Otterly.AI alternatives: cheaper engines, more prompts, or answers on demand

Otterly.AI is the budget way into AI visibility tracking: $29 a month buys 15 prompts across ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Perplexity and Microsoft Copilot, checked once a day. The reasons people start looking elsewhere are just as specific. The engines you want most, Claude, Gemini and Google AI Mode, are paid add-ons that can double the bill. Fifteen or even a hundred prompts run out fast once you track competitors too. And nothing in Otterly runs a prompt on demand: new prompts join tomorrow's daily cycle.

This guide compares five alternatives on exactly those points. Peec AI and Rankscale are dashboards with different quotas and engine bundles, Scrunch has the largest prompt allowance, Citesurf is the other sub-$30 option, and Cite42 is a pay-per-call API and MCP server for teams that want an answer now. Cite42 publishes this guide. We checked every vendor's pricing and documentation pages on November 5, 2026, and did not run paid tests through the other products.

The best Otterly.AI alternatives for different jobs

• Peec AI: 50 prompts for $95 with Gemini, AI Mode and Copilot included rather than sold as add-ons, plus an MCP server on every plan.
• Rankscale: 17 or more engines, including Claude and Perplexity, from $20 a month on an annual plan.
• Cite42: run any prompt now across ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity and Google AI Overviews from code or an MCP client, with no plan at all.
• Scrunch: 350 custom prompts and 1,000 industry prompts for $300, with Claude and Perplexity in every plan.
• Citesurf: a $29 scorecard across ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity and Claude that chooses its own questions.

Comparison at a glance

All prices are the vendors' published monthly figures before tax. Annual billing takes 15% off at Otterly and 17% off at Scrunch; Rankscale's $20 plan is sold yearly only.

What Otterly does well, and where the bill grows

Otterly's strengths are real: unlimited brands, competitors, countries and seats on every plan, Perplexity included where Peec charges Enterprise prices, a public API and MCP server from the Standard plan, and a seven-day trial with no card. It collects answers from the public websites of the AI tools, except Claude, which it reads through the API, and every tracked prompt runs daily.

The costs are in the add-ons and the meters. Claude costs $29, $109 or $439 a month by plan, Gemini and AI Mode $9, $59 or $149 each, and an extra 100 prompts $99, so a Premium account with every engine passes $1,000 a month. API and MCP calls are capped at 2,000 a month on Standard and 5,000 on Premium, and both return stored monitoring data rather than a fresh answer. Reviews mention a sentiment classifier that is "oversensitive" and waits of hours or days before edited prompts show new results. If one of those is your problem, here is where each alternative helps.

Peec AI: six engines included, with a daily cycle

Peec AI is the closest substitute at the next price point. Starter is $95 a month for 50 prompts, Pro $245 for 150, Advanced $495 for 350, each with unlimited seats, daily tracking and an MCP server, and the API from Pro. The engine list on every self-serve plan is ChatGPT, Google AI Mode, AI Overviews, Microsoft Copilot, Gemini and Naver AI, so the two engines Otterly sells as add-ons, Gemini and AI Mode, are included. Each project runs three of them at a time, and Starter tracks one country.

Peec collects by scraping the consumer apps as a logged-out user. Its weak spot against Otterly is coverage of the two engines Otterly includes: Perplexity has moved to Enterprise on the pricing page, and Claude is Enterprise only.

Pros

• Gemini and AI Mode included; MCP on every plan.
• A more complete sources view per answer and suggested prompts with search volumes.

Cons

• Perplexity and Claude need an Enterprise quote.
• 50 prompts on Starter is more than Otterly Lite but costs three times as much; three active models per project.

Rankscale: the most engines for the least money

Rankscale, from Vienna, sells credits rather than prompts. Essentials is $20 a month billed yearly for 120 credits, which the vendor says is about 480 engine answers a month; Pro is $99 for 1,200 credits, about 4,800 answers; Pro+ at $229 adds REST API access. Each engine answer costs about a quarter of a credit, and search terms are unlimited, so you decide how to spend the budget across prompts and engines. The engine list is the longest here: Google AI Overviews and AI Mode, ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Claude, Copilot, DeepSeek, Grok, Mistral and Meta's Muse Spark among 17 or more. MCP is included on every plan.

The caveats are maturity and transparency. Rankscale does not say how it collects answers, its REST API is not publicly documented, and G2 lists one or two reviews. For a small team that mainly wants Claude and Perplexity on a dashboard for under $100, it is still the cheapest way to get them.

Pros

• Claude, Perplexity, Grok and DeepSeek on a $20 or $99 plan.
• Credits roll over on Pro and above; MCP everywhere.

Cons

• Collection method and API output are not documented; few independent reviews.
• The $20 plan is yearly only, with no team workspaces.

Cite42: answers on demand, billed per call

Cite42 is not a dashboard. It is a pay-per-call API and MCP server: send a prompt and a list of brands, choose any of ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity and Google AI Overviews, and in a few seconds get back which brands each answer mentioned, in what order, and which sources it cited. ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini are queried through their official APIs with web search on, Perplexity through its own search, and AI Overviews from live Google results. The response records how each tool was queried in a measurement block, and trackers can opt into a capture of the ChatGPT app itself.

Billing is the opposite of Otterly's plans. You top up a balance (minimum $25.00) that never expires and pay only for successful calls, from $0.01 per AI tool: $0.05 for a ChatGPT-only check, $0.06 for Claude, $0.20 for all five. A verified signup includes $1.00 of credit. A tracker reruns up to 30 prompts weekly or monthly and keeps the history: Otterly Lite's 15 prompts on three tools once a week comes to about $8.45 a month this way, with Claude available at any time for $0.06 a check instead of a $29 add-on.

curl --fail-with-body https://www.cite42.dev/api/v1/rankings \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $CITE42_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "query": "Which AI visibility tools cover Claude as well as ChatGPT?",
    "competitors": ["Otterly", "Peec AI", "Rankscale", "Scrunch", "Cite42"],
    "models": ["chatgpt", "claude", "perplexity"]
  }'

Pros

• Claude and Perplexity on every call, with no add-on and no plan.
• Runs a prompt the moment you ask, from code or from Claude, ChatGPT, Codex and Cursor over MCP.
• Pay only for what runs; a 20-prompt audit costs a few dollars.

Cons

• No charts; results live in your MCP client, your code or the tracker report.
• Measures the models through their APIs rather than the consumer apps, apart from the opt-in ChatGPT app capture.
• No Copilot or AI Mode.

Scrunch: the biggest prompt allowance

If prompts are what you run out of, Scrunch's Starter plan is $300 a month ($250 billed annually) for 350 custom prompts, 1,000 industry prompts, 3 users and 5 page audits, and Growth is $500 ($417 annually) for 700 custom prompts. Every plan covers ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity, Google AI Mode and AI Overviews and Meta AI, so none of Otterly's add-ons apply. Scrunch collects "using a mix of browser automation and official platform APIs"; new prompts run daily for two weeks and then every 72 hours by default. The REST API is limited to Agency and Enterprise plans, but the MCP server works on any plan. Sitecore acquired Scrunch in June 2026.

Pros

• 350 prompts with Claude and Perplexity included for the price of Otterly's 100-prompt plan plus two add-ons.
• Site audits, AI bot traffic from your CDN and agent pages come with it.

Cons

• Refresh slows to every 72 hours after the first two weeks.
• The REST API needs Agency or Enterprise, and some of Scrunch's own FAQ pages still show older plan names.

Citesurf: a $29 scorecard across four engines

Citesurf is the other $29 option. You enter a brand and website, it generates a question set for your market, and it scores visibility across ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity and Claude, rescanning every three days. Plus is $29 a month for one brand, Max $99 for five, both with a REST API and an MCP server, and the first scan is free. It is a small, new product with no independent reviews yet, and you cannot choose the prompts yourself, so treat it as a scorecard rather than a tracker.

Which alternative fits which problem

• The add-ons are what hurt. Peec includes Gemini and AI Mode; Scrunch and Rankscale include Claude and Perplexity too; Cite42 charges $0.06 per Claude check with no plan.
• You need more prompts. Scrunch at 350, or a Cite42 tracker where each prompt is simply one billed call per tool per run.
• You want an answer now, from your own code or an AI assistant. Cite42 is the only tool here that runs a prompt on demand; the others return stored monitoring data.
• You want the cheapest multi-engine dashboard. Rankscale at $20 a month on an annual plan, with the caveats above.
• You want a scorecard without choosing prompts. Citesurf.

Frequently asked questions

What is the cheapest alternative to Otterly.AI?

Rankscale's Essentials plan is $20 a month billed yearly and covers 17 or more engines, including Claude and Perplexity. Citesurf is $29 for one brand across four engines. Cite42 has no subscription at all: a brand check across ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity and Google AI Overviews costs $0.20, top-ups start at $25.00 and the balance never expires.

Which Otterly alternatives include Claude without an add-on?

Scrunch, Rankscale and Citesurf include Claude in every plan. Cite42 queries Claude through the official API for $0.06 a check. Peec AI lists Claude under Enterprise only.

Does Otterly.AI have an API?

Yes, from the $189 Standard plan, metered at 2,000 requests a month (5,000 on Premium), alongside an MCP server. Both return the data Otterly has already collected. Cite42's API runs a new prompt when you call it and bills per call.

Can I check AI visibility from Claude or ChatGPT instead of a dashboard?

Yes. Cite42's hosted MCP server at https://mcp.cite42.dev gives Claude, ChatGPT, Codex and Cursor the same tools as its REST API, billed per call. Peec, Scrunch, Rankscale and Otterly also run MCP servers that read their stored monitoring data.

Run your Otterly prompts somewhere else first

Export the prompts you track, pick five that matter, and run them on the tools you are missing. A free Cite42 account comes with $1.00 of starter credit, enough for several five-tool checks from the dashboard or your MCP client. The AI visibility tools guide covers the dashboards in depth and the tool pricing guide compares monthly plans with pay per check.