Oct 4, 2026

Apollo.io Alternatives: 9 Tools Compared (2026)

Apollo does two jobs in one login: a contact database and an outreach engine. Most people shopping for an Apollo alternative are unhappy with one of those jobs, not both. Decide which one you’re replacing before you compare anything.

The quick answer: If your lists are fine but deals stall after the first email, the best Apollo alternative is Carly. Keep Apollo (or its Free or Basic plan) for data; Carly runs sequences from your reps’ own Gmail and Outlook mailboxes, drafts every reply in one team inbox, calls and texts new leads, books the right rep and keeps the CRM current. If the data is the problem: ZoomInfo or Cognism on an enterprise budget, Lusha or Hunter without one. For raw cold-email volume, Instantly.

Apollo.io alternatives compared

Entry prices from each vendor’s US pricing page on October 4, 2026.

Tool	Replaces Apollo’s	Starts at	Free plan	Best for
Carly	Sequences, replies, booking, CRM	AI agents from $35/mo	Free Zapier-style workflows	Pipeline that dies after the list
Apollo (for reference)	Both jobs	Basic $49/seat/mo yearly ($65 monthly)	Yes, 75 credits/mo	Data plus sequences in one tool
ZoomInfo	Data	Quote only	No	Enterprise data and intent
Cognism	Data	Quote only, 5 seats included	No	Verified mobiles, European data
Lusha	Data	$49.90/mo monthly ($37.45 yearly)	Yes, 40 credits/mo	Small teams buying contacts
Hunter	Data	$49/mo monthly ($34 yearly)	Yes, 50 credits/mo	Email finding and verification
Clay	Enrichment	Launch from $167/mo	Yes	Many data providers in one table
Instantly	Outreach	Outreach $47/mo monthly	No	High-volume cold email
lemlist	Outreach	Email $69/mo monthly ($55 yearly)	No	Email plus LinkedIn
Outreach	Outreach	Quote only	No	Enterprise sales engagement

Want the Carly row checked against your current Apollo bill? Book a call with the Carly team.

What Apollo costs now, and why teams leave

Apollo publishes four plans, priced per seat: Free, Basic at $49 a month billed yearly ($65 monthly), Professional at $79 ($99 monthly), and Organization at $119, billed yearly only with a three-seat minimum. Credits buy the data: 1 credit per email address and 8 per phone number, with 75 a month on Free, 2,500 on monthly Basic and 4,000 on monthly Professional. Our Apollo.io pricing breakdown walks through every tier.

At ApolloNEXT on September 30, 2026, Apollo launched Builder Studio (describe a workflow, get pages and automations), an Intelligence Layer that picks who to contact next, and Messaging OS for marketing emails and Google Ads audiences. Agents and AI lead scoring start on Professional. Our Apollo.io review has the hands-on verdict.

Why people still leave:

Data accuracy. Apollo cites 98% email accuracy. Reviewers on G2, Trustpilot and Reddit describe more bounces than that, especially outside North America.
Credits that expire. Credits are pooled across the team, reset every billing cycle and don’t roll over. Add-on credits renew automatically until you remove them.
Seat math. Every seat on an account must be on the same plan, so the researcher who never sends pays the sender’s tier. Free and Basic allow one mailbox per user and 250 sends a day; more mailboxes and higher volume start on Professional.
Billing and support. 3.1 out of 5 on Trustpilot across 1,346 reviews, with recent complaints about slow support and account lockouts. Downgrades apply at once with no refund for unused time, and annual plans can’t move to monthly mid-term.

Here’s the math for Josh’s four-rep team. To send from more than one mailbox per rep, they need Professional: $396 a month billed monthly, or $3,792 a year billed annually. Most of that pays for mailboxes and follow-up, not data. See how Carly handles the follow-up instead.

Apollo alternatives split into two jobs

Contact data: ZoomInfo, Cognism, Lusha and Hunter sell the list. Clay orchestrates many data providers at once.
Outreach and engagement: Instantly, lemlist and Outreach send the sequences. Smartlead, Reply.io and Salesloft sit in this group too.

Neither group answers the prospect, books the meeting or updates the deal. That’s the gap Carly fills, and it works next to the data tool you keep.

1. Carly: best Apollo alternative when the pipeline stalls after the list

Carly is an AI assistant for sales teams that works from the mailboxes, calendars and CRM you already have. Think of it as Apollo for data, Carly for everything after.

Here’s a Tuesday for Josh’s team, with Apollo Basic supplying the list:

7:00 am. 120 new contacts from an Apollo saved search start a three-step sequence from each rep’s own Gmail or Outlook account, inside a sending window.
9:40 am. Emily, a VP of operations, replies: “Not me, talk to Michael, he runs our carrier team.” Carly stops the sequence, labels the reply, looks Michael up through Apollo and drafts an intro for Josh to approve.
1:15 pm. A demo form comes in and routing rules hand it to Claire. Within minutes the lead gets an email and a text from the team’s own address and number, the AI voice agent calls with the form answers in hand, and the lead picks Thursday on Claire’s real calendar.
4:30 pm. After a call, Carly reads the Gong notes, sends the follow-up and moves the deal stage in HubSpot.

What’s doing the work:

Sequences from your own mailboxes. Follow-ups go out as replies in the same thread and stop on their own when the person replies (in any thread) or books. Per-mailbox daily caps, sending windows and unsubscribe headers are built in, and Apollo’s one-mailbox, 250-send limit on Basic stops mattering when Apollo isn’t the one sending.
One shared team inbox. Every rep’s Gmail and Outlook mailboxes, plus calls and texts, with assignments, notes, reminders and an “Awaiting reply” view.
Every reply drafted and sorted. Carly drafts the answer to each prospect and labels replies as interested, not interested or out of office, so reps work the hot ones first. Review and send, or let the agent send.
Routing and speed to lead. Rules assign each new lead from email, a form, a call or a text. Carly Phone gives the team a business number for texts and AI calls.
Booking on the right calendar. Carly checks all of your Google and Microsoft calendars at once, or sends a booking page.
A CRM that stays current. Use the built-in CRM (lead statuses, weighted pipeline, reports by owner) or keep HubSpot, Salesforce, Pipedrive, Close or Attio and Carly logs there. It acts on call notes from Gong, Fathom or Fireflies.
Enrichment from the tools you pay for. Carly connects to thousands of apps, including Apollo, Hunter, Lusha and People Data Labs, so it researches the lead before it writes. Our Apollo automation guide covers the Apollo plus Carly setup.

Steps that don’t need AI, like logging a reply or moving a deal stage, run as free Zapier-style workflows.

Best for: Teams whose Apollo seats mostly pay for sequencing and follow-up, and whose real loss is slow replies and unbooked meetings. Pricing: Free Zapier-style workflows; AI agents from $35/month. Carly for teams is set up with you on a short call. Running a high-volume cold program across many domains? Book a call and the Carly team scopes it with you.

2. ZoomInfo

ZoomInfo is the enterprise version of Apollo’s database: contact and company profiles, direct dials and mobiles, buying intent, and an AI sales agent called Copilot, plus GTM Studio for signal-triggered workflows. You fill in a form to get a price.

Pick it if: you sell to large accounts, need intent data, and have a budget that starts a sales conversation. Pricing: Quote only (Professional and higher packages).

3. Cognism

Cognism sells compliance-first B2B data with phone-verified mobile numbers and on-demand mobile verification, and positions itself on European coverage. Standard and Pro both include five seats.

Pick it if: your reps dial, and Apollo’s mobile numbers, especially in Europe, keep missing. Pricing: Quote only.

4. Lusha

Lusha is the simplest swap for Apollo’s data side: search, reveal, export. An email costs 1 credit and a phone number 5, against Apollo’s 8. Starter covers one seat with 400 credits a month; Pro adds the API, CSV enrichment and signals.

Pick it if: you want contacts without paying for a sequencer you won’t use. Pricing: Free (40 credits a month); Starter $49.90/month billed monthly or $37.45 yearly; Pro $69.90 monthly ($52.45 yearly).

5. Hunter

Hunter (the email finder at hunter.io, not Salesforce’s new Hunter agent) finds and verifies work emails, adds a searchable B2B database and runs simple sequences. There’s no per-seat fee: Starter connects three email accounts with 2,000 credits a month.

Pick it if: you mostly need verified emails for a list you already know. Pricing: Free (50 credits a month); Starter $49/month billed monthly or $34 yearly; Growth $149 ($104 yearly).

6. Clay

Clay isn’t a database. It’s a spreadsheet that runs waterfalls across 150+ data providers, with Claygent doing AI web research for custom fields. Usage is billed in actions and data credits.

Pick it if: you have a GTM engineer and want the best answer from many providers, not one. Pricing: Free plan (500 actions and 100 data credits a month); Launch from $167/month per Clay’s pricing page.

7. Instantly

Instantly is the opposite of Apollo: it starts with sending and sells data on the side. Connect as many mailboxes as you like with warmup included, then add SuperSearch (450M+ contacts) through a separate credits plan. Smartlead is the closest like-for-like at $39 a month billed monthly; see Instantly alternatives for the rest.

Pick it if: volume across many domains is the job and you’ll source leads elsewhere. Pricing: Outreach Growth $47/month billed monthly; credits and CRM are separate subscriptions.

8. lemlist

lemlist puts email and LinkedIn in one sequence. The Email plan has no per-user fee and covers 50,000 emails a month with a 650M+ lead database; Multichannel adds LinkedIn, calls and SMS.

Pick it if: your reps sell on LinkedIn as much as by email. Pricing: Email $69/month billed monthly ($55 yearly); Multichannel $109 per user monthly ($87 yearly).

9. Outreach

Outreach is enterprise sales engagement: sequences, dialer, conversation intelligence, forecasting and a lineup of AI agents. Pricing combines seats with AI credits, and every package is quoted. Salesloft, now merged with Clari, is its closest rival.

Pick it if: you run a large sales org on Salesforce and want sequencing, calls and forecasting from one vendor. See Outreach alternatives and Salesloft alternatives. Pricing: Quote only.

How to pick an Apollo alternative

The list is fine, but replies wait and meetings don’t get booked: go with Carly. Keep Apollo for data, or drop to Basic, and let Carly run sequences from your own mailboxes, draft every reply, call new leads and book them. Get started with Carly, or book a call to set it up for the team.
The data is the problem and the budget is enterprise: ZoomInfo, or Cognism if reps dial European mobiles.
The data is the problem and the budget is small: Lusha or Hunter.
You want many data sources in one place: Clay.
You want cold email at volume: Instantly or Smartlead.
LinkedIn is half the motion: lemlist.
You’re comparing AI SDRs: see our best AI SDR tools.

Already on Salesforce? Its Hunter outbound agent, announced September 15, 2026, can pull Apollo’s contact data without a separate Apollo subscription.

FAQ

What is the best alternative to Apollo.io?

It depends on which half of Apollo you’re replacing. For contact data, ZoomInfo at the enterprise end and Lusha or Hunter on a budget. For outreach, Instantly or lemlist. If the list is fine and the problem is everything after it, Carly runs sequences from your own mailboxes, drafts every reply and books the meeting. Book a call with the Carly team to compare it with your Apollo setup.

Is there a free alternative to Apollo?

Apollo’s own Free plan is the obvious start: 75 credits a month, two sequences, one mailbox and 250 sends a day. Hunter (50 credits a month), Lusha (40) and Clay (500 actions) also have free plans. For the work after the list, Carly runs free Zapier-style workflows, and AI agents start at $35/month.

Apollo vs ZoomInfo: which is better?

Apollo publishes its prices, has a free plan, and bundles sequences, a dialer and meetings with the data. ZoomInfo is quote only and aimed at enterprise teams that want deeper intent data, its Copilot agent and GTM Studio. If you need a sales call just to see a price, compare it against Cognism too.

Apollo vs Instantly: which should I use?

Apollo starts from the list (240M contacts) and adds sequences, with one mailbox per user until Professional. Instantly starts from sending, with any number of mailboxes and warmup on every plan, and sells leads as separate credits. Our Instantly vs Apollo breakdown compares them plan by plan.

Can I keep Apollo and add AI follow-up?

Yes. Apollo’s AI Assistant, and from Professional its agents, work inside Apollo. To work the reply where it actually lands, in Gmail or Outlook, add Carly: it uses Apollo for enrichment, drafts replies in one team inbox, books on the rep’s real calendar and updates HubSpot or Salesforce. See what Carly connects to.

Ready to automate your busywork?

Carly schedules, researches, and briefs you—so you can focus on what matters.

See what people say

"Before Carly, I relied on a Calendly link, but the whole process felt impersonal and not very professional. Carly changed that by handling all the back-and-forth, so I'm no longer stuck in endless email threads trying to line up schedules.

Now Carly reaches out to candidates, shares my real-time availability, lets them pick a slot, then sends a Zoom link and drops it straight into my calendar. She sends reminders to both of us before each call, which has significantly reduced no-shows and last-minute confusion.

On top of scheduling, Carly acts like a full executive assistant, sending me my schedule the night before so I can prepare for each call. It reminds me of the old x.ai assistant, but Carly is noticeably smarter, faster, and better suited to my healthcare recruitment business."

Gus Ibrahim, Founder & Director, IHR