Apollo vs Lusha (2026): Data, Credits, Pricing and Which One Fits Your Team

Apollo vs Lusha comparison: data claims, credit rules, pricing for three reps and which tool fits which team
AUTHOR:
REVIEWER:

Publish date: Oct 23, 2026

A phone number costs 8 credits on Apollo and 5 on Lusha, yet at annual list prices that is about $0.16 a number on Apollo and $0.44 on Lusha. That is our arithmetic on Apollo Professional and Lusha Pro, assuming every credit is used. Whichever way you search it, Apollo vs Lusha or Lusha vs Apollo, the choice turns on credits more than plan prices. This comparison reads both vendors' pages, help centers and terms, and prices a three-rep team. We found no published test of both tools on the same contacts, so we name no accuracy winner.

The Extractor
The Refiner
The Verifier
The Exporter

Get thousands of leads in 4 minutes.

Stop stitching tools together.
Start with verified sales data, delivered in minutes.

SCALE SALES NOW

No contracts · No setup · No onboarding

Apollo vs Lusha in 14 rows: what each vendor's own pages say

Accuracy figures are vendor claims, not test results.

ApolloLusha
ProductDatabase with email sequences, a US dialer and CRM syncDatabase and browser extension with email sequences (Engage), no dialer
Database claimed240M+ contacts, 30M+ companies515M+ contacts, 29M+ companies
Email accuracy claimed98% on its data page, 91% on its Lusha comparison page98%; 95% to 98% by region
Phone accuracy claimedNone on its data or pricing pages86% global, 85% US
Contacts by countryNot publishedPublished for 238 countries; no Italian contact data
How you payPer seat; each seat brings creditsPer credit amount; seats come with the plan
Cheapest paid planBasic, $49 per seat a month billed annuallyStarter, $37.45 a month billed yearly, one seat
Credits per email / phone number1 / 81 / 5
List price per credit, annual billingAbout $0.02About $0.087 to $0.094
Unused creditsExpire every billing cycleMonthly Pro and Premium roll over up to 2x; annual credits end with the term
Credits back for bad dataVerified emails that bounce when sent from Apollo within 30 days; never mobile numbersNo automatic refund; case-by-case review
Email sequencesEvery plan (2 per team on Free)Up to 10 active sequences per user
DialerUS dialer on paid plans, credits applyNone
Chrome extension1,000,000 users, 4.6 stars from 2.2K ratings400,000 users, 4.2 stars from 1.9K ratings

Per-credit prices are our arithmetic.

Apollo vs Lusha comparison table: database claims, credit costs, refunds, rollover and outreach tools

Apollo vs Lusha pricing: seats that carry credits against credits that carry seats

Apollo prices the seat: each Basic, Professional or Organization seat brings credits, granted upfront each billing cycle and pooled across the team, and every seat on an account sits on the same plan. Organization is annual only with a three-seat minimum, and the page's FAQ calls that tier Custom.

Lusha prices the credits: a slider sets Pro and Premium by the credits you need a year, and seats come with the plan (two on Pro, five on Premium). A third Pro seat added $37.40 a month at every setting we priced, from 7,200 to 38,400 credits, and teams above five users go to sales.

PlanBilled annually, a monthBilled monthlyCreditsSeats
Apollo Free$0$0900 per seat a yearPer seat
Apollo Basic$49 per seat$65 per seat30,000 per seat a year (2,500 a month on monthly billing)Per seat
Apollo Professional$79 per seat*$99 per seat48,000 per seat a year (4,000 a month)Per seat
Apollo Organization$119 per seatAnnual only72,000 per seat a year3 minimum
Lusha Free$0$040 a month1
Lusha Starter$37.45$49.904,800 a year (400 a month)1
Lusha Pro$52.45 to $279.95$69.90 to $362.407,200 to 38,400 a year (600 to 3,200 a month)2; third seat $37.40 a month
Lusha Premium$299.95 to $794.95$399.90 to $977.4040,800 to 120,000 a year (3,400 to 10,000 a month)5
Lusha ScaleCustomCustom"50%+ off price per credit"Custom

Prices exclude tax. *Apollo's list price in its own article, also shown on its pricing page; not a confirmed checkout price.

Per credit, that is about $0.02 on Apollo's annual plans against $0.087 to $0.094 on Lusha's yearly plans, falling only to $0.0795 at 120,000 credits. Plan detail: our Apollo.io pricing and Lusha pricing guides.

Lusha vs Apollo pricing for three reps: one worked year

Take a team that reveals 400 work emails and 100 phone numbers a month: 14,400 Apollo credits a year (8 per number) or 10,800 on Lusha (5 per number). Annual billing, list prices before tax:

Three reps, one yearCredits neededCredits includedYear at list price
Lusha Pro, 3 seats, 12,000-credit setting10,80012,000 (1.1x)$1,498.20
Apollo Basic, 3 seats14,40090,000 (6.25x)$1,764
Apollo Professional, 3 seats14,400144,000 (10x)$2,844*
Lusha Premium, 5 seats included10,80040,800 (3.8x)$3,599.40
Apollo Organization, 3-seat minimum14,400216,000 (15x)$4,284

*Apollo's list price ($79 a seat) in its own article, also shown on its pricing page; not a confirmed checkout price.

Lusha vs Apollo pricing for three reps: a year at list price and the credits each plan carries

Lusha is cheaper at this volume, and Apollo sells credits this team will never use. But each extra 2,400 Lusha credits adds $17.50 a month, so Lusha Pro with three seats reaches the price of three Apollo Basic seats between 14,400 and 16,800 credits a year, if the third seat stays at $37.40.

Spona's sales-call records confirm the three-user team behind that Apollo figure and a Lusha budget of $100 to $300 a month for three users, a budget band rather than a quote. Real contracts are usually bigger: Vendr puts the median Apollo buyer at $19,000 a year, with average savings of 30%, and the median Lusha buyer at $15,999, with 11%.

Apollo vs Lusha credits: what a reveal, an export, a bounce and a renewal cost

Both vendors' terms make all payments non-refundable, so these rules decide the real cost.

What happensApolloLusha
You reveal a contact1 credit per verified email (charged once even if several are found), 8 per phone number; office numbers free1 per email, 5 per phone number, up to 6 for both; searches, no-match lookups and re-opening a revealed contact are free
You exportSelect up to 25 (Free), 1,000 (Basic), 2,500 (Professional) or 10,000 (Organization) records at onceCSV: 1 credit per 25 rows, paid plans only; CRM: 1 credit per changed row
An email bouncesCredits back next cycle if sent from Apollo within 30 days; never for mobile numbersNo automatic refund; support reviews requests case by case
Credits go unusedExpire at the end of each billing cycle, add-on credits includedMonthly Pro, Premium and Scale roll over up to 2x the monthly allowance; annual credits end with the term
You downgradeImmediately, with no refund for unused timeAt the end of the billing cycle
You cancelAt the end of the term; you may not be able to rejoin at your current pricePlan runs to the end of the cycle, then drops to Free and "All stored credits reset"

Two rules catch teams out. Apollo returns bounce credits only for emails sent through Apollo, so a team sending from another tool gets nothing back. And Lusha's CSV export is a paid feature, so export your lists before a cancelled plan drops to Free.

Apollo vs Lusha data: 240M contacts against 515M, and the test nobody has run

Apollo logo, from the apollo.io site header, shown in this Apollo vs Lusha comparison
Apollo.io homepage: Grow revenue with one connected GTM system, plus a free sign-up form

Apollo claims 240M+ contacts and 30M+ companies and "Seven-step email verification with 98% accuracy", while its Lusha comparison page says "91% email accuracy". Apollo publishes no regional counts; it tells buyers to sign up and search their region.

Lusha logo, from the lusha.com site logo file, shown in this Apollo vs Lusha comparison
Lusha.com homepage: Data you can build on, with 515M+ verified contacts and 29M+ companies

Lusha claims 515M+ contacts and 29M+ companies, 98% email accuracy and 86% phone accuracy globally (85% in the US). Its accuracy FAQ splits email accuracy by region, from 98% in North America to 95% in Latin America, and its data page counts contacts by country, with one stated gap: "Italian contact data is not currently available."

Outside evidence is thin. Sparkle, a cold email vendor, emailed 250 contacts from each tool with the same copy: Apollo's list bounced 2.65% against Lusha's 3% and replied 0.56% against 0.4%, and Sparkle notes "the two contact sets were different people". Cleanlist measured Apollo's email match rate at 78% on 1,000 leads, with no Lusha figure. For a ZoomInfo vs Lusha vs Apollo contact data comparison, none of the three publishes a same-contacts test either.

Lusha's own advice: "Use 200 to 300 of your real target contacts, not a sample list from the vendor." Spona's check for buyers who already pay for a data tool works for either: compare the same 100 target accounts, deduplicate against the existing CRM, and measure incremental verified contacts, preparation time and cost per usable record.

Lusha vs Apollo for outreach: sequences, the dialer and the Chrome extension

ApolloLusha
Email sequences2 per team on Free; unlimited on paid plans, A/Z tests from ProfessionalEngage, from a connected Gmail or Outlook: up to 10 active sequences per user
Daily sends250 on Free and Basic; unlimited on Professional and OrganizationUp to 1,000 emails per user
CallingUS dialer on paid plans, 1 credit per 30 seconds connected; calls that ring out, are busy or fail use noneNo dialer
Chrome extension1,000,000 users; version 17.2.0400,000 users; version 11.0.8

Both send email sequences; only Apollo dials. Apollo's comparison article says Professional's dialer works "without additional per-call credit deductions", but its pricing cards say "US Dialer (credits apply)" and its help center bills connected calls with "a thirty-second minimum". Budget by the pricing page.

Apollo.io vs Lusha on CRM integrations, security and compliance

Both sync with Salesforce, HubSpot and Pipedrive, and neither lists a connector to the other. Apollo includes those CRMs on every plan and Outreach and Salesloft from Basic, but keeps single sign-on and advanced or custom API integrations for its top tier. Lusha's integrations page also lists Zoho CRM, Bullhorn, Clay, Zapier, n8n, ChatGPT and Claude.

Lusha documents more on compliance. Apollo says it is "SOC 2 Type II and ISO 27001 certified and GDPR compliant" and that it processes data on a legitimate-interest basis; its default "Deliver personal emails" setting adds a verified personal address as a secondary email. Lusha's facts page lists SOC 2 Type II, ISO 27001, 27017, 27701, 31700 and 42001, GDPR certification by ePrivacyseal and CCPA validation by TrustArc, and each record carries an EU-resident flag and Do Not Call status.

Lusha or Apollo: the better pick for four kinds of buyer

  • Solo sellers and small teams that want to find, email and call in one tool: Apollo. Basic includes sequences, 250 sends a day and a dialer billed in credits.
  • Two or three reps with modest volume and a sequencer already: Lusha. Pro with three seats lists at $124.85 a month for 12,000 credits a year.
  • Phone-heavy or high-volume teams: Apollo. Its credits cost a fifth to a quarter of Lusha's at list, which outweighs the 8-credit phone price.
  • EU-focused teams and anyone facing a security review: start with Lusha's documents, then test both.

Spona's win/loss notes record why buyers chose Apollo, Lusha or an incumbent over Spona, in their words (interview count not stated):

  • VP Sales, 100 to 500 staff: "Our team already knows the existing platform and the migration has to pay for itself."
  • RevOps director, 200 to 1,000 staff: "We need documented integrations, security evidence and predictable service levels before changing suppliers."
  • SDR manager, 20 to 100 staff: "A familiar browser workflow is more important to us than a new research interface."

If neither tool fits, start with our Lusha alternatives and Apollo alternatives guides.

Apollo vs Lusha vs Spona: where Spona fits, and where it does not

Spona prices the lead, not the seat. You describe your ideal customer in a chat; the AI mines 40+ sources, verifies every lead and delivers a scored list in about 4 minutes. Spona pricing: qualified leads $0.32 to $4, bulk leads $0.01 to $0.09, plus 1,000 setup credits ($8 to $10) per new ideal customer profile; a free plan returns sample leads.

Against the seat: $2,844, three Apollo Professional seats for a year (Apollo's list price in its own article, also shown on its pricing page; not a confirmed checkout price), buys 711 to 8,887 qualified Spona leads or 31,600 to 284,400 bulk leads, before setup credits. That suits a team that needs a few hundred well-matched contacts a month; Apollo suits reps who reveal and email thousands from one screen.

In Spona data, 1.525% of 20,000 sends to verified addresses in four countries hard bounced (catch-all addresses excluded), under Spona's 2% target. Inbox placement is a separate metric, and this is Spona's own pipeline, not a comparison with Apollo or Lusha.

Where Apollo and Lusha are stronger: Spona has no confirmed browser extension, native CRM connector or dialer (delivery is CSV or API), so it does not replace a rep's daily lookup tool. Buying a B2B list does not grant permission to email it; establish a lawful basis for personal data processing, meet transparency and objection duties, and follow the recipient country's electronic marketing rules, including prior consent where required.

The Extractor
The Refiner
The Verifier
The Exporter

Get thousands of leads in 4 minutes.

Stop stitching tools together.
Start with verified sales data, delivered in minutes.

SCALE SALES NOW

No contracts · No setup · No onboarding

Apollo vs Lusha FAQ

How reliable are Lusha and Apollo data?

Both claim 98% email accuracy on their data pages. On Capterra UK, users rate Apollo.io 4.5 and Lusha 4.0 overall. Lusha's Trustpilot score is 1.2 from 776 reviews, but Trustpilot's summary says people "expressed concerns about data collection and receiving unsolicited calls on their phone numbers", which points to people in the database rather than buyers; Apollo's is 3.1 from 1,365.

Why did LinkedIn remove Apollo?

MarTech reported that Apollo's company page disappeared from LinkedIn on March 6, 2025, a removal MarTech said "appears to be against LinkedIn's terms of service prohibiting third-party tools from scraping LinkedIn data". Apollo CEO Tim Zheng said the restriction "does not disrupt Apollo's services or impact our core platform functionality"; the report includes no statement from LinkedIn. Use LinkedIn information only through authorized means consistent with applicable law and LinkedIn's terms, without unauthorized scraping, automated extraction or bypassing access restrictions.

Can you use Apollo and Lusha together?

Yes, through your CRM. Neither integrations page lists the other, but both sync with Salesforce, HubSpot and Pipedrive, and Lusha charges CRM exports only for changed rows. Deduplicate first, or you pay twice for the same contacts.

Which is cheaper, Apollo or Lusha?

Per credit, Apollo. For the three-rep team in our worked year, Lusha, until it needs between 14,400 and 16,800 credits a year.

Where does ZoomInfo fit next to Apollo and Lusha?

Our ZoomInfo vs Apollo comparison covers ZoomInfo, and the checks used here (price per credit, refund and rollover rules, a same-contacts test) apply unchanged.

Share this article

GET FREE LEADSSparkle

Similar Topics For You

see all texts