Salsa

Salsa is embedded payroll infrastructure that lets SaaS platforms add native, multi-country (US and Canada) payroll to their products through REST and GraphQL APIs, embeddable UI components (Salsa Express), and real-time webhooks. Partner platforms provision employers and workers, run payroll, disburse worker payments, and handle tax setup and filings without leaving their own app. API access is partner-gated - Salsa issues sandbox and production Bearer API keys to approved platform partners.

Salsa publishes 8 API contracts indexed on the APIs.io network, including Companies API, Onboarding & Sessions API, Pay Schedules API, and 5 more. Tagged areas include Payroll, Embedded Finance, Payroll as a Service, Fintech, and Payments.

The Salsa catalog on APIs.io includes 1 Spectral governance ruleset.

Salsa’s developer surface includes authentication, documentation, and 9 more developer resources.

🌐 Visit website 📡 Profile data on GitHub

24.4/100 emerging ▬ flat Agent 19/100 agent aware Front door AI 1/6 silent Heartbeat 0/100 dormant saas Full breakdown ↓
scored 2026-11-13 · rubric v0.28.0 · Show this score on your site →

AccessFreemiumSelf serve⚡ Free to try

1 published contract

Payroll Embedded FinancePayroll as a ServiceFintech Payments Human Resources TaxMulti-Country

What this lets a business do 2

Business capabilities this provider's published APIs can perform, derived from its own contracts. Browse all capabilities →

Human Capital Management

BC-300

CompaniesPay SchedulesPaymentsPayrollsWorkers

POST /employers/{employerId}/payroll-runs POST /employers/{employerId}/payroll-runs/{payrollRunId}/preview POST /employers GET /employers

Developer Platform & API Ecosystem Management

BC-4270

Webhooks

POST /webhook-endpoints

Kin Score

Kin Score How this is scored →
scored 2026-11-13 · rubric v0.28.0

Composite quality — 24.4/100 · emerging

Contract Quality 8.9 / 19

Developer Ergonomics 3.2 / 15

Access Clarity 1.0 / 15

Operational Transparency 1.2 / 10

Contract Governance 1.2 / 9

Discoverability 5.0 / 8

Regulatory Posture 0.8 / 15

Create-or-Update Ergonomics 0.0 / 10

Agent readiness — 19/100 · agent aware

Machine-Readable Contract 18 / 18

Agentic Access Contract 10 / 10

Documented Reversibility 0 / 6

MCP Server 0 / 12

Machine-Readable Auth 10 / 10

Idempotency 0 / 9

Stable Error Semantics 0 / 8

Request/Response Examples 0 / 7

Rate-Limit Signaling 7 / 7

Typed Event Surface 0 / 6

Agent Skills 0 / 5

Well-Known Catalog 0 / 4

Consent & Bot Identity 0 / 3

A2A Agent Card 0 / 8

Dry-Run / Simulate Mode 0 / 4

Delegated User Identity 0 / 6

Protected Resource Metadata 0 / 5

Registration Without a Human 0 / 6

Agentic Commerce Well-Known Document 0 / 5

Pagination 0 / 5

Distinct Operations 3 / 3

MCP Tool Quality 6 / 6

Regulatory Posture applies to this provider. Its tags matched the Payments regime, so Regulatory Posture carries 15 points of the composite. If this regime is wrong for your business, say so on your provider repo — the applicability map is public and we will correct it.

Create-or-Update Ergonomics applies to this provider. This API accepts writes, so it carries 10 points of the composite. It is scored from the published contracts themselves: whether a caller can create-or-update in one call, whether the write accepts a key the caller already holds, and whether the response says which branch ran. Without that, every write needs a search-and-branch in front of it, and the first time that check is skipped a duplicate record is created. Scored against the observed mean rather than raw — a provider at the catalog average is unchanged by this facet, not penalised by it.

The six quality facets above are damped to 75 points between them, because the conditional facet above carries the other 25. That is why each facet's contribution is shown against a damped maximum: raising a quality facet moves the composite by 75% of its nominal weight, not 100%. The full arithmetic is at apis.io/rating/.

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Agent readiness — checks not met, largest first (exact, from this profile):

MCP Server +12 pts — deployment.mode + probe verdict on the mcp/ manifest, not the pointer; an unprobed slug falls back to authorship Ask about this →
Idempotency +9 pts — OpenAPI mutating operations declare an idempotency key — a header, a request-body property, or a named de-duplication token whose own description says so (verified); else common[].type matches /idempoten/i (documented) Ask about this →
Stable Error Semantics +8 pts — OpenAPI $refs a shared error schema across 4xx/5xx responses (verified), else common[].type includes ErrorCatalog / ErrorCodes / DeclineCodes Ask about this →
A2A Agent Card +8 pts — a2a/-a2a.yml manifest, graded on conformance.grade against A2A 1.0.0 Ask about this →
Request/Response Examples +7 pts — share of operations carrying request/response examples; else an Examples / Code Samples link Ask about this →
Registration Without a Human +6 pts — a `registration_endpoint` in the served RFC 8414 / OIDC discovery document Ask about this →

10 more unmet checks in the Agent Readiness table above.

Kin Score — facets with the most composite points still available (weight × headroom):

Access Clarity scores 6.4 — up to +18.7 composite points Ask about this →
Developer Ergonomics scores 21.4 — up to +15.7 composite points Ask about this →
Contract Quality scores 47.5 — up to +13.1 composite points Ask about this →

Each check links to what satisfies it. Publish the artifact, or tell us where it already lives, and the score moves on the next scoring run.

Not sure how this applies to your stack? Ask about any one item. Kin Lane reads every question, looks at your profile and your situation, and replies with what a fix would take — scoped to that one area, priced up front, yours whether you ship it or not. Ask a question →

Improve this rating by publishing the missing artifacts — every area above can be raised, and the full rubric is at apis.io/rating/. Every facet and dimension name above is a link: it opens that measurement's own page — what it means, the exact checks that feed it, how the whole catalog distributes on it, and the providers at the top of it. This rating is computed from the provider profile at artifacts.apis.io/salsa/apis.yml: open an issue on github.com/api-evangelist/salsa to ask a question or point us at an artifact you publish. Submit an artifact on GitHub — free → Manage your own listing — the Influence plan, $499/mo →

Markets this provider is in provisional

The Kin Score Market layer reads a provider inside its market: its position, and how deep its integrations go. Depth is only comparable within a position. Provisional and unweighted: not part of the Kin Score or agent readiness.

Market	Position	Depth	Registered MCP server	Declares compatibility
Canada RPAA Payment Service Providers (Bank of Canada registry + Payments Canada)	regulated	19.2 (thin)	-	-

Registered MCP server and declares compatibility are report only — not weighted. Undeclared means we found nothing we can read, so there is no number: we never infer integrations.

Standards implemented 1

Standards this provider implements or carries. De facto ones are profiled and measured by the API Commons; formal ones come from the standards directory and are linked by the provider's own tags. The evidence column says how each claim was established — not that it was made.

OpenAPI

measured — observed by APIs.io (published)

APIs 8

Individual APIs this provider publishes, each with its own machine-readable definition.

Salsa Companies API

Employer (company) entities and configuration.

Salsa Onboarding & Sessions API

User tokens, hosted onboarding, and mock onboarding.

Salsa Pay Schedules API

Worker pay groups and work weeks.

Salsa Payments API

Individual worker payments and disbursements.

Salsa Payrolls API

Payroll runs and reports.

Salsa Tax API

Employer and worker tax setup.

Salsa Webhooks API

Webhook endpoint management.

Salsa Workers API

Employees and contractors.

Scroll for all 8

Open Collections 9

Open, tool-agnostic API collections (OpenAPI-derived and Bruno).

Salsa Payroll Companies API

OPEN COLLECTION

Salsa Payroll Companies Onboarding & Sessions API

OPEN COLLECTION

Salsa Payroll Companies Pay Schedules API

OPEN COLLECTION

Salsa Payroll Companies Payments API

OPEN COLLECTION

Salsa Payroll Companies Payrolls API

OPEN COLLECTION

Salsa Payroll Companies Tax API

OPEN COLLECTION

Salsa Payroll Companies Webhooks API

OPEN COLLECTION

Salsa Payroll Companies Workers API

OPEN COLLECTION

Salsa Payroll API

OPEN COLLECTION

Scroll for all 9

Salsa API pricing

Not yet checked against Salsa's own pricing page. Compiled by API Evangelist on 2026-07-01 from www.salsa.dev/; confirm before you rely on a figure. A free plan or tier is listed.

Plan	Price
Sandbox free	—
Partner (PEPM) usage	—
Enterprise enterprise	—

Plan details, limits and sources →

Rate limits

Partner Request Rate: see partner agreement requests
Per-Employer Operations: see partner agreement requests
Payroll Run Concurrency: gated by readiness jobs

Compiled by API Evangelist, not yet checked against Salsa's documentation. Rate-limit details →

Pricing Plans 1

Published pricing tiers and plan structures.

Salsa Plans Pricing

3 plans

PLANS

Rate Limits 1

Documented rate limits and quota policies.

Salsa Rate Limits

3 limits

RATE LIMITS

FinOps 1

Cost, billing, and metering signals for API financial operations.

Salsa Finops

FINOPS

Spectral Rules 1

Spectral governance rulesets for linting and validating these APIs. Counts are the severity each rule declares, not results of running them.

Salsa API Rules

51 rules · 49 error-severity 1 warn-severity 1 info-severity

SPECTRAL

Security Posture 2

Authentication, domain security, vulnerability disclosure, and trust-center signals.

Salsa Authentication

http · 1 scheme

SECURITY

Salsa Domain Security

TLSv1.3 · HSTS · DNSSEC · DMARC

SECURITY

Agentic Access (API Evangelist recommendations) 1

Recommended x-agentic-access execution contracts for AI agents.

Salsa Agentic Access

42 operations · 25 acting

AGENTIC

Resources

Documentation 1

Reference material describing how the API behaves

Documentation

Documentation

Agent Surfaces 1

MCP servers, agent skills, and machine-readable catalogs

AgenticAccess

AgenticAccess

Build 1

SDKs, sample code, and the tooling you integrate with

GitHubOrganization

GitHubOrganization

Access & Security 2

Authentication, authorization, and security posture

DomainSecurity

DomainSecurity

Authentication

Authentication

Operate 1

Status, limits, changes, and where to get help

RateLimits

RateLimits

Commercial 2

Pricing, plans, and the legal terms of use

Plans

Plans

FinOps

FinOps

Company 2

The organization behind the API

LinkedIn

Website

Website

Other 1

Properties that don't map to a standard resource type

CapabilityMap

CapabilityMap

Source (apis.yml)

aid: salsa
url: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/api-evangelist/salsa/refs/heads/main/apis.yml
name: Salsa
kind: company
description: Salsa is embedded payroll infrastructure that lets SaaS platforms add native, multi-country (US and Canada) payroll
  to their products through REST and GraphQL APIs, embeddable UI components (Salsa Express), and real-time webhooks. Partner
  platforms provision employers and workers, run payroll, disburse worker payments, and handle tax setup and filings without
  leaving their own app. API access is partner-gated - Salsa issues sandbox and production Bearer API keys to approved platform
  partners.
deliveryModel:
  model: saas
  open_source: false
  commercial: true
  callable_host: true
  label: Hosted service · you call their endpoint
  confidence: high
  source:
  - openapi
  - pricing
  generated: '2026-08-28'
  method: derived
accessModel:
  pricing: freemium
  onboarding: self-serve
  trial: false
  try_now: true
  public: false
  gated: none
  gated_source:
  - onboarding
  label: Freemium · Self-serve signup
  confidence: medium
  source:
  - plans
  - authentication
  - security
  generated: '2026-11-13'
  method: derived
image: https://kinlane-images.s3.amazonaws.com/shared/apis-json/icons/salsa.png
x-docs-platform: readme
x-docs-platform-confidence: high
x-docs-platform-checked: 2026-10-04
tags:
- Payroll
- Embedded Finance
- Payroll as a Service
- Fintech
- Payments
- Human Resources
- Tax
- Multi-Country
tags_raw:
- Payroll
- Embedded Finance
- Payroll as a Service
- Fintech
- Payments
- HR
- Tax
- Multi-Country
created: '2026-07-01'
modified: '2026-07-01'
specificationVersion: '0.23'
apis:
- aid: salsa:salsa-companies-api
  name: Salsa Companies API
  description: Employer (company) entities and configuration.
  humanURL: https://docs.salsa.dev/reference
  baseURL: https://api.salsa.dev/api/rest/v1
  tags:
  - Companies
  properties:
  - type: OpenAPI
    url: openapi/salsa-companies-api-openapi.yml
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/building-with-salsa
  - type: APIReference
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/reference
  - type: PostmanCollection
    url: collections/salsa.postman_collection.json
  - type: OpenCollection
    url: collections/salsa.opencollection.json
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/payroll-run-via-api
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/express-embedded-ui
- aid: salsa:salsa-onboarding-sessions-api
  name: Salsa Onboarding & Sessions API
  description: User tokens, hosted onboarding, and mock onboarding.
  humanURL: https://docs.salsa.dev/reference
  baseURL: https://api.salsa.dev/api/rest/v1
  tags:
  - Onboarding & Sessions
  properties:
  - type: OpenAPI
    url: openapi/salsa-onboarding-sessions-api-openapi.yml
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/building-with-salsa
  - type: APIReference
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/reference
  - type: PostmanCollection
    url: collections/salsa.postman_collection.json
  - type: OpenCollection
    url: collections/salsa.opencollection.json
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/payroll-run-via-api
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/express-embedded-ui
- aid: salsa:salsa-pay-schedules-api
  name: Salsa Pay Schedules API
  description: Worker pay groups and work weeks.
  humanURL: https://docs.salsa.dev/reference
  baseURL: https://api.salsa.dev/api/rest/v1
  tags:
  - Pay Schedules
  properties:
  - type: OpenAPI
    url: openapi/salsa-pay-schedules-api-openapi.yml
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/building-with-salsa
  - type: APIReference
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/reference
  - type: PostmanCollection
    url: collections/salsa.postman_collection.json
  - type: OpenCollection
    url: collections/salsa.opencollection.json
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/payroll-run-via-api
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/express-embedded-ui
- aid: salsa:salsa-payments-api
  name: Salsa Payments API
  description: Individual worker payments and disbursements.
  humanURL: https://docs.salsa.dev/reference
  baseURL: https://api.salsa.dev/api/rest/v1
  tags:
  - Payments
  properties:
  - type: OpenAPI
    url: openapi/salsa-payments-api-openapi.yml
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/building-with-salsa
  - type: APIReference
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/reference
  - type: PostmanCollection
    url: collections/salsa.postman_collection.json
  - type: OpenCollection
    url: collections/salsa.opencollection.json
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/payroll-run-via-api
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/express-embedded-ui
- aid: salsa:salsa-payrolls-api
  name: Salsa Payrolls API
  description: Payroll runs and reports.
  humanURL: https://docs.salsa.dev/reference
  baseURL: https://api.salsa.dev/api/rest/v1
  tags:
  - Payrolls
  properties:
  - type: OpenAPI
    url: openapi/salsa-payrolls-api-openapi.yml
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/building-with-salsa
  - type: APIReference
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/reference
  - type: PostmanCollection
    url: collections/salsa.postman_collection.json
  - type: OpenCollection
    url: collections/salsa.opencollection.json
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/payroll-run-via-api
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/express-embedded-ui
- aid: salsa:salsa-tax-api
  name: Salsa Tax API
  description: Employer and worker tax setup.
  humanURL: https://docs.salsa.dev/reference
  baseURL: https://api.salsa.dev/api/rest/v1
  tags:
  - Tax
  properties:
  - type: OpenAPI
    url: openapi/salsa-tax-api-openapi.yml
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/building-with-salsa
  - type: APIReference
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/reference
  - type: PostmanCollection
    url: collections/salsa.postman_collection.json
  - type: OpenCollection
    url: collections/salsa.opencollection.json
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/payroll-run-via-api
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/express-embedded-ui
- aid: salsa:salsa-webhooks-api
  name: Salsa Webhooks API
  description: Webhook endpoint management.
  humanURL: https://docs.salsa.dev/reference
  baseURL: https://api.salsa.dev/api/rest/v1
  tags:
  - Webhook
  tags_raw:
  - Webhooks
  properties:
  - type: OpenAPI
    url: openapi/salsa-webhooks-api-openapi.yml
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/building-with-salsa
  - type: APIReference
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/reference
  - type: PostmanCollection
    url: collections/salsa.postman_collection.json
  - type: OpenCollection
    url: collections/salsa.opencollection.json
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/payroll-run-via-api
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/express-embedded-ui
- aid: salsa:salsa-workers-api
  name: Salsa Workers API
  description: Employees and contractors.
  humanURL: https://docs.salsa.dev/reference
  baseURL: https://api.salsa.dev/api/rest/v1
  tags:
  - Workers
  properties:
  - type: OpenAPI
    url: openapi/salsa-workers-api-openapi.yml
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/building-with-salsa
  - type: APIReference
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/reference
  - type: PostmanCollection
    url: collections/salsa.postman_collection.json
  - type: OpenCollection
    url: collections/salsa.opencollection.json
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/payroll-run-via-api
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://docs.salsa.dev/docs/express-embedded-ui
common:
- type: CapabilityMap
  url: capabilities/salsa-capability-edges.yml
  name: Salsa Business Capability Map
- type: AgenticAccess
  url: agentic-access/salsa-agentic-access.yml
- type: DomainSecurity
  url: security/salsa-domain-security.yml
- type: Authentication
  url: authentication/salsa-authentication.yml
- type: GitHubOrganization
  url: https://github.com/salsa-payroll
- type: LinkedIn
  url: https://www.linkedin.com/company/salsa-dev
- type: Website
  url: https://www.salsa.dev/
- type: Documentation
  url: https://docs.salsa.dev/
- type: Plans
  url: plans/salsa-plans-pricing.yml
- type: RateLimits
  url: rate-limits/salsa-rate-limits.yml
- type: FinOps
  url: finops/salsa-finops.yml
maintainers:
- FN: Kin Lane
  email: kin@apievangelist.com

Salsa API — frequently asked questions

Does Salsa have an API?

Yes. APIs.io lists 8 APIs from Salsa, including Salsa Companies API, Salsa Onboarding & Sessions API and Salsa Pay Schedules API, and 5 more.

Is there an OpenAPI specification for the Salsa API?

Yes. APIs.io indexes 8 OpenAPI specifications for Salsa, each linked for download from this page.

How do I authenticate with the Salsa API?

Salsa uses bearer-token authentication (http · 1 scheme). The details are profiled on APIs.io as Salsa Authentication.

How much does the Salsa API cost?

APIs.io lists 3 pricing plans for Salsa, with each plan's price, limits and inclusions under Pricing on this page.

Is the Salsa API ready for AI agents?

Salsa has a Kin Score of 24.4 out of 100 (emerging) and an Agent Readiness score of 19.0 (agent-aware), scored by API Evangelist on 2026-11-13.

Work with this as data

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