Apollo.io Alternative

Just the data.
Not the sales platform.

Apollo bundles enrichment with a prospecting database, a CRM, email sequences, a dialer, and analytics, priced per seat. If you only need the contact data, you're paying for a platform to use one endpoint. PeopleDB is that endpoint.

Get 10 free credits → No card required.

Apollo vs. PeopleDB

	Apollo.io	PeopleDB
Product shape	Sales platform: database, sequences, dialer	API
Pricing model	Per seat + credit allowances	Pay per lookup, 15¢ down to 6¢
Enrichment API key	Self-serve; Master key + work-email account	Self-serve, any account
Phone number cost	+8 credits when a mobile is returned	Included in the lookup
Credits	Monthly allowances per plan	Never expire
LinkedIn lookup	Yes	Yes
GitHub lookup	No	Yes
Prospecting / search	Yes, that's the product	No
Free tier	Yes, with export caps	10 credits, no card
Built for	Sales teams	Developers

Apollo details verified from their public API documentation on August 27, 2026; seat prices render client-side on their pricing page and run roughly $49 to $149 per user per month per third-party pricing guides. Numbers drift; check their site.

Using Apollo just for the enrichment API?

Apollo's API is real and publicly documented, and if you're already paying for the platform it's a reasonable thing to use. Buying Apollo only for enrichment is where the math gets strange. Person enrichment requires a Master API key on an account registered with a work email. The credit model bills 1 credit for a base enrichment and 8 more when a mobile number comes back, so phone-heavy workloads burn allowances quickly. And the allowance itself is tied to per-seat plans built for salespeople, not for a cron job.

PeopleDB prices the same operation as one flat lookup: emails, phone numbers, and social handles in a single response, one credit, only charged when at least one email is found. The API reference is public and pricing is published per lookup, not per seat.

When PeopleDB makes more sense

Enrichment is a backend job, not a seat

If the "user" of your enrichment is a worker process, seat pricing is a category error. PeopleDB's key is shared, billing follows volume, and there's no platform login anyone needs to occupy.

Your volume is bursty

Monthly credit allowances punish uneven usage twice: unused credits vanish at reset, and a heavy month hits the ceiling. Prepaid credits that never expire fit batch workloads: buy once, drain the pool at whatever rhythm your pipeline runs.

Your identifiers include GitHub

Apollo's inputs revolve around names, companies, and LinkedIn. If your pipeline starts from GitHub logins or IDs (developer tools, open source outreach), PeopleDB resolves those directly. Here's why that's harder than it sounds.

When Apollo is the better fit

If you need to find people, not just resolve them, Apollo's prospecting database is the product to beat, and having sequences and a dialer in the same tool genuinely matters for a sales team's workflow. PeopleDB has no discovery at all. Plenty of teams run both: Apollo for the humans doing outbound, PeopleDB for the pipelines doing enrichment.

The API

GET /api/v1/people

# Enrichment as a pipeline step: a column of identifiers in, contacts out
xargs -a linkedin_ids.txt -I{} \
  curl "https://peopledb.co/api/v1/people?linkedin_id={}" \
    -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN"

// ← one record per identifier, phones included, no seat involved
{
  "linkedin_id": "…",
  "email_addresses": ["…"],
  "personal_email_addresses": ["…"],
  "work_email_addresses": ["…"],
  "phone_numbers": ["…"]
}

Common questions

Does Apollo have an enrichment API?

Yes, publicly documented with self-serve keys. Two caveats from their docs: person enrichment requires a Master API key on an account registered with a work email, and a returned mobile number costs 8 additional credits on top of the 1-credit base (verified August 27, 2026).

What's the core difference from PeopleDB?

Apollo is a full outbound platform: prospecting database, sequences, dialer, analytics, priced per seat with credit allowances. PeopleDB is only the enrichment layer, billed per successful lookup with credits that never expire.

Can I use PeopleDB alongside Apollo?

Yes, and it's a common setup: Apollo for the humans doing prospecting and sequencing, PeopleDB for the pipelines doing enrichment, where phones don't cost extra credits. Nothing to migrate; it's one endpoint with 10 free credits.

What does PeopleDB not do?

Discovery and outreach. No prospecting database, no filters, no sequences, no dialer. You bring an identifier; it returns the contact record.

Pricing

100 credits — $15 (15¢ / lookup)

500 credits — $60 (12¢ / lookup)

2,000 credits — $200 (10¢ / lookup)

10,000 credits — $750 (7.5¢ / lookup)

50,000 credits — $3,000 (6¢ / lookup)

Get started → 10 free credits. No card required.

Comparing more tools? See the Apollo alternatives round-up, or the head-to-heads: vs. ContactOut, vs. Clearbit, and vs. Hunter.

Just the data.Not the sales platform.