What is the best AthenaHQ alternative?

Cituna. It tracks all 7 AI engines, writes the fix for every gap, shows which AI crawlers read your pages and publishes to your CMS, from $49 a month, well under AthenaHQ's $295. By need: Promptwatch for MCP and API on a $95 plan, Scrunch for a content layer at larger brands from $250, Otterly.AI for a $29 entry, Peec AI for unlimited users from $95, Rankscale for more than 17 engines, the Semrush toolkit or Ahrefs Brand Radar for teams in those suites, and SE Visible for 200 prompts at $99.

How much does AthenaHQ cost?

On its plans page, read 24 September 2026, Essential is free with $25 of credit, Starter is $295 a month on monthly billing or $245 a month on annual billing for 3,600 credits, and Enterprise is custom. A web search on 20 October 2026 showed the same Starter price.

Is there a cheaper AthenaHQ alternative with content features?

Yes. Cituna writes fixes and articles from $49 a month, Promptwatch adds AEO articles on its $245 Professional plan, and Scrunch lists content generation from $250. Otterly.AI ($29) and Peec AI ($95) give recommendations rather than written content.

Does AthenaHQ have an MCP server?

Its published plans list no MCP integration (athenahq.ai/plans, read 1 October 2026), and API access is a paid add-on on Starter, priced on request. Cituna includes MCP read tools from $49, Promptwatch includes MCP and API on its $95 Essential plan, Peec AI includes MCP on its paid plans, and Rankscale lists MCP on every plan.

Which AthenaHQ alternative tracks Claude and Grok?

AthenaHQ Starter includes both among its 11 models. Below $295, Cituna checks both daily from $49, Rankscale includes both on credits from $99, and Promptwatch lets you pick them among its four models at $95. Peec AI keeps them for Enterprise, and Otterly.AI sells Claude as an add-on and no Grok.

Can I keep AthenaHQ's free plan and add another tool?

Yes. Essential is a standing free plan rather than a timed trial, so you can keep it for a free read on five engines and pay for a second tool that tracks their own prompts daily or writes the fixes.

Who publishes this comparison?

The Rank Master editorial team. Every rival price links to the vendor's own page with the date it was read, and the ranking rules are set out under How we chose.

9 Best AthenaHQ Alternatives in 2026, All Under $295

The best AthenaHQ alternative for a B2B team that wants its content work done for it, not only suggested, is Cituna: it tracks all 7 AI engines, writes the fix for every gap, shows which AI crawlers read your pages and publishes to your CMS, from $49 a month, where AthenaHQ's paid plan starts at $295. Every tool below has an entry plan under that $295. For other needs: Promptwatch puts MCP and API access on a $95 plan, and Scrunch adds content generation and site audits from $250 for larger brands. Otterly.AI is the lowest monthly-billed entry here at $29. Peec AI gives unlimited users from $95, and Rankscale tracks more than 17 engines from $99 a month on monthly billing. The Semrush toolkit ($99) and Ahrefs Brand Radar (from $50 for custom prompts) fit teams already in those suites, and SE Visible reports on 200 prompts for $99.

Prices and limits are taken from each vendor's own pages as recorded between 24 September and 22 October 2026, with AthenaHQ's Starter price checked again on 20 October 2026. A tool tells you where you stand. If you want a team to get your product found in Google and recommended by the seven AI engines buyers now ask first, with published pricing and no annual lock-in, book a 30-minute call.

The 9 against AthenaHQ Starter

"Below AthenaHQ" is $295 minus the entry price, both on monthly billing. It is a sticker difference, not a like-for-like saving, because credits, prompts and models differ.

#	Tool	Best for	Entry plan (billed monthly)	Below AthenaHQ	Engines or models on it	Free plan or trial	Read
1	Cituna	Fixes and articles written for you	Starter, $49/month	$246	7, daily	3-day trial, card required	22 Oct 2026
2	Promptwatch	MCP and API on the first plan	Essential, $95/month	$200	4 models you choose	7-day free trial	8 Oct 2026
3	Scrunch	A content layer for larger brands	Core, $250/month	$45	4	7-day trial of Core	24 Sep 2026
4	Otterly.AI	The lowest monthly bill	Lite, $29/month	$266	4, 3 more as add-ons	Free trial, length not stated	24 Sep 2026
5	Peec AI	A seat for the whole team	Starter, $95/month	$200	3 of your choice	Free trial, length not stated	17 Oct 2026
6	Rankscale	More models than AthenaHQ	Pro, $99/month	$196	More than 17, on credits	7-day trial of Pro	17 Oct 2026
7	Semrush AI Visibility Toolkit	Teams already on Semrush	$99/month	$196	4	No free trial of the toolkit	24 Sep 2026
8	Ahrefs Brand Radar	Benchmarking without setup	Custom prompts, from $50/month	$245	6, plus Claude on custom prompts	No free trial	24 Sep 2026
9	SE Visible	Marketing and PR reporting	Basic, $99/month	$196	5	10-day free trial	24 Sep 2026
-	AthenaHQ (baseline)	A free plan, then 11 models	Starter, $295/month	-	11 models	Free Essential plan	24 Sep 2026

Why teams look for an AthenaHQ alternative

AthenaHQ is a good platform with a real free plan. The reasons buyers keep looking sit in the step above it:

Nothing between $0 and $295. The free Essential plan is followed directly by a $295 Starter, so a team whose budget lives in the low hundreds has no middle tier to buy.
Credits are hard to budget. One credit is one AI response. By our arithmetic, Starter's 3,600 credits a month cover about 11 prompts a day when each runs on all 11 models, so a longer prompt list means fewer models or fewer checks.
Extras are priced on request. API access and extra credits are add-ons on Starter, without a published price.
No MCP integration is listed. Its published plans, read on 1 October 2026, name no MCP server, so a team that wants its visibility data in Claude or Cursor needs another route.
Regions and languages are Enterprise. A SaaS company selling into several markets meets that limit early.

AthenaHQ, the baseline

AthenaHQ tracks how a brand appears in AI search and then tells you what to change. Its paid plan reaches a long list of models (ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews and AI Mode, Gemini, Claude, Copilot, Grok, DeepSeek, Meta AI and Mistral), and it bills usage in credits. What sets it apart is the layer after tracking: content recommendations, on-page and off-page actions, a content optimisation agent, and Google Analytics and Search Console integrations.

Its plans page, read 24 September 2026, listed:

Essential (free): $25 of credit, which is 300 credits, on ChatGPT, Perplexity, AI Overviews, Gemini and Copilot, with unlimited members. The page does not say whether the credit renews.
Starter: $295 a month on monthly billing, or $245 a month on annual billing, for 3,600 credits a month across 11 models, with CSV export and the content optimisation agent.
Enterprise: custom, and the only plan with tracking in several regions and languages.

A web search on 20 October 2026 returned the same $295 price for 3,600 credits.

How we chose these 9

This is a desk review of published pages, not a hands-on test, and it gives no scores. It draws on the AI visibility tools whose pricing pages this site recorded between 24 September and 22 October 2026.

The bar. A tool is on the list when three things hold:

Its pages say it tracks a brand's mentions or citations in at least three AI answer engines.
It publishes the price of a plan a team can buy without a sales call.
That entry plan costs less than AthenaHQ Starter's $295 a month on monthly billing.

Ten tools besides AthenaHQ were checked. Profound fails the second test, since its brand pricing after a 7-day trial is Enterprise by quote. That leaves nine.

The order. AthenaHQ's case rests on what it does after measuring, so we sorted on the same thing:

Writes or generates content: the tool's pages name written fixes, articles or content generation. Cituna, Promptwatch and Scrunch.
Recommends or audits: the pages name recommendations, a gap analysis or a site audit, but not written content. Otterly.AI, Peec AI, Rankscale and the Semrush toolkit.
Reports: tracking and benchmarking, without a named action layer. Ahrefs Brand Radar and SE Visible.

Inside each group, the lower monthly-billed entry price goes first. Rankscale counts at $99 for Pro, since its $17 Essentials plan is billed yearly only, and it sits ahead of the Semrush toolkit at the same price because it lists more engines. How this site treats rival claims is set out in our guide to SaaS alternatives and comparison pages.

1. Cituna: best for content written for you at a fraction of $295

Cituna puts the buyer questions for a market to seven engines each day (ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Claude, Grok, Google AI Overviews and Google AI Mode) and records the brands named and the pages cited in every answer. The difference from AthenaHQ's agent is that Cituna writes the change itself: schema, FAQ markup, an llms.txt file or a full article for each gap, ready to publish to WordPress, Shopify, Sanity, GitHub or any CMS by signed webhook. It reads its results next to Search Console data, and its MCP server gives Claude or another agent 22 read tools from Starter and 9 write tools on Pro.

Best for: a team that chose AthenaHQ for its content layer but wants the content written and a far lower monthly price.
What it costs (read 22 October 2026): Starter is $49 a month on monthly billing for 1 brand, 10 buyer prompts on all seven engines, 30 AI-written articles a month and read-only API and MCP access. Pro is $119 a month for 3 brands, 30 prompts, alerts, competitor tracking and MCP write tools. Max is $399 a month for 10 brands and 90 prompts. A 3-day trial needs a card, becomes Starter unless cancelled, and does not include MCP.
Where it falls short: it covers 7 engines to AthenaHQ's 11 and does not track Microsoft Copilot. There is no free plan to match AthenaHQ's Essential, competitor tracking starts on Pro, and a part month is not refunded on cancelling.

Start the Cituna free trial to see which engines name you.

Source: Cituna pricing and MCP page, read 22 October 2026.

2. Promptwatch: best for MCP and API access on a $95 plan

Promptwatch tracks four models you choose from OpenAI, Perplexity, Google, Claude, Gemini, Meta, DeepSeek and Grok, checked daily, on a flat fee rather than credits. Its first plan includes an MCP server and the API access AthenaHQ sells as an add-on, and its integrations list Google Search Console. Its Professional plan, at $245 and still under AthenaHQ's $295, adds AEO articles and Agent Analytics for AI crawler visits.

Best for: a team that wants AthenaHQ's Claude and Grok coverage without credits, and its data in Claude, Cursor or a script from the first month.
What it costs (read 1 October 2026, plan contents re-read 8 October 2026): Essential is $95 a month for 50 prompts and 6,000 responses on 4 models in one project, with a 7-day free trial. Professional is $245 for 150 prompts. Business is $579, sold through a demo.
Where it falls short: four models at a time against AthenaHQ's 11, one project on Essential, and no articles below $245.

Source: Promptwatch pricing, read 1 and 8 October 2026.

3. Scrunch: best for a content layer at a larger brand

Scrunch monitors prompts, citations, competitors and sentiment in AI search and audits how AI agents read a website. Its feature list names insights and recommendations, page optimisations and content generation, which makes it the closest match here to AthenaHQ's action layer. Enterprise customers also get an Agent Experience Platform that shows AI agents an optimised version of a site while visitors see the usual pages. Scrunch says Sitecore bought it in 2026 and that it continues as a standalone platform.

Best for: mid-size and enterprise brands with several teams, and agencies, that want tracking and content work in one place.
What it costs (read 24 September 2026): Core is $250 a month for 125 prompts, 4 platforms (ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews and Copilot), 5 site audits a month, 1 brand workspace and 5 users. Agency Core is $500 a month, Enterprise is custom, and a 7-day trial of Core converts to paid unless cancelled.
Where it falls short: at $250 it is only $45 below AthenaHQ Starter and covers 4 platforms to AthenaHQ's 11. API, MCP, Looker Studio, SSO and the Agent Experience Platform are Enterprise-only, and there is no free plan. Our Scrunch AI alternatives cover the tools that put those on a first plan.

Source: Scrunch pricing, read 24 September 2026.

4. Otterly.AI: best for the lowest monthly bill

Otterly.AI runs your prompts daily on ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Perplexity and Copilot and reports mentions, cited websites and a visibility index. Its action layer is lighter than AthenaHQ's: three recommendations a week on Lite, a GEO audit for single URLs and a prompt research tool.

Best for: a small team that wants daily tracking of a handful of prompts on a monthly bill under $30.
What it costs (read 24 September 2026): Lite is $29 a month on monthly billing ($25 annual) for 15 prompts and unlimited team members. Standard is $189 ($160 annual) for 100 prompts, API and MCP access and unlimited workspaces. Premium is $489 for 400 prompts. On Lite, Google AI Mode and Gemini are add-ons from $9 a month each and Claude from $29.
Where it falls short: Gemini, Claude and AI Mode, all on AthenaHQ Starter, cost extra on every Otterly.AI plan. The trial's length is not stated and there is no free plan.

Source: Otterly.AI pricing, read 24 September 2026.

5. Peec AI: best for a seat for the whole team

Peec AI charges by the prompts it runs each day and lets you choose the models, with unlimited users on every plan. It analyses which sources AI answers cite, suggests prompts to track and runs a gap analysis that comes with recommended actions, and it reports on AI crawler visits and referrals.

Best for: an SEO or content team that wants recommendations and source analysis shared with everyone, at a third of AthenaHQ's price.
What it costs (read 17 October 2026): Starter is $95 a month on monthly billing ($80 annual) for 50 prompts on 3 models in 1 project. Pro is $245 for 150 prompts and Advanced $495 for 350. An extra model on Starter is $35 a month.
Where it falls short: Claude, Grok, DeepSeek and Mistral, all on AthenaHQ Starter, are tracked only on Peec AI's custom Enterprise plan, which also holds API access and SSO. There is no free plan.

Source: Peec AI pricing, read 17 October 2026.

6. Rankscale: best for more models than AthenaHQ

Rankscale is the one tool here with a longer engine list than AthenaHQ: more than 17, among them ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, Perplexity, Grok, DeepSeek, Mistral, Copilot, AI Overviews and AI Mode. Like AthenaHQ it bills in credits, and you set how often each prompt runs, from hourly to monthly. Page audits of any URL, citation and sentiment analysis and an MCP server are on every plan.

Best for: teams and agencies that want AthenaHQ's breadth of models at a third of the price, and are happy to manage credits.
What it costs (read 17 October 2026): Pro is $99 a month on monthly billing ($84 yearly) for 1,200 credits and 10 brand dashboards, with a 7-day trial. Essentials is $17 a month, billed yearly only ($204). Pro+ is $229, Growth $385 and Enterprise $780 a month on monthly billing.
Where it falls short: a Claude check takes 2 credits and DeepSeek 1, against 0.25 for ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity and AI Mode, so the bill depends on the engine mix. Its action layer is audits, not written content. The REST API starts on Pro+.

Source: Rankscale pricing, read 17 October 2026.

7. Semrush AI Visibility Toolkit: best for teams already on Semrush

The Semrush AI Visibility Toolkit benchmarks a brand's AI visibility against competitors, tracks chosen prompts daily on platforms such as ChatGPT and Google AI Mode, and checks whether AI crawlers can read a site. Its competitor research lists the prompts and topics where rivals are cited and you are not, which gives a team its own to-do list.

Best for: a Semrush customer that wants AI answers next to its keyword and audit data.
What it costs (read 24 September 2026): $99 a month for 25 prompts and 1 domain for Brand Performance reports. Semrush One Starter, which bundles SEO and AI visibility, is $199 a month on monthly billing with 50 daily prompts.
Where it falls short: no free trial of the toolkit, each user needs a licence, and 50 extra prompts cost $60 a month. Brand Performance reports refresh weekly.

Source: Semrush toolkit article, read 24 September 2026.

8. Ahrefs Brand Radar: best for benchmarking without setup

Ahrefs Brand Radar measures how often brands are mentioned and cited in AI answers from a database of search-backed prompts run on ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Copilot, AI Overviews and AI Mode, so any brand can be looked up without setup. Custom prompts add your own questions, Claude included, and it also reports on YouTube, TikTok and Reddit.

Best for: an established brand benchmarking share of voice, or an Ahrefs customer adding a small prompt set.
What it costs (read 24 September 2026): custom prompts from $50 a month (2,500 checks), $100 (7,000) or $250 (25,000). Brand Radar AI with the AI Visibility Index is from $199 a month. Ahrefs Lite at $129 a month includes 5 tracked AI prompts.
Where it falls short: it reports rather than recommends, so there is nothing like AthenaHQ's content agent. There is no Brand Radar trial, each Claude update uses 8 checks, and the Index re-runs monthly over a 90-day window.

Sources: Ahrefs pricing and Brand Radar, read 24 September 2026.

9. SE Visible: best for marketing and PR reporting

SE Visible is SE Ranking's AI visibility product. It runs prompts daily on ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Google AI Mode and AI Overviews, logging mentions, sentiment, competitors and the domains and URLs cited, with answers gathered through each platform's own interface. Every plan includes unlimited users.

Best for: marketing and PR teams who report on how AI answers describe a brand, and want a large prompt set for the money.
What it costs (read 24 September 2026): Basic is $99 a month on monthly billing ($79 annual) for 200 prompts and 3 projects. Core is $189 for 450 prompts and 5 projects. Plus is $355 for 1,000 prompts and 10 projects, sold through a demo. A 10-day trial is offered.
Where it falls short: Claude is listed as coming soon, and country tracking covers seven countries in five languages. Like Ahrefs, it reports rather than acting on findings.

Source: SE Visible, read 24 September 2026.

Which AthenaHQ alternative is best for a B2B SaaS team?

A SaaS team that liked AthenaHQ for its content agent usually wants two things the $295 plan does not give it: a lower bill and the content actually written. Cituna does both from $49, on seven engines including Claude, Grok and Google AI Mode, with Search Console in the same view. If the team is engineering-led and wants the data in its own tools, Promptwatch's $95 Essential plan carries MCP and an API. If breadth of models is the reason you chose AthenaHQ, Rankscale keeps more than 17 on credits from $99.

Which AthenaHQ alternative is best for agencies?

The AthenaHQ plans recorded here are Essential, Starter and Enterprise. For client work, four alternatives publish a price, and each counts clients differently: Cituna Max is $399 a month for 10 brands and 90 buyer prompts; Rankscale Growth is $385 a month with white-label dashboards and an agency programme; Scrunch Agency Core is $500 a month, listed in Scrunch's pricing FAQ; and Otterly.AI Standard is $189 a month with unlimited workspaces, so each client can sit in its own. SE Visible also keeps 3 projects on its $99 Basic plan and 10 on Plus, which suits a small roster.

What is the cheapest AthenaHQ alternative?

On monthly billing, Otterly.AI Lite at $29 for 15 prompts on four engines, then Cituna Starter at $49 for 10 prompts on seven, and Ahrefs Brand Radar custom prompts from $50. Rankscale Essentials works out at $17 a month but is billed as $204 a year. If $0 is the budget, AthenaHQ's own Essential plan remains the free option.

Which AthenaHQ alternative has an MCP server?

AthenaHQ's published plans list none. Cituna includes 22 MCP read tools from its $49 Starter plan and 9 write tools on Pro at $119, hosted at https://mcp.cituna.com/mcp or run with npx -y cituna-mcp. Promptwatch includes MCP and API access on its $95 Essential plan, Rankscale lists MCP on every plan, Peec AI includes MCP on its paid plans, and Otterly.AI starts API and MCP on Standard at $189. Our guide to AI visibility tools with an API or MCP server covers the workflows a SaaS team can run with one.

What comes after the tool

Tracking and recommendations are the first half; being named by the engines depends on the pages and sources they read. Our guide to getting a SaaS product recommended by AI engines covers that half. For the full category, including AthenaHQ itself, see our comparison of the best AI visibility tools, and for an enterprise baseline with no published brand price, our list of Profound alternatives.

If you want a team that gets B2B SaaS companies found in Google and recommended by the seven AI engines, with open measurement across every engine and no annual lock-in, book a 30-minute call.

Some listings on this page may be paid placements.