Hunter vs Needle
Hunter and Needle are both sales engagement & outbound tools. Hunter is aimed at small businesses and freelancers, while Needle is aimed at agencies and small businesses. Hunter costs less, from $49/mo versus $69/mo for Needle. Both have a free plan.
Find and verify professional email addresses
Outbound engine you run from Claude, ChatGPT or Slack via MCP
| Pricing | Freemium · $49 | Paid · $69 |
| Starting price | $49/mo | $69/mo |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | — | 7 days |
| Built for | Small businesses, Freelancers | Agencies, Small businesses, Freelancers |
| Platforms | web | web |
| Country | FR · 2015 | DE |
| Rating | — | — |
Choose Hunter if
Marketers, recruiters and founders who need reliable email finding.
- Accurate email finding and verification
- Simple and fast
- GDPR-conscious
Look elsewhere if: Full sales engagement or phone data (Apollo, Lusha).
Choose Needle if
Founders, small sales teams and agencies that want to run multichannel outbound by prompting the AI assistant they already use.
- No lead credits or per-lead charges
- Works from the AI assistant your team already uses
- Human approval step before messages go out
Look elsewhere if: Teams that need a large verified B2B contact database or mature email deliverability tooling (Apollo, lemlist, Instantly).
Hunter vs Needle pricing
Hunter
- Free$050 credits/mo, 1 email account
- Starter$49/mo$34/mo billed annually; 2,000 credits/mo
- Growth$149/mo$104/mo billed annually; 10,000 credits/mo
- Scale$299/mo$209/mo billed annually; 25,000 credits/mo
- EnterpriseCustomCustom credits and accounts
Needle
- Free Trial$07 days, 1 connected account, no card required
- Pro$69/account/mo1 to 10 accounts; unlimited campaigns, inbox and API
- Agency$34/account/moFor accounts 11 to 50; first 10 at $69; white-label
- EnterpriseCustom51+ accounts, custom rates, dedicated deployment
Hunter · Key features
- Domain Search for company email patterns
- Email Finder by name and domain
- Email Verifier with confidence scores
- Simple cold email campaigns
- Chrome extension
- Bulk tasks and API
Cons
- No phone numbers
- Smaller database than Apollo
- Campaigns are basic
Needle · Key features
- MCP server that runs outbound from Claude, ChatGPT, Codex or Cursor
- Lead lists from LinkedIn, Instagram and Places business listings
- Finds people engaging with competitors' posts
- Multichannel sequences across LinkedIn, Instagram and email with branching
- Per-account daily limits, human-like pacing and sender warm-up
- Suppression of customers, open deals and recently contacted leads
Cons
- WhatsApp and SMS channels are not live yet
- No named CRM integrations on the website
- LinkedIn and Instagram automation can risk account restrictions
Hunter vs Needle: FAQ
Which is cheaper, Hunter or Needle?
Hunter starts at $49/mo and Needle at $69/mo. Both prices are checked on the vendors' own pricing pages.
Do Hunter and Needle have a free plan?
Yes, both Hunter and Needle have a free plan; paid plans add more usage and features.