Profound vs Semrush (2026): which should you pick?

Pick Profound if

• Fits if you're a large brand that wants answers tracked on up to 9 engines and can sign a custom contract
• Works for agencies running pitch audits for prospects, at $99 a month for 10 short workspaces

Look elsewhere if

• Skip it if you want to sign up and pay without a sales call, as brands can't
• Pricey if you're an agency with several clients, at $399 a month per client workspace on top of $99
• Tight if you want to test your own questions, since the trial's prompts are fixed
• Watch out: custom prompts, the API, exports and SSO all come only with Enterprise
• Watch out: agents spend credits, and extra credits need an Enterprise package with overage billing or a pause

Pick Semrush if

• Fits if you want research, rank tracking and audits in one account and can pay $117.33 a month or more
• Works for agencies that need keyword data for many countries and compare client sites with competitors

Look elsewhere if

• Pricey if you're one person with one site, at $117.33 a month even yearly, and the trial checks your card with a small charge
• Tight if your team is more than just you, since every extra user is from $45 a month
• Skip it if AI answer tracking is the point, as the SEO plan leaves it out and Starter is $165.17 a month
• Watch out: the API and share of voice need the custom-priced Advanced plan, and scheduled PDF reports are $10 to $20 a month extra
• Watch out: local, content, social and ad tools are separate toolkits with their own prices, and the free plan allows 10 reports a day

Profound

• Brands have no self-serve paid plan: after the 7-day trial, ongoing tracking needs a custom-priced Enterprise contract.
• Trial users get a recommended prompt set and cannot edit it; custom prompts, API access, exports and SSO come with Enterprise.
• On Agency Growth, each full client workspace is a $399-a-month add-on and 5 more trial workspaces cost $199 a month.
• Agent runs use credits; extra credits beyond the plan need an Enterprise package, with overage billing or a pause set by the account team.

Semrush

• Each plan includes one user; extra users start at $45 a month each, priced by plan level.
• Scheduled PDF reports are an add-on at $10 a month, or $20 with white-labeling; Advanced includes reporting.
• API access and share of voice come only with the custom-priced Advanced plan.
• Local, content, social, advertising, AI PR and traffic tools are separate toolkits with their own prices.

Profound

Answer Engine Insights

Runs set prompts daily and reports where a brand appears in the answers, which sources are cited, sentiment and how it ranks against competitors.

Wide engine coverage

Enterprise can track ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Mode, Gemini, Microsoft Copilot, DeepSeek, Claude, Google AI Overviews and Exa Search.

AI Marketer and agents

An assistant that finds gaps in AI answers and drafts or rewrites pages, plus reusable agents for recurring work. Agents run on credits.

Agent Analytics

Tracks AI crawler visits and AI-referred traffic across unlimited domains by connecting to CDNs and hosts such as Cloudflare, Fastly, AWS and Vercel.

Prompt Volumes

Estimates what people ask AI answer engines about a topic; the trial allows 5 searches.

Agency workspaces

Agency plans manage short pitch workspaces for prospects and full client workspaces from one dashboard with consolidated billing.

Semrush

Keyword research

Look up search volume, difficulty and intent from a database Semrush puts at 29 billion keywords across 142 country databases.

Competitor and backlink analysis

See which keywords and pages bring a rival site its traffic, and inspect any domain's backlink profile.

Position Tracking

Track daily rankings for 500 to 5,000+ keywords depending on the plan; Pro+ adds tracking by location and device.

Site Audit

Crawl your sites for technical SEO problems. From the Starter plan the audit also checks how ready a site is for AI search.

AI visibility tracking

Starter and above track daily whether set prompts in AI chat tools mention your brand, with sentiment monitoring. The SEO plan has none of this.

MCP and API access

Starter and above can query Semrush data from AI assistants through MCP; the API itself comes with the Advanced plan.

Profound

• Agency Growth$99

  per month for up to 10 pitch workspaces a month

  For agencies: 10 seven-day pitch audits a month on ChatGPT, Perplexity and AI Overviews, 5 agency seats. Each full client workspace is $399 a month extra.

• EnterpriseCustom

  For brands: tailored prompt tracking on up to 9 answer engines, AI Marketer credits, all-time history, CSV and JSON exports, API, SSO and dedicated support.

• Agency EnterpriseCustom

  For large agencies and networks: tailored client and trial workspaces, a dedicated agency partner, go-to-market help and Slack support.

Semrush

• Free$0

  1 project, 10 analytics reports a day and 10 tracked keywords, for trying the tools.

• SEO$117.33

  per month, billed annually ($139 billed monthly)

  1 user, 5 websites, 500 keywords tracked daily, basic keyword and competitor research, and Site Audit. No AI search tracking.

• Starter$165.17

  per month, billed annually ($199 billed monthly)

  5 websites and 500 keywords, full keyword research tools, MCP access, 50 AI prompts tracked daily and 300 AI visibility reports a day.

• Pro+$248.17

  per month, billed annually ($299 billed monthly)

  15 websites, 1,500 keywords, historical data, content optimization, cannibalization checks, multi-location tracking and 100 AI prompts.

• AdvancedCustom

  40+ websites, 5,000+ keywords, share of voice, API access, team users, reporting and unlimited AI prompts. Sold after a demo.

Profound

No public discounts listed.

Semrush

• Annual discount

  Save up to 17% with annual billing

  Semrush's pricing page lists annual billing at up to 17% less: Starter is $165.17 a month billed annually instead of $199 billed monthly.