ColdSEO vs Pitchbox (2026): which should you pick?

Pick ColdSEO if

• Fits if you do your own link outreach on a small budget
• Works for judging a campaign by the links it produced

Look elsewhere if

• Tight if you're staying free: 100 sends, 50 prospect credits and 25 AI first lines a month, from 1 inbox and 1 campaign
• Not for you if you want a trial of a paid plan: billing starts on day one, with a refund only if you downgrade within 14 days
• Pricey if you need more than one seat, the API or white-label exports, which come only with Agency at $159 a month
• Watch out: monthly credits don't roll over, and top-up packs cost extra, such as $15 for 500 prospect credits
• Skip it if you don't have mailboxes of your own to send from

Pick Pitchbox if

• Fits if you're an agency running link building for many clients and can commit for a year
• Works for in-house SEO teams that pitch publishers directly instead of hiring out

Look elsewhere if

• Pricey if you're one person, as every plan is a year's commitment and Pro alone is $2,520 a year
• Tight if more than 2 people pitch, as Pro has 2 users and 2 mailboxes
• Watch out: recurring campaigns, email rotation, Slack and the API start at Advanced for $420 a month
• Not for you if you want to try it yourself, as trials only come after a demo with a product specialist
• Pricey if you pay monthly, as expert onboarding then costs $2,000 to $4,000

ColdSEO

• The free plan stops at 100 email sends and 50 prospect credits a month, from 1 inbox and 1 campaign.
• Paid plans have no free trial: they are billed from day one, with a full refund if you downgrade within 14 days.
• Monthly credits do not roll over; one-time packs cost $15 for 500 prospect credits, $10 for 1,000 sends and $8 for 500 AI personalizations.
• More than one seat, API access and white-label exports come only with Agency, and sending needs mailboxes of your own.

Pitchbox

• Every plan needs a one-year commitment, whether billed monthly or annually; cancelling keeps access until the term ends.
• Pro has 2 users and 2 mailboxes; recurring campaigns, email rotation, Slack and the API start at Advanced for $420 a month.
• There is no self-serve trial: trials are arranged after a demo with a product specialist.
• Expert-led onboarding costs $2,000 to $4,000 by plan on monthly billing and is included with annual billing.

ColdSEO

Prospect Finder

Search by keyword, competitor backlinks or content topic, or upload a domain list, then filter by domain authority, traffic, language, country and spam score and pull emails.

AI-written first lines

Claude writes an opening line for each prospect that refers to something on their site; personalization can be switched on or off per sequence step.

Inbox rotation and warmup

Sends go round-robin across your connected Gmail, Google Workspace, Microsoft 365 or SMTP inboxes, with daily caps per inbox, automatic warmup and unsubscribe headers.

Reply inbox

Replies land in one inbox, sorted as interested, not interested, out of office or bounce. AI sorting of replies comes with Agency.

Link placement tracking

Set a target URL and ColdSEO scans the sites of prospects who replied for a backlink to it, so each campaign shows the links it earned.

Sequence templates

Ready-made sequences for guest posts, broken links and resource pages, or your own multi-step sequence.

Pitchbox

Prospecting

Search by topic, keywords, competitor sites or advanced search operators, filter by SEO metrics, and get sites back with contact details found and verified.

AI personalization and replies

AI reads each prospect's site to draft a personal pitch, and an AI Reply Agent can answer and negotiate replies. Both are on every plan.

Email sequences

Multi-step follow-ups with conditional templates, holiday scheduling and one-click unsubscribe. Rotating sends across mailboxes starts at Advanced.

Deliverability monitoring

From Advanced, a built-in MXRight service scores each mailbox daily and watches more than 80 blacklists.

Link partner CRM and inbox

One inbox for every mailbox and client, with follow-up reminders, out-of-office detection that snoozes a thread, tasks and pipeline stages.

Link monitoring and reports

Checks won links are live, indexed by Google and pointing at a healthy page: 1,000 to 10,000 links by plan, with white-label client reports.

ColdSEO

• Free$0

  1 inbox, 1 active campaign, and 100 sends, 50 prospect credits and 25 AI personalizations a month.

• Pro$63

  per month for 5,000 sends, billed annually ($79 billed monthly)

  5 inboxes, 10 active campaigns, 2,000 prospect credits and 1,000 AI personalizations a month, the warmup engine and full reply detection.

• Agency$159

  per month for 25,000 sends, billed annually ($199 billed monthly)

  25 inboxes, 5 seats, unlimited campaigns, 10,000 prospect credits and 5,000 AI personalizations a month, AI reply sorting, the API and white-label exports.

Pitchbox

• Pro$210

  per month, billed annually ($300 billed monthly)

  2 users, 2 email accounts, 2,000 outreach emails and 25 campaigns a month, 1 workspace and 1,000 links monitored.

• Advanced$420

  per month, billed annually ($600 billed monthly)

  Unlimited users, 6 email accounts, 5,000 emails a month, 25 workspaces, email rotation, deliverability monitoring, Slack and the API.

• Scale$825

  per month, billed annually ($1,200 billed monthly)

  Unlimited users, 20 email accounts, 25,000 emails a month, unlimited workspaces and campaigns, approval workflow and Looker Studio.

• Enterprise PlatformCustom

  For large companies: single sign-on, a service level agreement, vendor security review, private training and dedicated support.

ColdSEO

• Annual discount

  Save 20% with annual billing

  ColdSEO's pricing page lists annual billing at 20% off: Pro is $63 a month ($758 a year) instead of $79 billed monthly.

Pitchbox

• Annual discount

  Save 30% with annual billing

  Pitchbox's pricing page says annual billing saves 30% against monthly payments: Pro is $210 a month instead of $300.