Social listening
BuzzSumo alternatives 18 tools ranked by verified data
Data checked Oct 14, 2026 against the vendors' own pages. How we verify
We found 18 tools comparable to BuzzSumo among social listening tools, and scored each with the same scorecard; 12 have enough verified data to be ranked.
Fedica ranks first with 98/100, ahead of TrendFynd (98) and Nephia (85).
BuzzSumo itself scores 50/100 on the same scorecard, so 8 alternatives score higher.
3 alternatives have a free plan.
BuzzSumo's cheapest paid plan is $199 a month; 9 alternatives start lower (entry prices, not like-for-like plans).
BuzzSumo alternatives ranked
| # | Tool | Score | Coverage | From, billed monthly | From, billed yearly | Free plan | Platforms | Integrations | Checked |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |  Fedica | 98/100 | 85%6 of 7 criteria | $15/mo | $10/mo | Yes, 12 social accounts | 12 | – | Oct 14, 2026 |
| 2 |  TrendFynd | 98/100 | 90%6 of 7 criteria | $19/mo | Not offered | Yes | 7 | – | Oct 14, 2026 |
| 3 |  Nephia | 85/100 | 75%5 of 7 criteria | $19/mo | Not offered | Yes | 6 | – | Oct 14, 2026 |
| 4 |  AIMentionTracker | 85/100 | 90%6 of 7 criteria | $9/mo | Not offered | No | – | – | Oct 14, 2026 |
| 5 |  Promptmonitor | 82/100 | 75%5 of 7 criteria | $29/mo | Not offered | No | – | – | Oct 14, 2026 |
| 6 |  Clairon AI | 73/100 | 90%6 of 7 criteria | $49/mo | Not offered | No | 1 | – | Oct 14, 2026 |
| 7 |  Awario | 64/100 | 90%6 of 7 criteria | $49/mo | $29/mo | No | – | – | Oct 14, 2026 |
| 8 |  Thunzi AI | 51/100 | 90%6 of 7 criteria | $99/mo | $74.25/mo | No | – | – | Oct 14, 2026 |
| 9 |  Brand24 | 47/100 | 90%6 of 7 criteria | $249/mo | $199/mo | No | 8 | – | Oct 14, 2026 |
| 10 |  Hootsuite | 46/100 | 100%7 of 7 criteria | Not offered | $99/user/mo | No | 3 | 100 | Oct 14, 2026 |
| 11 |  Emplifi | 43/100 | 85%6 of 7 criteria | $1,249/mo | Not offered | No | 2 | – | Oct 14, 2026 |
| 12 |  YouScan | 33/100 | 90%6 of 7 criteria | Not offered | $499/mo | No | 1 | – | Oct 14, 2026 |
| – |  Dash Social | Not ranked | 50%4 of 7 criteria | Contact sales | Contact sales | No | 3 | – | Oct 14, 2026 |
| – |  Kolsquare | Not ranked | 50%4 of 7 criteria | Contact sales | Contact sales | No | 5 | – | Oct 14, 2026 |
| – |  AgentReacher | Not ranked | 35%3 of 7 criteria | – | – | – | 10 | – | Oct 14, 2026 |
| – |  Influencity | Not ranked | 25%2 of 7 criteria | – | – | – | 3 | – | Oct 14, 2026 |
| – |  Podzeus | Not rankedneeds a verified price | 25%2 of 7 criteria | – | – | – | – | – | Oct 14, 2026 |
| – |  Khoros | Not ranked | 15%1 of 7 criteria | – | – | – | – | – | Oct 14, 2026 |
Each value links the vendor page it was read from (hover for the check date). Coverage is the share of the scorecard's weight with verified data, and "N of M criteria" how many criteria the score is based on; a tool is ranked at 60% or more.
– = not published by the vendor, or not verified yet.
For reference, BuzzSumo scores 50/100 with 90% coverage. BuzzSumo review
Why each one ranks where it does
- 1. Fedica 98/100
Social media dashboard for scheduling across many networks, with follower and audience analytics, listening and AI message optimization.
- Entry price (100/100): $15/month billed monthly on Publish; $10/month billed annually on Publish (scored on the monthly price)
- Free plan or trial (100/100): Free plan (Free)
From $15 per month billed monthly ($10 billed yearly) on the Publish plan.
Homepage captured Oct 14, 2026 - 2. TrendFynd 98/100
Brand monitoring and trend discovery platform that tracks mentions across several networks and generates content ideas from trending videos.
- Free plan or trial (100/100): Free plan (Free)
- Verified features (100/100): 3 of 4 tracked features verified: analytics, team access, ai assistant
From $19 per month billed monthly on the Starter plan.
- 3. Nephia 85/100
Monitoring service that checks sources such as X and Reddit for brand mentions, classifies them with AI and drafts replies, delivered through Slack, webhooks and an API.
- Free plan or trial (100/100): Free plan (Free)
- API, integrations and export (100/100): public API
From $19 per month billed monthly on the Solo plan.
- 4. AIMentionTracker 85/100
Service that runs tracked prompts against AI assistants and search engines to show which brands they name, with sentiment, citations and alerts.
- Entry price (100/100): $9/month billed monthly on Solo (scored on the monthly price)
- Cost per user (team of 3) (100/100): $3 per user per month on Solo (team of 3, billed monthly)
From $9 per month billed monthly on the Solo plan.
- 5. Promptmonitor 82/100
Tracks how AI assistants such as ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini mention a brand, with cited sources, AI crawler analytics and website analytics.
- Verified features (100/100): 2 of 4 tracked features verified: analytics, team access
- API, integrations and export (100/100): documented data export
From $29 per month billed monthly on the Starter plan.
- 6. Clairon AI 73/100
Platform that tracks how a brand appears in answers from AI assistants such as ChatGPT and Gemini, reports on citations and generates articles.
- Verified features (100/100): 2 of 4 tracked features verified: analytics, team access
- API, integrations and export (100/100): public API, documented data export
From $49 per month billed monthly on the Starter plan.
- 7. Awario 64/100
Brand monitoring tool that tracks mentions of keywords across social networks, news, blogs, forums and the web, with boolean search and reports.
- Pricing transparency (100/100): 3 of 3 plans have a public price
- API, integrations and export (100/100): public API, documented data export
From $49 per month billed monthly ($29 billed yearly) on the Starter plan.
- 8. Thunzi AI 51/100
Reputation intelligence platform for African markets that monitors brand mentions, sentiment and AI visibility, including local language conversations.
- API, integrations and export (100/100): public API, documented data export
- Pricing transparency (84/100): 4 of 5 plans have a public price (1 "contact sales")
From $99 per month billed monthly ($74.25 billed yearly) on the Starter plan.
- 9. Brand24 47/100
AI-assisted social listening tool that collects online mentions of brands and topics, with sentiment analysis, reach metrics, alerts and reports.
- Verified features (100/100): 3 of 4 tracked features verified: analytics, team access, ai assistant
- API, integrations and export (100/100): public API
From $249 per month billed monthly ($199 billed yearly) on the Individual plan.
- 10. Hootsuite 46/100
Social media management suite covering post scheduling, a shared inbox, social listening, competitor tracking and reporting, with an AI assistant.
- Verified features (100/100): 3 of 4 tracked features verified: analytics, team access, ai assistant
- API, integrations and export (100/100): 100 integrations
From $99 per user per month billed yearly on the Standard plan.
How we picked
Every one of these social listening tools is scored by the same 7 criteria (scorecard v1). Each criterion gives 0 to 100 from the vendor's published data; the total is the weighted average. A criterion without verified data is left out and the other weights are re-normalised. A tool with under 60% of the weight covered is listed as not ranked, and so is a tool with no verified price and fewer than 2 verified features (“needs a verified price”); each score shows how many criteria it is based on. The core criteria are the same in every category; the category criteria are specific to social listening tools. Nobody gets custom weights, including our own products.
| Criterion | Weight | Type | What we measure |
|---|---|---|---|
| Entry price | 25% | Core | Price per month of the cheapest paid plan, against the prices of other social listening tools on the same billing basis (monthly-billed prices against monthly, annual-billed against annual).Log scale. Billed monthly: $15/month or less = 100, $249 or more = 0. Only billed annually: $5/month or less = 100, $59 or more = 0. Only free plans = 100. Usage-priced and one-time plans are not scored. |
| Free plan or trial | 15% | Core | Whether you can use the tool before paying: a free plan, or failing that a free trial, as shown on the vendor's pricing page.Free plan = 100. No free plan but a free trial = 60. The pricing page lists plans but shows neither = 0. No plans read = not scored. |
| Pricing transparency | 10% | Core | How much of the pricing is public: the share of plans with a published price ("contact sales" counts against), and whether there are at least 3 published tiers.80 x (plans with a public price / plans listed) + 20 x (public plans, up to 3) / 3. No plans read = not scored. |
| Verified features | 15% | Core | How many of the 4 features we track for this category the vendor's own pages verifiably show (analytics, team access, templates, ai assistant). This counts verified features only: a tool that documents less scores lower here, and only here.Linear: verified features / 2 (half the tracked list) x 100, capped at 100. No tracked feature verified = not scored. |
| API, integrations and export | 10% | Core | Whether a public API exists, how many integrations the vendor states, and whether the vendor documents a way to export your data.Average of the parts with data: public API yes = 100, no = 0; integrations on a log scale (100 or more = 100); a documented data export = 100. None verified = not scored. |
| Cost per user (team of 3) | 15% | Category | Monthly price per user for a team of 3, on the cheapest paid plan that is priced per seat or states room for at least 3 users.Log scale: $16.33 per user or less = 100, $116 or more = 0. Plans that do not state a user limit are not used. No such plan = not scored. |
| Platform coverage | 10% | Category | How many of the 15 social platforms we track the vendor says the tool supports.Linear: platforms / 10 x 100, capped at 100. No verified platform list = not scored. |
Sources are vendor pricing pages, docs and changelogs, each with the date we checked it. We did not test these tools hands-on unless a listing says so. Full formulas: methodology.
Questions, answered from the data
What is the best alternative to BuzzSumo?
Fedica, with 98/100 on our scorecard; TrendFynd is second with 98/100.
Is there a free alternative to BuzzSumo?
Yes: Fedica, TrendFynd and Nephia have a free plan; Fedica ranks highest of them.
What is the cheapest BuzzSumo alternative?
By entry price, AIMentionTracker: $9 per month billed monthly on the Solo plan.