Clay vs LeadMagic
An independent, review-free comparison compiled by the SaaSTracker editorial team. Both products are profiled in full, and neither can pay for placement here.
Still shortlisting? Browse the best in B2B Data Providers and the best in Buying Signals & Intent for every option we track, with award winners called out.
The short answer
Editorial assessmentLeadMagic compared with Clay
Clay is the table and the orchestration; LeadMagic is one of the providers you call from inside it, and the two are used together far more often than they are compared. If you need somewhere to build the logic, blend providers, and run waterfalls, buy Clay. If you already have that, whether through Clay or your own code, LeadMagic is one of the better value keys to plug into it.
Choose Clay if
GTM engineers and data-savvy teams building automated, multi-provider enrichment and personalization pipelines.
Choose LeadMagic if
Small teams that want champion job change tracking without a five-figure contract, Clay users who want signals and verified contact data from the same credit pool, and technical go-to-market operators who would rather call an API than log into another application.
Side by side
13 attributes| Attribute | Clay | LeadMagic |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Data | Signals |
| Starting price | Free plan; paid from $167/mo billed annually (Launch) | $49.99 per month (Basic) (free trial) |
| Pricing model | Two metered allowances per plan, actions (running workflows, including waterfall steps and Claygent) and data credits (data bought from providers), each set on its own slider, with a free plan, two self-serve tiers, and custom Enterprise. CRM auto-sync, webhooks, and the HTTP API integration are gated at Growth. | Self-serve credit subscription with one shared pool across more than fifteen endpoints, charged per successful result, with monthly or discounted annual billing. |
| Free plan | 500 actions and 100 data credits per month, unlimited seats and tables, up to 200 rows per table. | No |
| Free trial | 14 days | Trial credits are offered at sign-up rather than a fixed-length free trial |
| Best for | GTM engineers and data-savvy teams building automated, multi-provider enrichment and personalization pipelines. | Small teams that want champion job change tracking without a five-figure contract, Clay users who want signals and verified contact data from the same credit pool, and technical go-to-market operators who would rather call an API than log into another application. |
| Setup time | First enriched table in an hour via templates; a production pipeline (sources, then waterfalls, then scoring, then delivery) typically takes 2-4 weeks to harden. | An hour to a first successful call. Sign up, take an API key, and hit an endpoint. Building a scheduled job change sweep across a contact list and writing results back to a CRM is a day of work, or an afternoon inside Clay. |
| Learning curve | The steepest in this report, genuinely a skill. Templates, the academy, and a large creator ecosystem (courses, agencies) flatten it substantially. | Low for anyone technical and steep for anyone else. The endpoints are conventional and well described, but there is no interface to fall back on, so a team without engineering or Clay capability has no path to value. |
| Platforms | Web app, Chrome extension, REST API | REST API, lm-tui command line client, Hosted MCP server, AI go-to-market chat in beta, CSV bulk enrichment |
| Compliance | SOC 2 Type II, GDPR program | GDPR obligations apply to the personal contact data returned, No publicly advertised SOC 2 attestation |
| Founded | 2017 | 2022 |
| Headquarters | New York City, US | United States, operating as a remote-first team |
| Ownership | Venture-backed (private) | Bootstrapped |
Strengths and limitations
Clay
Strengths
- Waterfall coverage decisively beats any single data provider.
- Claygent turns open-web research into a scalable, auditable pipeline step.
- Deep native integrations across the modern outbound stack (sequencers, CRMs, signals).
- Template/creator ecosystem compounds, proven workflows are one click away.
Limitations
- Real learning curve, tables, waterfalls, and prompt design reward (effectively require) a technical operator.
- Credit economics are powerful but unforgiving without active management.
- Not a proprietary data source; quality ceilings are its providers'.
- Enterprise governance (SSO, roles, audit) only matures at top tiers.
LeadMagic
Strengths
- Job change detection at three credits a request, which puts the champion-moves signal within reach of companies that cannot spend five figures a year on it.
- Failed and empty lookups cost zero credits, which is a genuinely fairer meter than the pay-on-attempt model most enrichment vendors use.
- One credit pool across more than fifteen endpoints, so signals, contact data, and validation do not each need their own subscription and forecast.
- A hosted MCP server included on every tier, so an AI assistant can call signal and enrichment lookups as tools without an integration project.
Limitations
- There is no application. No dashboard, no alerts, no scoring, and no routing, so the entire workflow around a signal is yours to build.
- The signal set is narrow relative to dedicated platforms: job changes, hiring, growth, account changes, and funding, with no social listening, no website visitors, and no product usage.
- The job change detector answers a question about a contact you supply; it does not maintain a champion list or watch it for you, which is most of what packaged job change vendors actually sell.
- Accuracy and uptime figures are vendor claims rather than independently audited numbers, and match rates in practice vary by region and seniority.
Pricing compared
Clay
Two metered allowances per plan, actions (running workflows, including waterfall steps and Claygent) and data credits (data bought from providers), each set on its own slider, with a free plan, two self-serve tiers, and custom Enterprise. CRM auto-sync, webhooks, and the HTTP API integration are gated at Growth.
- Free$0
- Launch$167
- Growth$446
- EnterpriseCustom
Clay's effective price is workflow-dependent: well-designed tables deliver coverage and personalization no single vendor matches at any price, while naive configurations burn credits alarmingly. Teams treating credit design as part of the craft consistently report it as the stack's highest-ROI line item.
LeadMagic
Self-serve credit subscription with one shared pool across more than fifteen endpoints, charged per successful result, with monthly or discounted annual billing.
- Basic$49.99
- Essential$99
- Growth$249
- Professional$499
- Ultimate$849
Measured on the signal alone, LeadMagic is the cheapest route to job change detection by an enormous margin: three credits a check on a $49.99 plan against vendors quoting $40,000 a year for the packaged version. Measured as a whole, it is good value because the signals and the contact data share one pool and failed lookups are free, which removes the two most common ways credit-metered vendors quietly overcharge. What you are not buying is any of the workflow: no champion list that maintains itself, no alert, no scoring, no play. If your team can write a scheduled job or drive a Clay table, that trade is heavily in your favour. If it cannot, the $49.99 buys you nothing usable and you should pay more for a product with an interface.
Editorial verdict on each
Clay
Clay is the most consequential product in this report: it moved the center of outbound gravity from databases and sequencers to the orchestration layer between them, and its valuation sprint reflects substance, not froth. The costs are honest, a real learning curve and credit economics that punish sloppiness, but teams that invest in the craft get coverage, research, and personalization nothing else assembles. If your outbound has an engineer, this is their instrument.
Read the full Clay profileLeadMagic
LeadMagic is the answer to a specific unfairness in this category: the job change signal, which is one of the highest-converting triggers in B2B sales, is normally sold only in five-figure annual packages behind a demo. Here it is three credits a request on a $49.99 plan, sharing a credit pool with verified emails, mobiles, validation, and company data, with failed lookups costing nothing. Buy it if you or your Clay table can turn an API response into a task, because on that basis the value is hard to beat and the pay-per-result meter is genuinely fairer than the norm. Do not buy it expecting a product: there is no dashboard, no champion list that maintains itself, no scoring, and no alert, and the signal set is narrow. It is infrastructure for a motion you design, not a motion you can switch on.
Read the full LeadMagic profileClay profile last reviewed 2026-09-26; LeadMagic last reviewed 2026-08-22. Pricing is compiled from public sources and can change without notice. See our methodology.
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The best in Buying Signals & Intent
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Frequently asked questions
6 questionsWhat is the difference between Clay and LeadMagic?
Clay is the table and the orchestration; LeadMagic is one of the providers you call from inside it, and the two are used together far more often than they are compared. If you need somewhere to build the logic, blend providers, and run waterfalls, buy Clay. If you already have that, whether through Clay or your own code, LeadMagic is one of the better value keys to plug into it.
Is Clay or LeadMagic cheaper?
Clay starts at Free plan; paid from $167/mo billed annually (Launch). LeadMagic starts at $49.99 per month (Basic) (free trial). The billing models differ, so the entry price is rarely the whole cost. Clay pricing model: Two metered allowances per plan, actions (running workflows, including waterfall steps and Claygent) and data credits (data bought from providers), each set on its own slider, with a free plan, two self-serve tiers, and custom Enterprise. LeadMagic pricing model: Self-serve credit subscription with one shared pool across more than fifteen endpoints, charged per successful result, with monthly or discounted annual billing.
Does Clay or LeadMagic have a free plan?
Clay has a free plan. 500 actions and 100 data credits per month, unlimited seats and tables, up to 200 rows per table. Trial terms: 14 days. LeadMagic has no free plan. Trial terms: Trial credits are offered at sign-up rather than a fixed-length free trial.
Who should choose Clay?
GTM engineers and data-savvy teams building automated, multi-provider enrichment and personalization pipelines.
Who should choose LeadMagic?
Small teams that want champion job change tracking without a five-figure contract, Clay users who want signals and verified contact data from the same credit pool, and technical go-to-market operators who would rather call an API than log into another application.
What are the best alternatives to Clay and LeadMagic?
SaaSTracker profiles 26 products in B2B Data Providers. The Summer 2026 awards in the category went to Apollo.io (Category Leader), Lusha (Best Value), Prospeo (Momentum). SaaSTracker profiles 17 products in Buying Signals & Intent. The Summer 2026 awards in the category went to Crunchbase (Category Leader), Trigify (Best Value), Unify (Momentum). Every profile is compiled from primary sources, so a shortlist can be built from pricing, limitations, and fit rather than from star ratings.
