Promptwatch alternatives, from free trackers to full market intelligence
Updated October 2026
Promptwatch checks AI answers daily and adds two features rare in this category: crawler-log visibility and conversion tracking, on top of a named Competitor Analysis and Content Gap Analysis. People look for an alternative for two reasons you can confirm on its own site: the published Essential plan is $95 a month, and no source outside AI answers, crawler logs and conversions is named. Every fact below was read off each vendor's own site.
Quick answer
MarketHQ is the only alternative here that joins AI-answer tracking to Reddit, Hacker News, GitHub, news, blogs and social, starting free then $29 a month; Promptwatch starts at $95 for daily AI-answer tracking with crawler-log and conversion analytics. If price is the deciding factor, Otterly.ai and Rankscale.ai are the cheapest published options, and AthenaHQ has a genuinely free tier.
Key points
- MarketHQ starts at $29/month and also tracks Reddit, news, blogs and social; Promptwatch's published plan is $95/month for AI-answer tracking plus crawler and conversion analytics.
- AthenaHQ's Essential plan is free; Otterly.ai and Rankscale.ai are the cheapest paid plans here after that, from $20-$29/month.
- Promptwatch, Peec AI and Otterly check daily; MarketHQ checks weekly.
Why choose MarketHQ over Promptwatch?
Promptwatch is built for the AI-answer question, plus crawler and conversion analytics. MarketHQ answers the AI-answer question and also reads the web conversation behind it, for less than a third of Promptwatch's entry price.
Promptwatch's crawler-log visibility and conversion tracking are genuinely uncommon in this category, and its Content Gap Analysis names where competitors appear in AI answers instead of you. What its own site doesn't name is Reddit, Hacker News, GitHub, news, blogs or social.
MarketHQ checks six AI assistants weekly and tracks Reddit, Hacker News, GitHub, Stack Overflow, Dev.to, Lobsters, news, blogs and social lanes (X, LinkedIn, YouTube, Bluesky, Product Hunt) on paid plans, starting at $29 a month with a free tier below that, and turns gaps across all of it into one action plan.
What sources does MarketHQ cover?
Free: Hacker News, GitHub, RSS, Stack Overflow, Dev.to, Lobsters. Paid plans add Reddit, LinkedIn, YouTube, X, Perplexity, Product Hunt, Broader web crawl, Bluesky.
- Grouped Slack daily digest
- Drafted replies from your own strengths
- Gap analysis and action plans
- Weekly AI-answer visibility (paid plans)
- Chat over your own evidence
- API and MCP on every paid plan
- Flat capacity pricing, tiers differ by tracking volume only
- 7-day trial for $0.99 on Lite and Startup
- Free tier with no card and no end date
Each tool was checked on its own pricing and product pages; Promptwatch, Peec AI, Profound, AthenaHQ and Brand24 were re-checked 1 October 2026, the rest in late September 2026. Entries are ordered with MarketHQ first because this is our page; the rest are not ranked.
MarketHQ
AI-answer tracking joined to the communities, news, blogs and social posts those answers are often built from, against the same competitors, with gap analysis and an action plan. Our own product, listed first because this is our page.
- Best for
- Teams that want the AI answer and the web conversation behind it in one workspace.
- Pricing
- Free tier; Lite $29, Startup $99, Growth $199 a month; 7-day trial for $0.99 on Lite and Startup. Tiers differ by tracking capacity only.
- Sources covered
- Hacker News, GitHub, Reddit, Stack Overflow, Dev.to, Lobsters, news, blogs and social (X, LinkedIn, YouTube, Bluesky, Product Hunt), plus a weekly check of ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity, Grok and DeepSeek.
- AI visibility
- Yes
Peec AI
Checks AI answers daily across a handful of models, with recommended actions, an MCP server and separate agency pricing for multi-client teams.
- Best for
- Agencies and teams running several client projects on AI-answer tracking alone.
- Pricing
- Starter $95 a month (50 prompts, 3 models, 1 project); Pro $245; Advanced $495. API is Enterprise only.
- Sources covered
- AI-answer tracking only; no non-AI sources named.
- AI visibility
- Yes
Profound
The best-known name in the category, with prompt-volume research and up to nine tracked engines at the top end. No self-serve monthly plan as of September 2026.
- Best for
- Teams with budget for a custom deal who want engine depth and prompt-volume data.
- Pricing
- Free 7-day trial (50 prompts a day, 3 engines); beyond that a credit-based Agency Growth plan or custom Enterprise, neither with a published dollar price.
- Sources covered
- ChatGPT, Gemini and Google AI Overviews on the trial; up to nine engines on Enterprise.
- AI visibility
- Yes
AthenaHQ
The only tool on this list with a standing free tier rather than a trial, metered in credits: one credit per AI response.
- Best for
- Trying AI-visibility tracking before committing a budget.
- Pricing
- Essential free with $25 of credit (300 credits); Starter $295 a month with 3,600 credits and 17% off annually; Enterprise custom.
- Sources covered
- ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews, Gemini and Copilot free; Starter adds AI Mode, Claude, Grok, DeepSeek, Meta AI and Mistral.
- AI visibility
- Yes
Otterly.ai
The cheapest paid tool here that publishes every number, metering usage in search prompts rather than credits, with daily tracking on every plan.
- Best for
- One brand, a short prompt list, a budget around $29 a month.
- Pricing
- Lite $29 a month for 15 search prompts, Standard $189 for 100, Premium $489 for 400; Claude, Google AI Mode and Gemini are paid add-ons; 15% off annually.
- Sources covered
- ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Perplexity and Microsoft Copilot on every plan.
- AI visibility
- Yes
Rankscale.ai
The widest published engine list at the lowest entry price, with unlimited search terms on its Pro plan.
- Best for
- Buyers who want many engines checked and will interpret the result themselves.
- Pricing
- Essentials from $20 a month, Pro $99, Growth $385, Enterprise $780, with a 7-day free Pro trial.
- Sources covered
- ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Mode, AI Overviews, Gemini, DeepSeek, Mistral, Claude, Grok and Copilot.
- AI visibility
- Yes
Scrunch AI
Built around personas and page audits, shipping industry prompt sets alongside your own for a category-wide view.
- Best for
- Marketing teams running AI visibility as a programme across several buyer types.
- Pricing
- Starter $250 a month billed annually ($300 month-to-month); Growth $417 or $500; Enterprise custom.
- Sources covered
- ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity, Google AI Mode, AI Overviews and Meta.
- AI visibility
- Yes
Brand24
Media and social monitoring first, with AI Visibility sold as an add-on below its top tier rather than the product itself.
- Best for
- Companies whose first problem is press and social coverage, not AI answers.
- Pricing
- Individual $249 a month or $199 billed annually, up to Business $699/$599; Enterprise from $1,499; AI Visibility is an add-on below Enterprise.
- Sources covered
- Facebook, Instagram, X, news, blogs, Reddit, LinkedIn, YouTube, TikTok, reviews and more.
- AI visibility
- Yes
What does Promptwatch actually cost?
The published Essential plan is $95 a month, checked on promptwatch.com/pricing on 1 October 2026.
Essential includes daily AI-answer tracking, Competitor Analysis, Content Gap Analysis, crawler-log visibility and conversion tracking, plus a 7-day free trial. The pricing page doesn't show a separate monthly figure above Essential.
None of Promptwatch's named features cover Reddit, Hacker News, GitHub, news, blogs or social; its coverage is AI-answer tracking plus crawler and conversion data.
Which Promptwatch alternative is cheapest?
AthenaHQ's Essential plan is free; Rankscale.ai starts at $20 a month and Otterly.ai and MarketHQ both start at $29.
AthenaHQ's $25 of free credit (300 credits) is enough to find out whether you have a visibility problem before spending anything. Rankscale Essentials and Otterly Lite are the cheapest paid plans that publish every number, both well under Promptwatch's $95 Essential.
MarketHQ is the only one of those three that also tracks Reddit, Hacker News, GitHub, news, blogs and social at $29 a month, rather than AI answers alone.
Which alternative also reads the web, not just AI answers?
MarketHQ. Every other tool on this list tracks AI answers (and, for Promptwatch, crawler and conversion data) only.
Promptwatch, Peec AI, Profound, AthenaHQ, Otterly.ai, Rankscale.ai and Scrunch AI all check what assistants say and stop there. Brand24 goes the other way: social and press first, AI Visibility as an add-on.
An assistant's answer is frequently built from a Reddit thread, a news article or a blog post comparing products. MarketHQ reads the answer and the conversation behind it in the same workspace, against the same competitors.
- AI answers (plus crawler/conversion data for Promptwatch) only: Promptwatch, Peec AI, Profound, AthenaHQ, Otterly.ai, Rankscale.ai, Scrunch AI.
- Social and press first, AI Visibility as an add-on: Brand24.
- AI answers plus Reddit, news, blogs and social together: MarketHQ.
Where does Promptwatch still win?
Promptwatch wins on daily cadence and on two features MarketHQ doesn't offer at all: crawler-log visibility and conversion tracking. Choose MarketHQ when the web conversation behind the answer matters as much as the answer, and those two features aren't required.
If you need to see whether AI crawlers are hitting your site, or tie AI-answer visibility to actual conversions, Promptwatch has features that aren't built into MarketHQ today.
MarketHQ wins for teams that want one workspace checking AI answers weekly and reading Reddit, Hacker News, GitHub, news, blogs and social for the same competitors, starting free then $29 a month.
- Choose Promptwatch if crawler-log visibility is a requirement.
- Choose Promptwatch if conversion tracking tied to AI-answer visibility is a requirement.
- Choose Promptwatch if daily AI-answer checks matter more than price or web-conversation coverage.
What does the same month look like on each tool?
Roughly the same measurement, very different amounts of context left over. The numbers below are illustrative, not measured.
Illustrative: you track twelve buying questions for your category, including two direct competitor comparisons. On Promptwatch's Essential plan that's checked daily for $95, with crawler-log and conversion data on top. On AthenaHQ's free tier the same twelve fit inside 300 credits.
On MarketHQ Lite at $29, the same questions are checked weekly across six assistants, and the Hacker News thread or news article that shaped a competitor's answer arrives in the same digest.
Frequently asked questions
How much does Promptwatch cost?
The published Essential plan is $95 a month with a 7-day free trial, checked on promptwatch.com/pricing on 1 October 2026. The page doesn't show a separate monthly figure above Essential.
What is the cheapest Promptwatch alternative?
MarketHQ is free to start, then Lite at $29 a month with Reddit, news, blogs and social added. AthenaHQ's Essential plan is also free, with 300 credits for AI-answer tracking alone. Rankscale.ai Essentials starts at $20.
Which Promptwatch alternative also tracks Reddit or news?
MarketHQ. It tracks Reddit, Hacker News, GitHub, news, blogs and social alongside a weekly AI-answer check. The rest of this list, including Promptwatch itself, tracks AI answers (plus crawler and conversion data for Promptwatch) only.
Does any alternative track crawler logs or conversions like Promptwatch?
Not that we found on the vendor sites we checked. Crawler-log visibility and conversion tracking are named only on Promptwatch's pricing page among the tools in this list.
Related
- MarketHQ vs Promptwatch — the direct head-to-head with pricing and source coverage side by side
- Peec AI alternatives — the same field read from a daily multi-project AI-visibility tool
- Profound alternatives — the field read from the category's best-known vendor
- All alternatives — every field we have verified
- Pricing — what the four MarketHQ tiers cost
Sources
- Promptwatch pricing: https://www.promptwatch.com/pricing (verified 2026-10-01)
- Peec AI pricing: https://peec.ai/pricing (verified 2026-10-01)
- Profound pricing: https://www.tryprofound.com/pricing (verified 2026-09-30)
- AthenaHQ pricing: https://www.athenahq.ai/pricing (verified 2026-09-30)
- Otterly.ai pricing: https://otterly.ai/pricing/ (verified 2026-09-30)
- Rankscale.ai pricing: https://rankscale.ai/pricing (verified 2026-09-30)
- Scrunch pricing: https://scrunch.com/pricing (verified 2026-09-30)
- Brand24 pricing: https://brand24.com/prices/ (verified 2026-10-01)