# Prompt Volume, Seats or Credits: How AI-Visibility Tools Price

> Source: CitedIndex — https://citedindex.com/blog/how-ai-visibility-tools-actually-price-2026 (sourced research, built to be cited)
> By CitedIndex Editorial · Published 2026-08-04

_Two tools quoting $99/month can mean 15 prompts or 100. We mapped six different pricing units across our index so a quote is comparable, not just a number._

Ask two AI-visibility vendors for a quote and you'll get two numbers back, but the numbers rarely mean the same thing. [Otterly AI](/otterly-ai)'s $189/month Standard tier buys 100 tracked prompts a month across four engines. [GeoRankers](/georankers)'s $129/month Grow tier buys ten "seed topics," ten tracked competitors and three seats: a completely different unit of measurement, at a lower price, for a feature set neither number alone describes. Neither vendor is being deceptive. The category simply never standardized on one billing unit the way project-management or CRM software settled on "per seat, per month" years ago. This is a walkthrough of the units we actually found across our index's sourced pricing pages, and what to normalize for before comparing two quotes.

## Why this market doesn't price like typical SaaS

Classic per-seat SaaS pricing works because the thing being metered (a named user logging in) is the same across every vendor. AI-visibility tools meter something closer to *usage against a moving target*: how many prompts get run, how often, against how many AI engines, sometimes bundled with content generation or audits that consume the same budget. That's a harder thing to standardize, and our index shows six genuinely different approaches to it, not two or three.

## Six ways the tools in our index price the same underlying job

**1. Prompt-volume tiers.** The most common shape: the price ladder is a straight multiple of how many tracked prompts you get, with everything else (engines, features) usually held constant across tiers. Otterly AI is the cleanest example: Lite ($29/month, 15 prompts), Standard ($189/month, 100 prompts) and Premium ($489/month, 400 prompts) all track the same four engines with no API/MCP on Lite, added from Standard up. The unit is simple, but two vendors' "prompt" can still mean different things. See the credit-metering section below.

**2. Multi-axis tiers that move together.** Some vendors don't isolate one variable; they bundle several into each tier jump. GeoRankers' Launch tier ($41/month, billed quarterly) gives 3 seed topics, 5 tracked competitors and 1 seat; Grow ($129/month) raises all three at once to 10 topics, 10 competitors and 3 seats. You can't buy more competitors without also buying more topics and seats. The tiers are a package, not independently priced levers.

**3. Credit-metered, mixed-cost actions.** [Rank Prompt](/rankprompt) prices in credits rather than a flat "prompts included" number, and different actions draw down the same pool at different rates: a prompt scan costs 1 credit, an AI-written article costs 10, and a Lighthouse-style GEO audit costs 5–10. A team using Rank Prompt mainly for scans and one using it mainly for content generation get very different real-world usage out of the same 150-credit Starter tier ($49/month). The credit count on the pricing page understates or overstates capacity depending on what you're actually doing with it.

**4. Pure pay-as-you-go, no subscription at all.** [Sleepwalker](/sleepwalker) bills [€0.02 per credit with a €5 minimum top-up](https://www.sleepwalker.ai/) and no forced monthly plan, so cost scales directly with usage rather than committing to a tier sized for your busiest month. This is the one model in our index where the sticker price genuinely can't be compared to a tiered competitor's without first estimating your own monthly volume.

**5. One flat plan, no ladder at all.** [Gauge](/gauge) publishes exactly one named self-serve plan: Growth, $599/month, 600 daily prompts across 6 platforms plus 18 AI-written articles and 10 seats. There is no cheaper tier to step down to; broader engine coverage or unlimited seats requires a custom Enterprise quote instead. A buyer comparing Gauge's $599 against an entry-tier competitor's $49 is comparing an all-in bundle to a stripped-down starting point, not two points on the same curve.

**6. Free/open-core plus a custom services layer.** [Canonry](/canonry) is free and self-hosted at the core (you bring your own Gemini/OpenAI/Claude/Perplexity API key and the software itself costs nothing), with two custom-priced layers on top: "Canonry Embedded" (white-labeled reporting for an agency's own client portal) and "Canonry Managed" (done-for-you execution). The published "Free" tier is real, but it isn't the full cost of running the tool at any real volume. Your own LLM API usage is a variable cost that never appears on Canonry's own pricing page.

## What to actually normalize before comparing two quotes

- **Convert to cost per check you'd realistically run**, not cost per month. 100 prompts for $189/month (Otterly Standard) and 10 seed topics for $129/month (GeoRankers Grow) aren't directly comparable until you estimate how many distinct brand/competitor checks each setup would actually cover for your own use case.
- **Ask what one "prompt" or "credit" buys**, not just how many you get. A credit-metered tool where a content-generation feature drains the same pool as a visibility scan (Rank Prompt) can burn through its allowance far faster than the headline number suggests if you use both features.
- **Check whether the axes move independently or as a bundle.** GeoRankers-style multi-axis tiers mean you can't buy just "more competitors." Confirm the tier you'd actually need covers every axis you care about, not only the one that's cheapest to scale.
- **Price in your own usage for BYOK tools.** A free or near-free self-hosted tool (Canonry, and several others in our [full pricing breakdown](/best-ai-visibility-tools)) shifts cost onto your own LLM API bill, worth estimating before assuming "free" beats a $29/month subscription.
- **Watch for tools with no lower rung.** A single flat-plan vendor like Gauge isn't necessarily more expensive per feature than a tiered competitor's mid tier, but there's no way to start smaller and grow into it, which matters if you're not sure yet how much usage you'll need.

## FAQ

### Why don't AI-visibility tools all price per seat, like most B2B SaaS?
Because the thing that costs the vendor money isn't a logged-in user; it's the volume of AI-engine queries run on a schedule, which scales with tracked prompts, topics or competitors, not headcount. Several tools in our index (GeoRankers, Rank Prompt, Gauge) do add seats as a secondary axis on top of a usage-based core tier, rather than as the primary pricing lever.

### Is a credit-metered tool more or less predictable than a flat prompt-count tier?
Less predictable in raw dollar terms, because your monthly cost depends on which features you actually use, not just how many "prompts" a tier lists. See Rank Prompt above, where a content-heavy month draws the credit pool down faster than a scan-only month. It's more flexible if your usage mix genuinely varies month to month, and harder to budget against if you want a fixed number going in.

### Does "free" or "open-source" actually mean no ongoing cost?
Not necessarily. A self-hosted, BYOK tool like Canonry has no software subscription, but you still pay for the underlying LLM API calls it makes on your behalf, a real variable cost that doesn't show up anywhere on the vendor's own pricing page and has to be estimated separately.

### Where can I see exact current prices for a specific tool?
Every tool's own listing in our [full directory](/) carries its sourced pricing tiers and a verification date. This piece compares pricing *architectures*, not a live price list. Check the individual listing (or the vendor's own pricing page) before a purchase decision, since self-serve pricing on tools like these can change without notice.

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Tags: geo, ai-visibility, pricing, buyer-guide, market-analysis