Key takeaways
- Profound has no self-serve monthly tier, so "under $100" means a different class of tool: lighter, cheaper, and usually built around monitoring.
- Otterly.AI is the cheapest real monthly plan at $29 for 15 prompts across four engines. Gemini, Google AI Mode and Claude cost extra.
- At $95 a month you are choosing between Peec AI (clean analytics, 3 models per plan) and Promptwatch (all tracked models, Agent Chat, no AEO articles on this tier).
- Semrush's AI Visibility Toolkit is $99 per domain. It makes sense mostly if you already live in Semrush.
- Compare the plan you would actually use: prompts, models, countries and credits change the real price more than the headline number.
Why "under $100" is a different category from Profound
Profound is built for enterprise marketing teams. Its own positioning has moved from tracking toward an AI marketing platform with agents and an AI Marketer, and the entry point is a free trial followed by custom pricing. One roundup that tried to price a standard workload (one brand, 50 prompts, four engines) simply listed Profound as "not computable" because no self-serve tier exists.
That is fine if you have an enterprise budget. If you are a small team, a consultant, or a founder who just wants to know whether ChatGPT mentions you, it is the wrong shape of product.
So what does a sub-$100 budget get you? Mostly daily prompt tracking across a handful of AI engines, some source and citation data, and varying amounts of recommendation features. Not much beyond that. I will say up front that the cheap tier of this market is mostly monitoring, and the real differences are in the limits.
What to check before you compare prices
Headline prices hide four things.
- Prompt count. 15 prompts is a spot check. 50 is a workable starting set for one brand.
- Engines included. Some tools charge add-ons for Gemini, Google AI Mode or Claude. Others include everything.
- Credit systems. Credit-based tools (Rankshift, Rankscale) can be cheap or expensive depending on how often you run prompts and how many engines you cover.
- Billing. Some of the lowest numbers, like Rankscale's $17 Essentials plan, are yearly billing only.
Engine coverage matters more than it looks. According to Promptwatch's average sources per response data, ChatGPT cites about 5 sources per web-search answer while Google AI Overviews and Perplexity cite about 10 each. Different engines behave differently, so a tool that tracks only two of them gives you a partial picture of your visibility.
Price and limits at a glance
| Tool | Entry price | Engines on entry plan | Main catch |
|---|---|---|---|
| Otterly.AI | $29/mo (Lite) | 4: ChatGPT, AI Overviews, Perplexity, Copilot | 15 prompts; Gemini, AI Mode, Claude are add-ons |
| Rankscale | $17/mo yearly, $99/mo Pro | All engines | Cheapest tier has few credits |
| ZeroRank | $39/mo | Varies by plan | Answer-run budgets and plan allowances |
| AIclicks | $39/mo | Multiple | Lighter depth |
| Geoptie | $49/mo | 4 engines per brand | Four engines at a time |
| SE Ranking (SE Visible) | $65/mo | Multiple | AI is layered onto an SEO suite |
| Rankshift | EUR 69/mo | Multiple | Credit-based tracking |
| LLMrefs | $79/mo | 7+ platforms | Monitoring only |
| Peec AI | $95/mo (EUR 85) | 3 of 6 models | Extra models cost $30 to $140/mo on annual billing |
| Promptwatch | $95/mo | All tracked models | No AEO articles on Essential |
| Semrush AI Visibility Toolkit | $99/mo per domain | 4 | An add-on, not a dedicated AI product |
Prices come from the vendors' own pages and third-party roundups published in 2026. Confirm on each pricing page before you buy, because these change often.
The cheapest real options
Otterly.AI
Otterly is the one everyone lists first, and fairly. The Lite plan at $29 a month gives you 15 prompts across ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Perplexity and Copilot, with published pricing on every tier and no sales call. Unlimited team members and brand reports, 50+ country tracking, and API and MCP access from the Standard plan are the other selling points.
What you don't get: Claude, Gemini and Google AI Mode by default, a free tier to test, a credit system you can flex, or much in the way of deep content fixes. Lite also limits you to three recommendations a week. It is a monitor, and a decent one.
Rankscale
Rankscale has the lowest floor price I found, $17 a month on yearly billing, and tracks every engine on every tier with no add-on fees. The trade-off is credits. One roundup calculated that its $99 Pro plan covers up to 4,800 engine answers at the lowest engine weight, which works for 50 prompts across four engines, but the cheapest tier includes few credits. Do the math on your own prompt count before you get excited about $17.
ZeroRank, AIclicks and Geoptie
This group sits at $39 to $49 and leans toward "monitoring plus something." ZeroRank pitches research, recommendations, content tools and automation from $39. AIclicks gives prompt-level visibility scoring and competitor comparisons from $39. Geoptie offers unmetered audits and content generation from $49, though only four engines per brand at a time. All three are newer names, so check how long their track records run.
Trakkr and LLMrefs
Trakkr tracks 8 models with flat pricing and no credit metering, but caps you at 50 prompts per brand unless you buy a prompt pack. LLMrefs starts at $79 and covers seven or more platforms with rank-style tracking. It does not act on what it finds.
The $95 to $99 tier: where the real choice is
This is where "under $100" gets interesting, because you are choosing among serious tools with different philosophies.
Peec AI at $95
Peec is the usual pick for people who want clear analytics. Starter is $95 a month in USD (EUR 85) with 50 prompts and daily tracking, and you choose 3 of 6 models. Source analysis, team collaboration and recommendations are the strengths. The catch is the three-model cap: extra models cost $30 to $140 a month on annual billing, so full coverage pushes you past $100 quickly. Higher tiers are $245 and $495.
Promptwatch at $95
Promptwatch Essential is also $95 a month, with a 7-day free trial. For that you get 1 project, 1 seat, 50 prompts and 6,000 responses, with every tracked model unlocked (ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google, Claude, Gemini, Meta AI, DeepSeek and others), plus Agent Chat, country-level tracking, 360 Insights, content gap analysis, a site audit, and MCP and API access. Tracking runs against the real interfaces of the AI engines rather than just APIs, which matters because user-facing answers can differ from API output.
The honest limit: Essential does not include AEO articles or content writing. Those start on Professional at $245, and the automated Content Agent is on Business. So at $95 you get the diagnosis and the prioritized work, not the writing. If you want to see how it compares on a smaller scale, the free AI Visibility Report on the Promptwatch site lets you check without a login.
Semrush AI Visibility Toolkit at $99
Semrush charges $99 a month per domain for AI tracking across ChatGPT, Google AI, Gemini and Perplexity, sitting next to your keyword data. If your team already pays for Semrush, that adjacency is the whole value. If not, you are buying an SEO suite add-on rather than a dedicated AI visibility product, and the AI domain limits differ from your SEO limits. Plans run up to $299 and then custom.
Ahrefs Brand Radar
Ahrefs sells Custom Prompts from $50 a month, with index access priced separately. It has a big research database, but the separate products and usage rules make the real monthly cost harder to predict.
What each tier actually gets you
| Budget | What you realistically get | What you give up |
|---|---|---|
| $17 to $39 | 15 to 50 prompts, 3 to 4 engines, daily or weekly checks | Deep recommendations, extra engines, often a free trial |
| $49 to $79 | Broader engines or some content tools, light automation | Track record, some metering |
| $95 to $99 | 50 prompts, source and citation data, team features, recommendations | Content writing, multi-project setups |
| $245 and up | Content writing, knowledge bases, crawler analytics, more prompts | Budget |
How to choose
Pick by the job, not by the lowest number.
- You just want to know if you show up. Otterly Lite at $29 or a cheap newcomer is enough. Don't overbuy.
- You already pay for an SEO suite. Semrush or Ahrefs keeps everything in one place.
- You need all the major engines without add-on math. Rankscale or Promptwatch Essential, depending on whether you prefer credits or fixed allowances.
- You want clean reporting for a team or small agency. Peec AI, as long as three models is enough.
- You want to know why you are missing and what to fix. Promptwatch Essential at $95 gives you content gap analysis and the Agent Chat analyst. Writing the content still means upgrading or doing it yourself.
For wider lists, the GEO software directory at bestgeosoftware.com and the AI rank tracking directory at ai-rank-tools.com cover many more options than fit here.
Test before you commit
Two things are worth doing in the first week of any trial.
- Load the same 20 to 50 prompts into two tools and compare. Responses vary, but if two tools disagree wildly about whether you are mentioned, find out why before you trust either.
- Check which engines your customers use. If your buyers live in Perplexity or Google AI Overviews, a plan that excludes them is not cheap, just incomplete.
The third-party roundups behind this guide each push their own product to the top, so treat the rankings with some suspicion. ZeroRank is a good example: useful tables, but it lists itself first.
The same applies to 3RD's guide by team type, which is more careful about published pricing and trials than most.
Bottom line
Under $100 you can get a working AI visibility monitor. You cannot get Profound's depth, and most of the cheap tools stop at "were you mentioned." Start at $29 if that is all you need. Move to the $95 tier if you need full engine coverage or analysis, and budget for the Professional tier if you expect to publish content to fix the gaps you find.