Comparison
Clay is infrastructure for getting data and running AI workflows you build, and its paid plans send email. Clean does one job: it finds companies with a real reason to buy what you sell, shows the evidence, names who decides and never sends.
Book a demoLast updated October 6, 2026
The short answer
Pick Clay if someone on your team will build and run data workflows: as of 2026-10-06 it offers data from 150+ providers, an AI research agent, signals and email sending on paid plans, with Launch at $185 a month billed monthly. Pick Clean if you want companies with a real reason to buy found and ranked for you, with the evidence and who decides.
Clay and Clean do different jobs. Clay describes itself on its homepage as infrastructure to get any data and run agentic workflows. You assemble the steps: which data providers to pull from, which signals to watch, what its AI agent researches, and on paid plans, the emails Clay sends. Clean does one narrower job. It finds businesses with a real reason to buy what you sell, shows the evidence behind each one, and names who decides there.
So the real question is who does the work in the middle. With Clay, your team designs the workflow and owns what it returns. With Clean, the research comes back done: companies ranked against your ICP, the records behind each one, the people to contact, and who in your network can introduce you. Clean is not a contact database you search, and it is built industry by industry rather than as a general data tool.
Everything below about Clay comes from Clay's own pricing page and homepage, read on 2026-10-06 and listed under Sources. Plans change, so check Clay's pricing page before you buy.
As of 2026-10-06, Clay's pricing page and homepage list all of the following. Clay's homepage also says engineers build on Clay, while its Launch plan is pitched "for small teams building and automating prospecting workflows".
Clay publishes its prices. As of 2026-10-06, Clay bills in two units. Actions measure the work Clay's platform does, such as running a table, calling an AI model or exporting data, and Clay says they start at less than $0.01 each. Data credits pay for data bought from Clay's marketplace and for most AI runs, starting at $0.05 each. Every plan includes a monthly allowance of both, and Clay says Launch and Growth are scoped so that 90% of its customers never hit a usage limit.
Paid plans show a 14-day trial, and Clay's pricing page says you can start for free with no credit card required. The Free plan runs up to 200 rows per table and does not include phone numbers.
Clean does not publish prices on this page. Access starts with a demo, and the three-way comparison adds Apollo to the picture.
Clay plans as published on clay.com/pricing, read 2026-10-06
| Plan | Billed monthly | Billed annually | Included each month |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | $0 | 500 actions and 100 data credits; up to 200 rows per table; no phone numbers |
| Launch | $185 a month | $167 a month | 15,000 actions and 2,500 data credits |
| Growth | $495 a month | $446 a month | 40,000 actions and 6,000 data credits |
| Enterprise | Custom | Custom, annual commitment | 200,000+ actions and 100,000+ data credits |
Clay does send email. As of 2026-10-06, its Launch plan lists "Send emails via Clay or integrations", and the plan comparison lists email campaigns run natively in Clay or through connected email tools on Launch, Growth and Enterprise. Growth adds the option to buy domains and email accounts for sending through Clay. So a Clay workflow can find a company, research it and send the email.
Clean stops before the message. Clean doesn't use ad clicks, page views or other intent data, and it never sends, posts or replies. It shows who is worth reaching and why; your team decides who to contact and what to say. Prospects sync to HubSpot or Attio. If protecting your domain matters, the security page covers domain safety and what data Clean can access.
Clay's pricing page and homepage, read 2026-10-06, do not say you need one. Its Free plan has unlimited seats, and Launch is aimed at small teams. But its homepage speaks to the engineers who build on it, and the product rewards someone who will own the build: picking providers, writing the prompts its research agent follows, setting signal rules, scoring the rows and keeping the email steps current as your market shifts.
A useful test before you buy: name the person who will maintain the tables three months from now. If that person exists and enjoys it, Clay gives them a lot of room. If nobody does, you are paying for a tool that waits for a builder.
Clean asks for less. You define your ICP, and Clean ranks companies against it, attaches the evidence and names who decides. How Clean works walks through what you set up and what comes back.
Clean starts from what companies actually do, read from real-world records, and keeps the evidence attached so every reason can be checked. Each prospect comes back with:
With Clay, what you get back depends on what you build: which providers you pull from, which signals you track, and what you ask its agent to look for. That suits a team that already knows which moments matter in its market and has someone to encode them. Clean is built industry by industry. Here is what it returns in three of the markets it serves.
If you sell to manufacturing plants, a Clay builder would first have to decide which plant moments to encode; manufacturing buying signals lists them. Clean returns plants with a real reason to buy what you sell and the people who decide there; see Clean for manufacturing. If you sell benefits or coverage to employers, benefits buying signals covers the moments that open an employer's decision; software sellers to agencies, brokerages, MGAs and carriers face different ones. In both cases Clean returns the companies with a real reason to buy what you sell and who decides there; see Clean for insurance. If you sell to law firms or in-house legal teams, Clean returns law firms and legal teams with a real reason to buy what you sell, the evidence behind each one and who decides; legal tech prospecting and Clean for legal tech go further.
Yes, and for some teams that is the right setup. Clean finds the companies with a real reason to buy and shows why. Clay keeps doing what your team already built it for: filling in data, running research steps and sending from your existing workflows.
The handoff is simple. Clean's prospects sync to HubSpot or Attio, and Clay's Growth plan includes CRM auto-sync, so your Clay workflows can pick them up from there. The Clay and Clean stack guide covers running both, and the Clay alternatives list covers the other tools people weigh against Clay. For every comparison in one place, see Compare Clean, and for the other alternatives lists, the alternatives hub.
Clay vs Clean at a glance (Clay facts from clay.com, read 2026-10-06)
| Clay | Clean | |
|---|---|---|
| What it is, in its own words | Infrastructure to get any data and run agentic workflows | Finds businesses with a real reason to buy what you sell, shows the evidence and names who decides |
| Core job | Data from 150+ providers, an AI web research agent, signals, and on paid plans email sending; ad audiences and CRM auto-sync on Growth | Ranks companies against your ICP and names who to contact |
| Who runs it | Its homepage says engineers build on Clay; Launch is pitched at small teams building and automating prospecting workflows | A founder or small team that wants the research done for them |
| Starting point | Search for companies and people inside Clay, or bring a list | Your ICP and what you sell |
| Prioritization | A scoring workflow you set up; Clay lists scoring on intent and engagement signals as a use case | Built in: every company ranked against your ICP |
| Evidence | Whatever your workflow and its AI agent return | The records behind each prospect |
| Sends email | Yes, on paid plans, inside Clay or through connected email tools | No. Clean never sends, posts or replies |
| Intent data | Web intent signals on Growth | Not used |
| Price, as of 2026-10-06 | Free plan, no credit card required to start; Launch $185 a month billed monthly or $167 billed annually; 14-day trial on paid plans | Not published here; book a demo |
Who each is for
| Clay | Clean | |
|---|---|---|
| Best owner | Someone who designs and maintains data workflows; Clay's Launch plan names small teams | A founder or small team that wants companies found and ranked for them |
| Primary job | Get data from many providers and run AI workflows on it | Find companies with a real reason to buy and the people who decide |
| Output | Tables, email sent from Clay, CRM syncs and ad audiences | A ranked list of prospects with the evidence, who to contact and who can introduce you |
| Best when | You want to design every step yourself | You want the research done and your team to decide who to contact and what to say |
Clay wins when you want to build the process yourself. As of 2026-10-06 its pricing page says it offers data from 150+ providers, an AI agent that researches companies and people on the web, job-change, hiring, news and social signals, and email sending on paid plans. It has a free plan and unlimited seats, and its homepage says more than 500,000 teams use it. If your bottleneck is assembling data from many places and acting on it in one tool, Clay is the stronger pick.
Clean wins when you want the research done rather than built. It finds companies with a real reason to buy what you sell, ranks them against your ICP, shows the records behind each one, names who to contact and shows who in your team's network can introduce you. It does not use intent data and never sends anything, so your team keeps every first touch.
Clay is infrastructure to get data and run AI workflows that your team builds, and on paid plans it sends email. Clean does the research itself: it finds companies with a real reason to buy what you sell, ranks them against your ICP, shows the records behind each one, names who to contact and shows who in your network can introduce you. Clean never sends anything.
As of 2026-10-06, Clay's pricing page lists a Free plan with 500 actions and 100 data credits a month. Launch costs $185 a month billed monthly or $167 billed annually, with 2,500 data credits and 15,000 actions. Growth costs $495 or $446. Enterprise is custom with an annual commitment. Paid plans show a 14-day trial, and Clay says you can start for free with no credit card.
Yes. As of 2026-10-06, Clay's pricing page lists email campaigns on its Launch, Growth and Enterprise plans, sent from inside Clay or through email tools it connects to. Growth also lets you buy sending domains and email accounts through Clay. Clean works differently: it never sends, posts or replies, and your team decides who to contact and what to say.
As of 2026-10-06, Clay's pricing page and homepage do not say you need one. Its Launch plan is aimed at small teams, and its Free plan includes unlimited seats. Its homepage, though, speaks to the engineers who build on Clay, and the results depend on someone choosing providers, writing agent prompts and maintaining tables over time. If nobody on your team will own that work, plan for it before you buy.
Yes. Clean finds which companies have a real reason to buy and who decides there, with the evidence attached. Clay keeps running the data and email workflows your team already built. Clean's prospects sync to HubSpot or Attio, and Clay's Growth plan includes CRM auto-sync, so your Clay workflows can pick them up from your CRM.
Choose Clay when your bottleneck is data work you want to design yourself: pulling from many providers, running AI research on each row, tracking signals and sending email in one tool. As of 2026-10-06, Clay says it offers data from 150+ providers. Choose Clean when you want companies with a real reason to buy found and ranked for you.
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