and Proctoring flags actually land before you build a scorecard around them.
• The AI Notetaker hour cap is small for a live-interview-heavy team. 50 hours/year on Recruit Pro covers about 100 thirty-minute interviews. Guard: count last quarter’s live interview hours and multiply by four. If that exceeds the plan cap, price Growth or use a dedicated notetaker like Metaview or BrightHire.