cite0 vs Profound: the enterprise instrument and the local one
Until September 2026 Profound sold a $99 Starter and a $399 Growth plan, and at $99 cite0 tracked twice the prompts. Those plans are gone: Profound’s public entry is now a free 7-day trial — 50 prompts a day on ChatGPT, Gemini and Google AI Overviews, no exports — followed by an Enterprise quote. cite0 remains $99 for 105 questions, neighbourhood-targeted, with the Google profile, website and copy fixed from $199. Profound is the serious choice for a multi-market brand with a team and a budget. For one business at one address it is no longer a like-for-like comparison, and we say so.
USD. Month to month, or commit to a year and save 20% — 25% if you pay for the year up front. Every plan starts with a free 7-day demo and takes no card. See pricing.
cite0 and Profound, capability by capability
| Capability | cite0 | Profound |
|---|---|---|
| Entry | $99/mo — 105 questions | Free 7-day trial — 50 prompts daily, no exports |
| Ongoing price | $99 / $199 / $499, published | Enterprise, quoted; self-serve $99 and $399 plans withdrawn Sept 2026 |
| Engines | ChatGPT; + AI Overviews at $199; + Gemini at $499 | Trial: ChatGPT, Gemini, AI Overviews. Enterprise: nine, incl. Perplexity, AI Mode, Copilot, Claude, DeepSeek |
| Geographic targeting | Neighbourhood and market level | One region per plan; city level on Enterprise by arrangement |
| Question set | Pre-run pack for your category and market, plus your own | Custom prompts on Enterprise; fixed set on trial |
| Competitor set | Derived from the businesses AI actually names | You supply the list |
| Sentiment and citation tracking | Included every tier | Included |
| AI crawler analytics from server logs | From $199 | Included |
| Prompt volume history | Modelled demand per question, method published | All-time on Enterprise; none on trial |
| Exports and API | Included | Enterprise only (CSV, JSON, API) |
| SSO, SOC 2, dedicated support | Not offered | Enterprise |
| Google Business Profile audit or writes | Yes, from $199 | Not offered |
| Website AEO audit | Full audit, scored, with every fix rendered | Yes — bot view, page speed, readability |
| Fixes implemented for you | Included from $199 | Not offered |
| Content scoring weights published | Yes — nine checks summing to 100 | Dimensions named, weights not published |
| Built for | Single-location local service businesses | Enterprise and mid-market brands, agencies |
What changed in September 2026, and why it matters
When we first compared the two on 25 August 2026 the honest headline was “same $99 entry, cite0 tracks twice the prompts”. Profound has since removed the $99 Starter and $399 Growth plans from its pricing page. The products it still sells — a free trial and an enterprise contract — are a clear statement of who it is for, and it is not a single med spa in North York. We have left the row in the table because readers will still find the old prices quoted on third-party sites.
Where Profound is the better buy
- You are a brand across many markets. Nine engines, region segments, all-time prompt-volume history, and an API to feed it all into your own reporting. cite0 has none of that scale.
- You have compliance requirements. SSO, SOC 2, a dedicated specialist with an SLA. cite0 is a small Toronto company and does not offer them.
- You need Perplexity, Claude, Copilot or DeepSeek. Profound covers them; cite0 does not.
Where cite0 is the better buy
- You want a published price. $99, $199 or $499 a month, no sales call, free 7-day demo without a card.
- You have one address. cite0 runs the questions from your neighbourhood and derives your competitor set from who AI actually names there. Profound’s unit is the region, and you type the competitors in.
- You want the work done. From $199 cite0 writes to your Google profile, renders every website fix and scores your copy against published weights. Profound measures and reports; implementation is yours to arrange.
How much does Profound cost in 2026?
Profound no longer publishes a self-serve price. The pricing page lists a free 7-day trial (50 prompts daily across three engines, no exports) and a custom-quoted Enterprise plan with nine engines, CSV and JSON exports, API access and SSO. An agency plan is referenced at 400 credits per client workspace without a public price. The $99 Starter and $399 Growth plans were withdrawn in September 2026.
Is Profound overkill for a single-location business?
Usually. Profound answers how a brand appears across many markets and many engines, with the exports, API and compliance an enterprise team needs. A single business needs to know whether it is named when someone in its own neighbourhood asks, and what to fix. That is a smaller question, and paying enterprise rates to answer it is the mismatch.
Does cite0 track as many AI engines as Profound?
No. Profound covers nine engines on Enterprise, including Perplexity, Copilot, Claude, DeepSeek and Google AI Mode. cite0 covers ChatGPT at $99, Google AI Overviews from $199 and Gemini from $499. If engine breadth is the requirement, Profound wins it outright.
We will run your questions before you pay anything. Book a demo and we will show you what AI currently says when someone asks for a business like yours in your neighbourhood — including who it names instead of you.
Book a demoCompetitor figures were read from each vendor’s own public pricing, product and documentation pages on 15 October 2026, and from a dated third-party source only where the vendor’s page no longer prints a number — each such case is marked in the sources. Prices are in USD unless noted and may have changed since. cite0 figures are the live tier catalogue. We do not place ourselves first by default, we link to every competitor, and where a competitor is the better fit we say so.
- Profound — Pricing. Free 7-day trial: 50 prompts daily across ChatGPT, Gemini and Google AI Overviews, no exports. Enterprise: custom quote, nine engines, CSV/JSON exports, API, SSO. An Agency Growth plan is referenced in the FAQ at 400 credits per client workspace with no public price. The $99 Starter and $399 Growth plans we compared against on 25 August 2026 are no longer on the page; a competitor’s dated write-up places the withdrawal in mid-September 2026. Read 15 October 2026.
- cite0 — Where our search numbers come from, and what they don’t tell you.