Apollo is a sales intelligence and prospecting platform that combines B2B contact data, email sequencing, and workflow automation in one tool
Head-to-head comparison
Apollo vs Clay
Compare Apollo and Clay side by side across pricing, features, ratings, pros, cons, best-fit use cases, and alternatives.
Apollo
sales
Pricing
Free plan
Rating
—
Votes
0
Clay
sales
Clay is a B2B data enrichment and outbound automation platform that combines multiple data providers, AI-powered research agents (Claygents), and workflow automation for sales and marketing teams
Pricing
Free plan
Rating
—
Votes
0
Feature comparison
Feature
Apollo
Clay
Category
sales
sales
Pricing
Free plan
Free plan
Free plan
API access
Mobile app
Browser extension
Team collaboration
Custom training
Self-hosted option
Offline mode
Multi-language support
Apollo pros and cons
Consolidates prospecting, contact data, email sequencing, and a dialer into one platform, letting teams retire several point tools and reduce their overall stack cost
Extensive B2B database with granular filtering by role, industry, company size, technographics, and buying signals speeds up building targeted prospect lists
Data enrichment keeps CRM records current by filling in and updating contact and company fields, reducing the manual cleanup RevOps teams typically shoulder
AI Assistant and call summaries accelerate account research and message drafting, cutting the time between finding a prospect and reaching out
Note: Pricing and credit allocations shift over time, and some buyers find the credit-based structure and plan differences harder to predict than a flat per-seat model
Note: Advanced capabilities such as intent data, higher email sending limits, and richer AI features are gated to upper tiers, so the cheapest plans can feel limited for serious outbound
Note: Data accuracy and coverage, while broad, can vary by region and role, so teams should validate against their own segments before committing at scale
Clay pros and cons
Waterfall enrichment chains 200+ data providers in sequence, delivering materially higher contact coverage and match rates than any single-vendor data source can achieve
Claygent AI agents let teams answer bespoke research questions about companies and people at scale, replacing hours of manual prospect research
The signals engine surfaces buying triggers like job changes and promotions, enabling timely, relevance-driven outreach rather than static list building
A single data marketplace consolidates purchasing and credits across many providers, removing the need to negotiate and manage separate vendor contracts
Note: The platform has a genuine learning curve; formulas, conditional logic, and multi-step recipes take time to master before teams see full value
Note: Consumption-based pricing splits platform fees from data credits, making total spend hard to predict and prone to climbing quickly at higher volumes
Note: Recent plan restructuring moved API and CRM features into higher tiers, raising effective costs for some mid-tier users
Which one should you choose?
Best overall signal
Apollo
Selected using Toolglade popularity signals such as views and votes.
Best value signal
Apollo
Selected using free-plan availability and engagement signals.
Best for
Apollo
- Startups and mid-market sales teams consolidating prospecting tools
- SDRs and account executives running high-volume outbound
- Revenue operations teams needing ongoing data enrichment
- Founders doing early sales and lead generation themselves
- Marketers building targeted B2B contact lists
Clay
- Sales development and outbound teams building scalable prospecting systems
- RevOps teams standardizing enrichment and data hygiene across the funnel
- Growth marketers running account-based marketing programs
- Agencies delivering lead generation and outbound as a service
- Data-fluent operators who want to build custom enrichment workflows
FAQ
Is Apollo better than Clay?
It depends on your use case. Compare category fit, pricing, feature availability, and ratings before choosing.
Which tool has a free plan?
Apollo and Clay offer a free plan based on current Toolglade data.