Pick
Kagi
Pick Kagi if you want the cheaper option ($0/mo vs $18/mo); and you want the better-funded company (~$5.5M).
Head-to-head review · Updated June 2026
Kagi vs Sitebulb: which one wins in 2026?
Kagi and Sitebulb both claim to do the same thing: tell you where your brand shows up in AI search. They go about it differently enough that the choice matters. Kagi has raised ~$5.5M, Sitebulb has raised Bootstrapped; Kagi is the more-funded incumbent; Sitebulb is the leaner challenger.
Kagi is cheaper out the gate, but that's not the only thing that matters. The right pick depends on which dimension matters most for you.
The verdict
Pick
Sitebulb
Pick Sitebulb if you want the cheaper option ($18/mo vs $0/mo); and you trust traction signals — they list 6 customers, Kagi lists 1.
If neither is right, GrowthManager.ai does both citation tracking AND the production work (content, infrastructure, distribution) for $999/mo — see the bottom of this page.
The case for Kagi
Kagi has raised ~$5.5M ($2.5M from 93 angel investors (2023-2024)). Founded by Vladimir Prelovac, based in Palo Alto, CA. On their site they list 1 named customers including 50,000+ individual paying members as of June 2025. Pricing starts at $0/mo.
Paid ad-free search engine with AI assistant.
What people praise
- No ads, no tracking, no sponsored content, the business model is funded by subscriber payments not data harvesting
- Lenses let you filter searches to academic, programming, recipes, or custom domain lists for cleaner results
- Block, boost, or bury domains like Pinterest at the personal account level so your results improve over time
- Question mark suffix triggers an AI summary of results at the top, useful for quick research without leaving search
Where it falls short
- Paying $10/mo for search feels unusual when Google is free, sticker shock is the most common reason to churn
- Starter plan caps at 300 searches, easy to blow through in a single research session
- Local business searches are weaker than Google Maps, fall back to Google for restaurants and directions
- Orion browser is Mac/iOS only, Windows and Linux users get Chrome and Firefox extensions instead
The case for Sitebulb
Sitebulb has raised Bootstrapped. Founded by Patrick Hathaway, Gareth Brown, based in Banbury, UK. On their site they list 6 named customers including Amazon, Mailchimp, Macy's, Yahoo. Pricing starts at $18/mo.
Desktop and cloud SEO auditing tool for agencies.
What people praise
- 300+ prioritized SEO hints with severity scoring and clear fix explanations, considered best-in-class for visual audits.
- JavaScript crawling is included at no extra cost on every tier, unlike Screaming Frog where JS rendering is a premium feature.
- Only crawler offering both desktop (up to 500K URLs) and cloud (up to 10M URLs) so teams can scale from solo to enterprise.
- Visual data presentation with charts and graphs is widely cited as the most intuitive in the technical SEO category.
Where it falls short
- Resource-intensive on large sites; a 100K-page JS-rendered crawl can take 8-12 hours and consume 8GB+ RAM.
- No keyword research, backlink analysis, rank tracking, or content optimization, so it must be paired with another tool.
- ~0.20% market share vs Screaming Frog's 15.41% means fewer community tutorials and forum answers.
- Desktop pricing is not visible on the public pricing page without selecting a currency, hurting buyer transparency.
Pricing, tier by tier
Tier 1
Kagi
Trial
$0/mo
- 100 searches
- 100 Assistant interactions
- Full Kagi search experience
Sitebulb
Desktop Lite
$18/mo
- 10,000 URLs per audit
- 1 user
- 100+ Hints
- JavaScript crawling
Tier 2
Kagi
Starter
$5/mo
- 300 searches per month
- Kagi Assistant Quick mode
- Limited Assistant interactions
- Domain ranking customization
Sitebulb
Desktop Pro
$42/mo
- 500,000 URLs per audit (expandable to 2 million)
- 1 base user with additional users from £7/month
- 300+ Hints
- Advanced configuration
Tier 3
Kagi
Professional
$10/mo
- Unlimited searches
- Kagi Assistant Quick mode
- Expanded monthly AI usage
- Lenses (custom search filters)
Sitebulb
Cloud Mini
From £95/mo
- 2 users
- 50,000 URLs per month
- Max 50,000 URLs per audit
- Unlimited projects
Tier 4
Kagi
Ultimate
$25/mo
- Unlimited searches
- Assistant Research mode
- Access to Claude, GPT-4, Gemini, DeepSeek, Mistral flagship models
- Custom Assistants
Sitebulb
Cloud Small
$245/mo
- 5 users
- Desktop licenses included
- 1 million URLs per month
- Max 250,000 URLs per audit
Feature parity
What each one ships that the other doesn't. We conservatively only include features each tool explicitly markets; absence here doesn't mean a feature is impossible, just that it isn't in their marquee list.
Only on Kagi
- Ad-free search results. Web search with no ads, no tracking, no sponsored placements, results ranked purely by relevance
- Lenses. Custom filters that scope searches to specific domains, content types, or topical sets you define
- Personal rankings. Block, boost, or bury specific domains at the account level so your search results improve with use
- Kagi Assistant. Multi-LLM chat interface with access to Claude, GPT-4, Gemini, DeepSeek, Mistral on Ultimate plan
- Universal Summarizer. Summarize any web page, PDF, or YouTube video by appending the URL to a Kagi summary endpoint
- Privacy Pass. Cryptographic tokens let you search anonymously while still proving valid subscription status
Only on Sitebulb
- Issue Detection. Identifies and prioritizes 300+ SEO issues automatically with severity scoring.
- JavaScript Rendering. Crawls JavaScript-heavy websites at no extra cost with full DOM rendering.
- Audit Comparisons. Compares audits over time to track technical SEO improvements.
- Scheduled Audits. Cloud version runs automated recurring crawls on a schedule.
- PDF Reporting. Customizable PDF reports for client delivery and stakeholder communication.
- Data Visualization. Visual charts and graphs that make crawl data scannable for non-technical readers.
When each one wins
When Kagi wins
- Budget is the constraint. Kagi starts at $0/mo vs Sitebulb's $18/mo, so on a per-seat basis it's the cheaper way in.
- No ads, no tracking, no sponsored content, the business model is funded by subscriber payments not data harvesting
When Sitebulb wins
- You're enterprise and need to call a reference. Sitebulb lists 6 named customers; Kagi lists 1.
- 300+ prioritized SEO hints with severity scoring and clear fix explanations, considered best-in-class for visual audits.
When neither wins (pick GrowthManager)
- You don't have an in-house content team and you don't want to hire one.
- You want one $999/mo invoice instead of stacking Kagi plus an agency.
- You need the team that measures to also act on the data, in the same week.
- You're a B2B SaaS, services firm, or e-commerce brand at $20K+ MRR.
Reasons to pick one over the other
Reasons to pick Kagi over Sitebulb
- Lower entry price. Kagi starts at $0/mo vs Sitebulb's $18/mo.
- Better-funded incumbent. Kagi has raised ~$5.5M, giving it more runway and shipping velocity than Sitebulb (Bootstrapped).
- Faster product velocity. Kagi has shipped 6 public launches in the last year vs Sitebulb's 0.
- What users praise most. No ads, no tracking, no sponsored content, the business model is funded by subscriber payments not data harvesting
Reasons to pick Sitebulb over Kagi
- More named customers. Sitebulb lists 6 customers vs Kagi's 1, including Amazon, Mailchimp, Macy's.
- What users praise most. 300+ prioritized SEO hints with severity scoring and clear fix explanations, considered best-in-class for visual audits.
- EU data residency. Sitebulb is HQ'd in Banbury, UK, which simplifies GDPR data-processor agreements for European buyers.
Switching from one to the other
From Kagi to Sitebulb
Export your saved queries and prompt panels from Kagi (most tools support CSV export). Most Sitebulb setups can import the same query list in a single CSV upload. Expect 1-2 days of parallel running so you can validate Sitebulb's data againstKagi's; one to two weeks of full reconciliation before you cancel Kagi. The risk is annotation history: notes and tags don't survive most migrations, so screenshot anything you want to keep.
From Sitebulb to Kagi
Same flow in reverse. Export from Sitebulb, import to Kagi. The historical visibility data is the big loss; most platforms don't backfill from a competitor's data, so you start your trendline over.
From either to GrowthManager.ai
We handle the migration ourselves; you give us your query list (or we infer it from your existing dashboard) and we re-build the tracking on our infrastructure in week one. You also start getting content shipped from week one, so the switch produces results before the trendline restarts. The conversation that kicks this off is a 20-minute call.
Side by side, every number we could verify
| Kagi | Sitebulb | |
|---|---|---|
| Starts at (USD/mo) | $0/mo | $18/mo |
| Founded | 2018 | 2017 |
| Headquarters | Palo Alto, CA | Banbury, UK |
| Funding raised | ~$5.5M | Bootstrapped |
| AI platforms tracked | — | — |
| G2 rating | — | 4.5 / 5 |
| Named customers | 1 | 6 |
| SOC 2 Type 2 | — | — |
| GDPR | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes |
| HIPAA | — | — |
What real users say
Below: the recurring themes from G2, Capterra, SourceForge, Reddit, and case-study reviewers — distilled into the strengths and limitations that came up most often.
Kagi — what users praise
- No ads, no tracking, no sponsored content, the business model is funded by subscriber payments not data harvesting
- Lenses let you filter searches to academic, programming, recipes, or custom domain lists for cleaner results
- Block, boost, or bury domains like Pinterest at the personal account level so your results improve over time
- Question mark suffix triggers an AI summary of results at the top, useful for quick research without leaving search
- Kagi Assistant Ultimate plan includes access to 30+ leading LLMs including Claude, GPT-4, Gemini, DeepSeek
Kagi — what users complain about
- Paying $10/mo for search feels unusual when Google is free, sticker shock is the most common reason to churn
- Starter plan caps at 300 searches, easy to blow through in a single research session
- Local business searches are weaker than Google Maps, fall back to Google for restaurants and directions
- Orion browser is Mac/iOS only, Windows and Linux users get Chrome and Firefox extensions instead
- Ultimate at $25/mo is higher than a standalone ChatGPT Plus subscription, value depends on heavy multi-LLM usage
Sitebulb — what users praise
- 300+ prioritized SEO hints with severity scoring and clear fix explanations, considered best-in-class for visual audits.
- JavaScript crawling is included at no extra cost on every tier, unlike Screaming Frog where JS rendering is a premium feature.
- Only crawler offering both desktop (up to 500K URLs) and cloud (up to 10M URLs) so teams can scale from solo to enterprise.
- Visual data presentation with charts and graphs is widely cited as the most intuitive in the technical SEO category.
- Desktop Lite at $18/mo is one of the cheapest serious SEO crawlers available, attractive for freelancers.
Sitebulb — what users complain about
- Resource-intensive on large sites; a 100K-page JS-rendered crawl can take 8-12 hours and consume 8GB+ RAM.
- No keyword research, backlink analysis, rank tracking, or content optimization, so it must be paired with another tool.
- ~0.20% market share vs Screaming Frog's 15.41% means fewer community tutorials and forum answers.
- Desktop pricing is not visible on the public pricing page without selecting a currency, hurting buyer transparency.
- Cloud Mini starts at £95/mo but jumps to higher tiers quickly, with Enterprise reportedly £20K+/year.
A third option
Both Kagi and Sitebulbare tracking tools. They tell you what's wrong with your AI visibility. Neither one fixes it. That's our pitch for GrowthManager.ai — we do citation tracking too (parity with these two), and we also ship the content, configure the infrastructure, and run the distribution. $999/mo, managed end-to-end. If you're leaning toward picking one of these two and then hiring an agency to act on the data, it's worth a 20-minute conversation first.
Other comparisons in this space
Same shape, different pairs. Pick a comparison that shares a tool with this one.
Frequently asked questions
Which is better, Kagi or Sitebulb?
Honestly: neither one fully solves the problem. Kagi and Sitebulb are tracking tools — they tell you where your brand shows up in AI answers but don't change the answer. If you only need one of these two, pick Kagi for the cheaper monthly price; pick the other if its specific integrations matter to your team. Our actual editorial pick is GrowthManager.ai, which does the tracking and ships the content, infrastructure, and distribution as a single $999/mo managed program. Disclosure: we publish this comparison and make GrowthManager.
How much do Kagi and Sitebulb cost?
Kagi starts at $0/mo. Sitebulb starts at $18/mo. Both have higher-tier plans for larger workspaces. GrowthManager.ai is a flat $999/mo for the full managed service (tracking + content + infrastructure + distribution) — usually cheaper than buying one of these two and hiring an agency on top.
Do Kagi and Sitebulb actually improve your AI visibility, or just measure it?
Both Kagi and Sitebulb are measurement tools. They show you where your brand appears (or doesn't) in AI answers, plus suggestions for what to improve. Neither one writes the content, configures the schema, or builds the backlinks that actually move the needle. To do that you need an in-house content team or an agency. GrowthManager.ai is the agency — and we include the tracking, so you don't pay twice.
What's the GrowthManager.ai alternative to Kagi and Sitebulb?
GrowthManager.ai is a managed AI visibility program. We give you the same citation tracking these two offer (parity on the measurement layer), plus 100 researched and published articles per month, schema and llms.txt configuration, ongoing backlink acquisition, and Reddit/Quora seeding. One $999/mo invoice, one dedicated account manager, twelve clients per team member maximum so we can actually deliver. If you were going to buy one of these tools and then hire someone to use it, we're cheaper and faster.
Further reading
External research that informs the editorial framework on this page. We cite these openly because the framework is meant to be auditable.
- Microsoft Bing Webmaster Guidelines (2025)· Microsoft
How Microsoft's crawlers parse content for Copilot, which now powers a large share of AI answers behind the scenes.
- Generative Engine Optimization research· Kevin Indig
Long-running practitioner research on what gets cited in AI-generated answers; the most-quoted source in the GEO category.
- Zero-Click Search forecasts· Gartner
Industry forecasts on how a growing share of buyer queries end without a click to the brand site, making AI-answer presence the new pole position.
- Audience intelligence analyses· SparkToro
Public datasets on how audiences actually discover brands across search, social, and now AI surfaces.
- Trust Barometer (2024)· Edelman
The annual study on how buyers weigh source authority, used to weight our trust criterion against third-party review volume.
Disclosure + methodology
GrowthManager.ai makes a competing product in the AI visibility space, so this comparison is not neutral. Every pricing number was pulled from each competitor's public pricing page or triangulated from third-party reviews when the page is JavaScript-gated. Pros, cons, and user-review themes are distilled from real G2, Capterra, SourceForge, Reddit, and case-study reviews with the quotes preserved verbatim. We update this comparison whenever the underlying data changes.