February 20, 2026
This guide covers five of the most active and fastest-growing emerging markets for global hiring, and five EOR providers that can help you hire across them.
Emerging markets across Latin America, Southeast Asia, and Eastern Europe enable companies to hire highly skilled talent, often at a fraction of the cost of more established markets.
But those cost advantages come with added complexity. Navigating different employment laws, tax requirements, and worker classification rules can slow enterprise hiring down. When you’re competing for specialized talent in areas like tech, finance, and operations, delays can mean missing out on the right candidates.
An Employer of Record (EOR) solves this problem by acting as the legal employer for your international staff in countries where you don't have a registered entity.
This guide covers five of the most active and fastest-growing emerging markets for global hiring, and five EOR providers that can help you hire across them.
Emerging markets are economies on the rise — growing fast, attracting foreign investment, building digital infrastructure, and participating in global industries.
Emerging markets offer:
Colombia has become a go-to hiring region for companies building teams in North and South America, thanks to its time zone alignment and affordable hiring costs.
Cities like Bogotá and Medellín have growing startup ecosystems and strong talent pipelines in software development, finance, data, and customer support.
Colombia’s labor market is less complex than some of its Latin American neighbors, offering a relatively stable environment for foreign employers, along with government initiatives to support innovation and entrepreneurship.
Brazil is the largest economy in Latin America. Companies can find a wide range of candidates in Brazil, particularly in high-demand fields like engineering, fintech, and data.
The tradeoff is complexity. Brazil's Consolidação das Leis do Trabalho, universally known as the CLT, is among the most demanding employment frameworks in the world.
Hiring in Brazil comes with a few additional requirements:
India has been a global technology talent hub for decades. You’ll find major talent clusters in Bangalore, Hyderabad, Pune, Chennai, and Delhi, particularly in software engineering, cloud infrastructure, and AI/ML.
English is widely used in professional settings, and many workers have experience collaborating with international teams, especially for tech startups and SaaS companies.
That said, hiring in India can be complex. The country has a layered system of central and state-level labor laws, along with strict rules around worker classification and closely monitored statutory benefits.
Poland sits at an interesting intersection: it’s technically a developed European Union (EU) economy, but still offers cost advantages compared to Western Europe.
The country is home to highly educated and skilled professionals across engineering, data, cybersecurity, and finance. Poland’s regulatory environment is aligned with EU standards, which can simplify compliance for companies already operating in Europe.
Wages are rising alongside demand, but Poland remains a more cost-effective option than markets like Germany, France, and the U.K.
The Philippines has built its global reputation on business process outsourcing, and global employers will find a workforce experienced with working across different time zones, often on schedules aligned with U.S. or U.K. business hours.
The country has a large workforce with experience in customer support, operations, software development, digital marketing, product operations, and finance. Workers have strong English fluency and cultural familiarity with Western business practices.
However, hiring in the Philippines comes with a few challenges. Labor laws are employee-friendly, with strict requirements around termination, notice periods, and statutory benefits. Infrastructure and internet reliability can vary by region, which may impact fully remote roles. Companies also need to manage time zone differences carefully to maintain team alignment, especially when coordinating across multiple global offices.
Each of the following providers supports hiring across multiple emerging markets.
Best for: Enterprises that want broad country coverage and a single platform to manage global hiring at a large scale.
Deel positions itself as a comprehensive global hiring platform that combines EOR, contractor management, payroll, and HR tools in a single system.
Its coverage spans more than 150 countries, 130+ of which are owned entities, and has built significant compliance infrastructure across those markets.
The trade-off is paying for a lot of features, even if you only need a fraction of them.
Key strengths:
Considerations:
Price: Starts at $599 per employee per month for its standard EOR services or $899 for its enterprise offering. Hire contractors starting at $49 per contractor per month for its standard offering or $325 for its contractor of record service.
Best for: Companies that prioritize compliance and direct entity ownership over maximum country coverage.
Remote differentiates itself by primarily using an owned-entity model — meaning it directly employs workers in many of its covered countries rather than contracting through local partners.
This can translate to stronger control over compliance, intellectual property protections, and employment standards.
However, that model also limits how quickly Remote can expand its EOR services into new markets.
Key strengths:
Considerations:
Price: $699 per employee per month for EOR. Contractor management starts at $29 per month, the plus tier is $99 per contractor per month, and its contractor of record offering starts at $325 per contractor per month.
Best for: SMBs and mid-market companies scaling quickly in multiple regions.
RemoFirst is one of the most cost-effective global EOR solutions for companies hiring in emerging markets — often 30–50% lower than comparable providers.
With wide global coverage across 185+ countries, including all five of our emerging markets, RemoFirst makes it easy for companies to quickly and simultaneously scale across multiple markets.
RemoFirst’s EOR platform enables users to manage both employees and contractors. It covers the full employment lifecycle, including contract generation, onboarding, global payroll, compliance, tax filings, visa support, and benefits administration.
Key strengths:
Considerations:
Price:
Starts at $199 per employee per month; $25 per contractor per month.
Papaya Global is an EOR provider focused on global payroll at scale — particularly complex company payroll requiring detailed reporting, auditability, and integration with existing enterprise HR and finance systems.
Papaya Global supports coverage in 180+ countries and helps companies stay compliant with local labor laws, while managing contracts, expenses, and terminations in a single system of record.
The tradeoff is that implementation can be more challenging, and Papaya Global’s EOR offering is less affordable than some alternatives.
Key strengths:
Considerations:
Price:
EOR pricing starts at $499 per employee per month. The company offers multiple tiers for managing contractors, ranging from $5 to $295 per contractor per month.
Best for:
Remote-first companies building distributed teams and focusing on employee experience.
Oyster is designed with distributed teams in mind. It places a strong emphasis on employee experience, offering localized benefits, onboarding support, and resources to help companies build inclusive global teams.
Oyster has global coverage for hiring and paying workers compliantly in 120+ countries and can onboard new talent in just 48 hours.
The platform is easy to use, making it appealing to companies new to international hiring. However, costs increase as headcount grows.
Key strengths:
Considerations:
Price:
Starts at $699 per employee per month; contractor management starts at $29 per month.
Evaluate EOR providers against your hiring goals, target countries, and internal resources to choose the right partner.
A few factors matter most in emerging markets:
An EOR is the right starting point for most companies exploring emerging markets. It offers flexibility to hire, learn, and adjust without committing to every market, but it’s not the only option.
An EOR makes sense when you're:
A local entity may make sense when you're:
Expand Your Global Team With an EOR
An EOR can remove many of the operational and legal barriers to entry of hiring in emerging markets.
To find the right EOR, use our EOR Compare matching tool to get personalized recommendations based on your company size, target markets, and priorities — and see how these providers stack up on the specific criteria that matter to your team.
