Apollo.io vs Clay
Eight of fourteen models named Apollo.io first on the direct prompt; eight named Clay. Apollo.io was named by fourteen of the fourteen models and Clay by thirteen and Apollo.io carries 75 labels and Clay 56, so the shares are not directly comparable.
San Francisco, United States, founded 2015. Named in twenty-two categories this edition.
Named in eleven categories this edition.
Share is the count of first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts over all fourteen models, for a mid-market B2B company; rank is within the category; every quote names the model and the prompt it came from. Both figures come from the data enrichment page.
By framing
Apollo.ioFirst choices, of fourteen modelsClay
Across every category in the November 2026 Edition, Apollo.io and Clay were named in the same answer 241 times, of the 1129 answers naming Apollo.io and the 310 naming Clay. In those answers Clay took the first choice seventeen times and Apollo.io 104.
Every model, every framing
| Model | Direct | Paraphrase | Comparative | Budget-constrained | Scale-constrained | Negative |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Claude Haiku 4.5 | | | | | | |
| GPT-5.4 mini | | | | | | |
| Gemini 3.5 Flash | | | | | | |
| Perplexity Sonar | | | | | | |
| Grok 4.20 | | | | | | |
| Mistral Small | | | | | ||
| DeepSeek V4 Flash | | | | | | |
| Llama 4 Maverick | | | | | ||
| Qwen 3.7 Flash | | | | | | |
| Kimi K2 | | | | | | |
| GLM 4.7 FlashX | | | | | | |
| MiniMax M2.5 | | | | | | |
| GPT-6 Luna | | | | | | |
| Muse Glimmer 30B | | | | | |
Apollo.io Clay first choice named as an alternative argued againstblank: not namedEach cell is one answer, Apollo.io on the left and Clay on the right.The direct prompt
Both were the first choice
2 of 14 modelsThe answer named them together, and the judge labeled each a first choice.Apollo.io first, Clay an alternative
6 of 14 modelsClay was named in the answer but not as the choice, or not at all.Clay first, Apollo.io an alternative
6 of 14 modelsApollo.io was named in the answer but not as the choice, or not at all.Bold names in an answer are the products the judge labeled a first choice; a model naming several gives each of them that label. The full answer text for every row is in the record.
By buyer segment
Apollo.io81%#1 of 9Clay5%#2 of 9Apollo.io63%#1 of 9Clay27%#2 of 9Clay7%#3 of 10Apollo.io2%#8 of 10What the models said about Apollo.io
Every negative label with a quote, up to three, then the highest-weighted positives, up to three. Three of three in this category shown.
“Widespread reports of inaccurate/outdated contact data ... BBB complaints about unauthorized distribution of personal phone numbers” Grok 4.20 · negative prompt · hard negative
“Users experience data inaccuracy with Apollo.io, leading to unreliable contact information that requires verification.” Muse Glimmer 30B · negative prompt · hard negative
“Apollo.io - Best overall for SMB and agencies, with a large database, built-in email sequences, and a dialer at a published per-seat price.” Llama 4 Maverick · paraphrase prompt · first choice
What the models said about Clay
Every negative label with a quote, up to three, then the highest-weighted positives, up to three. Six of eight in this category shown.
“Avoid ZoomInfo ($15K+/year), Clay ($167–185+/month)” DeepSeek V4 Flash · budget prompt · hard negative
“Avoid enterprise-heavy tools like ZoomInfo ($15K+/yr), Cognism (quote-based, high for non-EU focus), or full Clay setups unless your free tier covers it” Grok 4.20 · budget prompt · soft negative
“it is not a single authoritative database. It chains providers, requiring technical setup, provider management, and careful credit controls.” Perplexity Sonar · negative prompt · soft negative
“If you want flexible AI workflows & multiple data vendors: Choose Clay to aggregate multiple providers using waterfall enrichment.” Gemini 3.5 Flash · comparative prompt · first choice
“Apollo.io or Clay are the best choices due to their balance of cost, coverage, and ease of integration” Mistral Small · paraphrase prompt · first choice
“Clay | Waterfall logic across 150+ providers, programmable workflows, automation depth | From $149/mo” Kimi K2 · scale prompt · first choice
Comparisons are drawn for the top eight products in each category, each against each. The output is the models' output; nothing here is a recommendation by the index.