Tools
The best AI visibility tools in 2026, honestly compared
By Arnav Mukherjee, founder of TofuBofu · July 7, 2026
I build one of these tools, so you should read this with that in mind. But I would rather give you an honest map than a sales pitch, partly because a dishonest one is easy to see through, and partly because the honest version is more useful to you and, frankly, better for us. When I ran our own product on our own site early on, it scored us near zero and named a competitor as the leader. I am not going to pretend the category is simpler or that we are the answer to every version of this question. We are not.
So here is the real landscape, organized the way that actually helps you choose: not by a feature checklist, but by the job you need done. The most important line runs between tools that only measure and tools that also help you fix.
The landscape by job to be done
Enterprise monitoring. Profound is the category leader here. It has the widest engine coverage, deep analytics, and the enterprise polish that comes with raising 96 million dollars at a 1 billion dollar valuation in early 2026 and serving hundreds of large customers including part of the Fortune 500. Custom pricing, historically starting around 499 dollars a month. If you are a large brand with a marketing team, this is the serious end.
Mid-market monitoring. Otterly starts around 29 dollars a month for a limited set of prompts and four engines, monitoring only. Peec is a clean European option in the mid-market. And as covered separately, the AI features inside Semrush and Ahrefs are strong trackers if you already pay for those platforms. All of these are good at showing you where you stand.
Free snapshot. HubSpot's AEO Grader is free, needs no account, and scores how AI perceives your brand across several dimensions in one shot. It is the easiest possible starting point, and a genuinely good way to see whether this even matters for you before spending anything.
Measure and fix. This is the thin part of the market, and where we built TofuBofu, aimed at B2B services firms. Almost everything above tells you the score. Very little, especially below about 100 dollars a month, turns the score into a prioritized fix list and drafts the content and schema to act on. That is the gap we chose to fill, which is a claim you should test against the others, not take on faith.
The category, by job to be done
How to actually choose
Ignore the engine-count arms race for a minute. Coverage matters, but every serious tool now tracks the major engines, so it is rarely the deciding factor. Ask yourself one question instead: is my bottleneck seeing the data, or doing the work?
If you have a marketing team that will act on a dashboard, a good monitor is all you need, and Profound, Otterly, or your existing SEO tool's AI features will serve you well. If you are a founder without that team, more data is not your problem. You already suspect you are invisible. The bottleneck is turning that into shipped fixes, and that is a different kind of tool. Buy for your bottleneck, not for the longest feature list.
What to do
1. Start with a free check
Run HubSpot's AEO Grader or a free scan to see roughly where you stand. It costs nothing and tells you whether this is worth real attention.
2. Name your bottleneck honestly
Is it seeing the data or doing the work? That single answer decides whether you need a monitor or a measure-and-fix tool, and it is more useful than any comparison table.
3. Match the tool to your size
Enterprise platforms are excellent and wrong for a solo founder. Pick the tool built for a company your size, not the most impressive one.
4. Treat prices as moving bands
This category reprices constantly. Use the rough bands to shortlist, then check current pricing before you commit.
See where you stand, and what to fix
Run a free scan built for services firms: your position across six AI engines, plus a ranked list of what to change.
Get your free auditFrequently asked questions
What are the best AI visibility tools in 2026?
It depends on your job. For enterprise-scale monitoring, Profound is the category leader, with the widest engine coverage and custom pricing. For mid-market monitoring, Otterly, Peec, and the AI features inside Semrush and Ahrefs are solid. For a free one-time snapshot, HubSpot's AEO Grader is the easiest start. The more useful question than best is which tool matches whether you mainly need to measure your AI visibility or also need help fixing it.
How much do AI visibility tools cost?
The range is wide. Entry monitoring tools like Otterly start around 29 dollars a month for a limited number of prompts. Mid-market tools sit roughly in the 49 to 100 dollar range. Enterprise platforms like Profound have historically started around 499 dollars a month and go up from there on custom pricing. HubSpot's AEO Grader is free for a one-time check. Prices move quickly in this category, so treat these as rough bands rather than fixed figures.
What is the difference between AI visibility tools?
The biggest real difference is not engine coverage or price, it is whether a tool only measures or also helps you act. Most tools in the category are monitors: they show your mentions, share of voice, and sentiment across AI engines. Very few, especially below about 100 dollars a month, turn that measurement into a prioritized fix list and produce the content and schema to close the gaps. That measure-versus-fix split matters more than the feature checklists most comparisons focus on.
Is Profound worth it?
For large enterprises, Profound is the strongest monitoring platform, which is why it raised 96 million dollars at a 1 billion dollar valuation in early 2026 and serves hundreds of enterprise customers including part of the Fortune 500. It has the widest engine coverage and deep analytics. For a small services firm or a solo founder, it is priced and built for a different buyer, so the fit is usually wrong even though the product is excellent.
What is the best AI visibility tool for a small B2B services firm?
The right fit is a tool that does not just measure but helps you act, priced for a company without a marketing team. Enterprise monitors are overkill and overpriced for this buyer, and free graders are a snapshot rather than an ongoing system. What a small services firm needs is measurement plus a prioritized fix list and the content to execute, which is the specific gap most of the category leaves open below the enterprise tier.
Do AI visibility tools generate content or just track?
Almost all of them only track. The category grew out of analytics, so the default product is a dashboard of mentions, share of voice, and sentiment. Content generation, actually drafting the blogs, FAQ schema, and comparison pages that would earn citations, is rare, especially at lower price points. If getting the work done is your bottleneck rather than seeing the data, that narrows the field considerably.
Should I use a free tool or a paid AI visibility tool?
Start free to see reality, then go paid when you need a system. A free grader like HubSpot's or a free scan tells you roughly where you stand in one snapshot, which is enough to decide whether this matters for you. Move to a paid tool when you need repeated per-engine measurement over time or, more importantly, help turning that measurement into shipped fixes. The trigger for paying is usually the fix, not the data.
Sources and further reading
- AI visibility tools pricing compared (2026): entry pricing and engine coverage across the category.
- HubSpot AEO Grader: the free one-time brand check referenced above.
- G2 research: half of B2B buyers start with AI: the demand shift behind the category.