Honest comparison, written by the ReachClaw team
An Apollo.io alternative for one-person sales: $6.99/mo flat, from your own Gmail
Apollo charges per user, then meters what you look up with credits. ReachClaw is an AI email agent for people who send tens to a few hundred targeted emails a month: it finds leads by searching the web, writes each email, sends from your Gmail and handles the replies, for one flat price. Here is the comparison, including the many cases where Apollo is the better choice.
Why people look for an Apollo alternative
It is the seat, and then the credits.
Apollo prices per user. Landbase's March 2026 breakdown of Apollo's pricing lists Basic at $49 per user per month on annual billing ($59 monthly), Professional at $79 ($99 monthly) and Organization at $119 ($149 monthly) with a three-user minimum, so a two-person team on Organization pays for three seats. On top of the seat, lookups are metered in credits: one per verified email, eight per phone number. The same article quotes third-party estimates of $150 to $400 per user per month for heavy outbound once overages and add-ons are counted, and notes that cancelling needs 30 days' written notice before renewal. There is a permanent free plan, with 900 credits per user per year.
If you are one person sending fifty well-chosen emails a month, a seat sized for a sales team is the wrong shape. ReachClaw's Solo plan is $6.99 a month, not per user: the AI finds leads by searching the public web, writes each email, sends it from your Gmail and drafts replies to whatever comes back. The AI runs on your own Anthropic API key, so Anthropic bills that usage to you at its published prices. The plan covers the software, not the model.
Apollo.io vs ReachClaw, side by side
| Apollo.io | ReachClaw | |
|---|---|---|
| Starting paid price | $49 per user/mo on annual billing ($59 monthly), per Landbase, Mar 2026 | $6.99/mo flat (Solo), not per user |
| Free plan | Yes: 900 credits per user per year | Free to sign up and look around; lead search and sending need a paid plan |
| Lead source | Contact database with filters, paid for with credits | AI web search of public pages on your targeting, or CSV import; no credits |
| Email verification | Verified email reveals, 1 credit each | None; the address is saved as it appears on the page |
| Outbound emails per month | Email campaigns on every plan; sending volume depends on your mailbox | 100 (Solo), 500 (Growth), unlimited (Scale), from your own Gmail |
| Follow-up sequences | Multi-step sequences | One email per lead; ongoing campaigns email new leads only |
| Inbound replies | AI reply handling is not listed on its pricing page | AI drafts or sends replies from your knowledge base on every paid plan |
| Website chat | Not on its pricing page | Included: 500 to 10,000 AI answers a month by plan |
| AI cost | Included; AI credits on Professional and up | Your own Anthropic API key, billed by Anthropic |
| Best for | Sales teams that need a database, phone numbers and sequences | One person or a small team sending targeted emails from Gmail |
Apollo figures are from Landbase's pricing breakdown dated 31 March 2026 and Apollo's own pricing page as read in October 2026; check their pricing page for the latest. ReachClaw pricing is current: Solo $6.99, Growth $29.99, Scale $69.99 a month.
What ReachClaw does instead of a sales database
No credits to buy, no seats to count. An AI agent that works out of the Gmail account you already have, outbound and inbound.
Finds leads by searching the web
It builds an ideal customer profile from your website, and you can add plain-text search rules that every search follows. The AI searches public pages for matching businesses and saves the name, company, role, email and source page, with a note on why it fits. Each lead gets a fit score from 0 to 100. Or import a CSV of contacts you already have.
Writes one email per lead, sends from your Gmail
Each email is drafted from your website, documents and notes plus the lead's details. One-time campaigns wait for your approval; ongoing campaigns write, approve and send to each new lead on an interval you set.
Handles the replies in the same inbox
When a prospect or a customer writes back, the AI drafts or sends the answer from your knowledge base, in Co-pilot mode (you approve each one) or Autopilot. Apollo's pricing page does not list anything like this.
Tracks opens, clicks and replies
Per-email engagement in your analytics, with suspected bot opens and clicks flagged so a security scanner does not look like an interested buyer.
When ReachClaw is not the answer
- You need a contact database you can filter by industry, size, title or technology, with verified emails. Apollo's database is the product; ReachClaw's leads come from AI web searches of public pages and are not verified.
- You call prospects. Apollo sells phone numbers and a dialer; ReachClaw has neither.
- You rely on multi-step sequences: automatic follow-ups on day 3 and day 7 to people who have not replied. ReachClaw sends one email per lead per campaign.
- You need enrichment, CRM sync (HubSpot, Salesforce, Pipedrive) or A/B testing. None of that exists in ReachClaw.
- You run a team of reps sharing one pool of credits and one CRM. ReachClaw plans count connected inboxes (1, 3 or 10), not people, and there are no team logins.
- Your business runs on Outlook. ReachClaw connects to Gmail and Google Workspace only.
- A few free lookups a month is all you need. Apollo's free plan gives you that; ReachClaw's lead search starts on the $6.99 Solo plan.
That is most of what Apollo sells, and we are not going to pretend otherwise. If none of it applies, if you send a modest number of well-targeted emails from your own Gmail and want the same tool to answer what comes back, a per-seat plan plus credits is working against you. That is who we built this for.
Other Apollo alternatives worth a look
If you need a database, verified emails or sequences, these are the names that come up in 2026 roundups. We compare them in more depth in our guide to AI lead generation tools. Prices change often, so we leave them out; check each vendor's pricing page.
Lusha
Contact lookups with a free monthly allowance, pitched at people who need a quick email or phone number rather than a full prospecting platform.
Hunter.io
Finds and verifies email addresses for a domain, with a small free tier. A narrow tool that pairs well with any sender.
Instantly.ai
A cold-email sending platform: many inboxes, warm-up, sequences, plus a separate lead-credits plan. We compare it in our Instantly alternative page. Read it.
Clay
Enrichment and waterfall sourcing across many data providers, for teams that want to build their own lead workflows.
Up and running in under an hour
1. Connect your Gmail
One OAuth sign-in. Every email goes out from your real address, so replies land in your inbox and your sender reputation stays yours.
2. It learns your product
It reads your website and your documents, so the emails it writes describe what you actually sell.
3. Find or import leads
Run a search from the profile it built, add search rules if you want to skip certain domains or industries, turn on automatic search (every 3 hours by default), or import a CSV.
4. Review, send, track
The AI drafts one email per lead. Approve them in a one-time campaign, or let an ongoing campaign send to each new lead. Opens, clicks and replies show up in your analytics.
Sign up and connect Gmail for free; lead search and outbound campaigns start on the Solo plan at $6.99/mo.
Keep reading
Instantly.ai alternative
The same honest math against a sending platform with a separate credits plan.
Best AI lead generation tools
Apollo, Instantly, Clay, Lusha and more, with where ReachClaw fits.
Automated lead generation
How a search, score, email and repeat system works, step by step.
AI lead generation
What AI can and cannot do when it finds leads for you.
AI email agent for sales
How an agent that works from your Gmail differs from a sales platform.
Flat pricing, three plans
$6.99, $29.99, $69.99 a month. No seats, no credits.
Questions people ask
How much does Apollo.io actually cost?
Per Landbase's March 2026 pricing breakdown, Apollo has a permanent free plan with 900 credits per user per year, then Basic at $49 per user per month on annual billing ($59 monthly), Professional at $79 ($99 monthly) and Organization at $119 ($149 monthly) with a three-user minimum. Credits are the second meter: one credit per verified email reveal or export, eight per phone number. The same article quotes third-party estimates of $150 to $400 per user per month for teams doing heavy outbound once overages and add-ons are counted. Apollo's own pricing page confirms the plan names and that credits are pooled across seats; check it for the latest numbers.
How much does ReachClaw cost as an Apollo alternative?
One flat monthly price, not per user: Solo $6.99 (100 outbound emails a month, 1 Gmail inbox), Growth $29.99 (500 outbound emails, 3 inboxes), Scale $69.99 (unlimited outbound, 10 inboxes). There are no credits to buy. One honest caveat: the AI runs on your own Anthropic API key, so Anthropic bills that usage to you at its published prices. The plan covers the software, not the model.
Does ReachClaw have a free plan like Apollo?
You can sign up, connect Gmail, crawl your website and look around for free, but lead search and outbound campaigns need a paid plan. Apollo's free plan does include a small monthly credit allowance for looking up contacts, so if all you want is a handful of free lookups a month, Apollo's free tier is the better deal and we would rather say so than pretend otherwise.
Where do ReachClaw's leads come from, and are the emails verified?
There is no contact database. ReachClaw builds an ideal customer profile from your own website, you can add search rules in plain text (for example, which domains or industries to skip), and the AI searches public web pages for businesses that match, saving each person's name, company, role, the email visible on the page and a link to the page it came from. The emails are not verified. If an address is wrong, the bounce lands in your Gmail like any other bounce, so review the first batch before you send. You can also import your own CSV; every row needs an email address.
Does ReachClaw send multi-step follow-up sequences?
No. A ReachClaw campaign sends one AI-written email per lead. An ongoing campaign re-runs on an interval you choose and emails only the new leads found or imported since the last run; it does not send day-3 and day-7 follow-ups to people who have not replied. If Apollo's sequences are the part you rely on, keep Apollo.
Can I move my Apollo contacts to ReachClaw?
Yes, as a CSV. Export your saved contacts from Apollo (Landbase notes that exports cost one credit per contact on Apollo's side), then import the file on the Leads page. Rows without an email address are skipped. Anyone who opted out can be marked unsubscribed and is left out of every campaign from then on. Sequence history does not carry over.
Does ReachClaw work with Outlook or other mailboxes?
No, Gmail and Google Workspace only. Every email goes out from the Google account you connect, and replies come back to that inbox. Apollo's pricing page says its free plan is also Gmail-only, with Microsoft and other providers on paid plans. If your business runs on Outlook, ReachClaw is not for you yet.
Is this comparison written by ReachClaw?
Yes, this page is written by the ReachClaw team, so read it with that in mind. Apollo is a far bigger product than ours: a contact database with filters, verified emails, phone numbers, enrichment, sequences, a dialer and CRM integrations. We have quoted its published pricing as carefully as we can and linked the source; check Apollo's pricing page for the latest. Our argument is narrow: if you are one person sending a modest number of targeted emails from your own Gmail and want the same tool to handle the replies, a flat $6.99 a month beats a per-seat plan plus credits.
One flat price, from your own Gmail
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