Care.com Review: Is Care.com Still Worth It in 2024?

Care.com is an online marketplace where people post jobs for a wide variety of caregiving roles. The company was founded in 2006, and it’s currently one of the most widely used job sites for caregivers.

With millions of family users and a global footprint, it’s a solid place to find jobs as a care provider. You can find jobs on the site or through the Care.com mobile app.

While the site was originally created as a simple job board (and this is still its main use), it’s expanded to include a new “booking” function designed to appeal to gig workers and compete with the leading gig apps for babysitting, pet care, and other types of caregiving work.

The catch is that bookings are fully mediated by Care.com, meaning they’ll take a cut of your pay, and you can only get paid through the platform. By contrast, if you only use the Care.com job board to connect with potential employers, you and the client will settle all the details of your employment off the platform, including your hours, how you’ll be paid, and how long you’ll work for them.

Types of services

Care.com supports a variety of caregiving services. Below are a few examples:

• Babysitting
• Nannying
• Special needs care
• Tutoring
• Senior care
• Pet sitting and boarding
• Dog walking
• Pet grooming
• Housekeeping
• Household management
• Personal assistance

This may seem like a gold mine of job opportunities, but there is a catch: You need to create a new profile for each type of job you want to do. You can have multiple profiles under one account (meaning you don’t need to pay any extra fees), but you’ll need to write a new bio for each profile.

Cost of using Care.com

Care.com isn’t exactly free to use. While you can create a Care.com account for free, you’ll need to pay a certain amount of money to actually use the site to find work. The table below summarizes Care.com’s costs and service fees.

Care.com Costs and Fees

Premium membership

A basic Care.com membership is free (though you still have to pay the background check fee). However, there is also a paid subscription option for caregivers. A premium subscription comes with several special perks:

• Waived annual screening fee
• Free CareCheck background check
• Higher ranking in caregiver search results
• Priority job alerts
• Option to message families with no active job postings

Care.com doesn’t specify how much a premium membership costs. However, they do imply that there are multiple options to choose from. Just bear in mind that your subscription will renew automatically if you don’t cancel it.

Requirements for caregivers

There are only a few requirements you’ll need to meet to get approved to post a profile on Care.com:

• Be at least 18 years old
• Have a Social Security number
• Pass a CareCheck

CareCheck is the name of Care.com’s background check. You’ll need to undergo a new check each year.

Supported areas

Care.com is available in cities and towns across the US. Additionally, the site operates in more than a dozen other countries:

• Canada
• The United Kingdom
• Germany
• The Netherlands
• Austria
• Switzerland
• Sweden
• France
• Denmark
• Finland
• Spain
• Ireland
• Australia
• Norway
• New Zealand

Even though it’s a global platform, if you’re a US user, you can only search for and accept jobs within the US.

How to sign up for Care.com

To begin your search for caregiver jobs, just follow these five steps:

1. Click “Apply to Jobs” at the top of the Care.com homepage.
2. Select if you are an “Individual” or “Company” (small business) from the drop-down menu.
3. Select the type of service you want to offer.
4. Enter your email address and create your account password.
5. Click “Join now” to continue the enrollment process.

After enrollment, you’ll need to pass a background check, provide information about your professional experience, and upload a photo.

The whole process typically takes at least 3 business days. Once you’re approved, you can begin applying for jobs.

Where to download the Care.com app

App Store Google Play

Care.com is a legit job seeking site for care providers. In fact, it’s one of the most widely used job sites. Nevertheless, there have been cases of scammers using Care.com to trick caregivers into handing over their money or sensitive information.

It’s important to stay vigilant against scams and take precautions to protect yourself. Don’t share highly sensitive personal information with users you don’t know, and be sure to familiarize yourself with the signs of nanny and caregiver job scams.

How safe is Care.com for caregivers?

Care.com is just as safe for workers as any other job site. While Care.com claims to employ certain safety measures to protect caregivers (e.g., screening care seekers and monitoring messages), there are still risks involved, especially given the sensitive nature of caregiving work.

Ryan emphasized the importance of vetting families before you accept a job with them. “It’s 100% up to the sitter/nanny to implement safe practices, be careful sharing information, interview with families before accepting jobs, etc.”

To him, the risks involved are similar to those you’d face working as an Uber driver since you’re dealing with strangers, and he said this is especially true for Care.com’s booking function. “I have heard a lot of female sitters express concern with being booked by single fathers and such,” he added. For this reason, he puts a lot of effort into vetting families.

Ryan generally avoids replying to people who don’t put a noticeable effort into their communications with him, does an online search on people who give him their name, and insists on having a phone or video call and in-person meeting before taking a job.

You set your own rates on Care.com. The platform offers suggestions based on your specialty and location, but some users report that the suggested rates tend to be lower than what they might normally charge, close to minimum wage.

Ryan confirmed that rates can vary widely, even between neighborhoods within a particular city. For example, in Ryan’s area (Washington, D.C.), he said some people post jobs for $9 per hour, which is well below the minimum wage of $17 per hour. But half a mile away, a different family might be offering $40 per hour. “Most cities will probably be similar,” he added.

Factors that can influence your earnings include your experience level, where you live, what types of services you provide, and your availability. The table below gives a glimpse into how your income can vary depending on which caregiving services you provide.

Care.com Salaries in Top US Cities

Source: Care.com rates calculators for caregiving, babysitting, housekeeping, and pet care.

How you’ll get paid

When you complete a job, you’ll get paid in one of two ways:

• Through Care.com: The client will send a payment through the Care.com platform, which will be deposited into your bank account 6 hours after the booking. This is how payments work on Care.com for “bookings,” and Care.com takes a percentage of your pay.
• Off the platform: You and your client decide on your own payment arrangement (cash, check, bank transfer, PayPal, Venmo, Zelle, etc.). This applies to any job you get from the regular Care.com job board.

Ryan told us most caregivers make payment arrangements off the platform, simply using the job board function to connect with clients and then not using the site after that. “Care.com doesn’t track or remain involved at all outside of bookings,” he added.

In fact, he said that the majority of caregivers and care seekers who use Care.com move off the platform, even if the job started with a one-time booking. “Care.com doesn’t provide any benefit at all for continuing to go through the site, the costs are higher, both sides pay fees, the booking and messaging is clunky, etc. It’s 1000x easier to just text your new sitter and ask if they are free Friday night,” Ryan said.

We asked Ryan about his experience using the site for over a decade, and he gave us some insight into the realities of finding work through Care.com.

Anybody you speak to can leave you a review

It’s not just people you’ve worked with on Care.com who can leave you reviews—even people who you’ve had a short conversation with on the platform can post a review. For Ryan, this is a huge deterrent to even replying to a potential client’s message unless he’s pretty sure that the job will be a good fit.

The faulty review system is a big pain point for many other users as well. Care.com complaints posted online suggest that it’s not uncommon for workers to get bad reviews from people they never worked with—whether the reason be that they declined a job offer, didn’t respond very quickly, or didn’t tell the client what they wanted to hear.

Care.com, for their part, seemingly doesn’t moderate reviews or offer any option to remove reviews that are unjustified. One slipup, and you could find yourself with a low rating that makes it next to impossible to land jobs on the platform.

You’ll get random booking requests intended for someone else

One peculiarity that Ryan assumes is related to Care.com’s new “booking” feature is the random messages he occasionally gets that are addressed to someone else. He hypothesized that it happens when caregivers reject a booking request and Care.com automatically sends the same request out to other local care providers.

“It leads to awkward messages,” he said. “I never accept these jobs and have tried to disable them.” To him, this feature is not well thought out, and he hopes it’s something that Care.com will work on changing.

Booking requests don’t come easy

According to Ryan, gig bookings on Care.com can be “extremely hit and miss,” and they’re not a reliable income source. Additionally, getting these bookings is next to impossible without a very strong profile.

Specifically, Ryan told us you’d likely be disappointed by the lack of jobs you’d get if you signed up expecting Care.com to work like Uber or Instacart. Instead, you need to appeal to parents first. “To make your profile appear like someone they would want to leave their kids with, there will be a lot of legwork required,” he said.

You’ll need to manually apply to jobs and work with parents to get reviews and build up your profile, which could take months or even a year. Only then, with a strong profile and good reviews, would you maybe have a chance of families “booking” you through the site.

Signup may be tougher for transgender and nonbinary users

Ryan told us a lot of caregivers aren’t able to pass the CareCheck if they’ve recently changed their name or go by a different name than their legal name. “I’ve noticed people that are transgender have encountered this a lot when they sign up with one name but all their documents are still in another name,” he added.

This isn’t the only issue you might face on Care.com if you’re not cisgender. At the time of writing, the only gender options provided for new caregivers are “male” and “female,” marking a limitation for nonbinary users.

Care.com Gender Options for New Users

Most caregivers who use Care.com have one issue or another with the platform. Most people recognize that it’s a reliable and valuable tool for finding work due to its huge market share, but it has some faults that are enough to turn some users away for good.

Care.com pros and cons

While some users praise Care.com as a convenient platform for finding caregiving jobs, others feel that it leaves a lot to be desired. Weigh up the benefits and drawbacks according to real Care.com workers before you sign up.

Care.com reviews

Before you start using Care.com, check out the table below, which gives a summary of Care.com ratings from across the web.

Care.com Ratings

Not all of these reviews are from caregivers—some are from client users. Additionally, some may be specific to the online platform or mobile app or reflect the experiences of users who’ve been scammed by criminals operating through Care.com. Nevertheless, it’s clear that many people aren’t perfectly happy with how Care.com operates.

How Care.com compares to other apps

For Ryan, what currently separates Care.com from its competitors is its “popularity in most markets.” Within 25 miles of where he lives, he told us there are usually over 1,500 jobs at any given time—with “big boosts” near the end of the school year and end of summer.

By comparison, competitors generally only reach the double digits in terms of job numbers in his area. For example, a quick search showed only 86 jobs on UrbanSitter, and there’s only ever around 30 jobs available at any one time on Sittercity. “Being able to find the right family, in the right location, with the right hours/needs, and the right pay is going to be harder on these smaller sites,” he added.

With that said, if what you really want is one-time gigs you can pick up whenever you have room in your schedule, Care.com probably isn’t the best platform to use since it can take a great deal of time and effort to build up reviews and references from regular jobs. Without reviews, you’ll struggle to get booking requests on Care.com. You’ll probably have an easier time with caregiving apps dedicated to gig work.

Alternative caregiving apps and sites

Whether you’re a babysitter, senior caregiver, or pet care provider, there are plenty of alternatives to Care.com that you may wish to consider. Explore your options by reading detailed reviews of other caregiving apps on the market:

• Sittercity
• Rover
• Wag!

For a more comprehensive selection of options, you can also check out our comparison of the nation’s top 10 babysitting apps as well as our detailed guide to getting jobs as a caregiver.