7 Best Social Media Listening Tools in 2026 (Free and Paid, Compared)
Compare the 7 best social media listening tools on price, mention limits and AI features, with every price checked November 6, 2026 for teams of any size.
Shamim Mia, Founder, SerpAstraLast verified November 6, 202612 min readWe compare pricing pages, documentation and public reviews. We never accept payment for rankings.
Key takeaways
- Brand24 is the best fit for most teams at $249/month; Awario is the cheapest dedicated listener at $49/month, and Sprout Social starts at $99/seat/month for teams that also need publishing.
- Three of the seven tools publish no price at all — Mention, Brandwatch and Talkwalker are all custom quote, so budget on a sales call, not a rate card.
- The single most important buying factor is the mention cap: keyword and mention limits decide what you actually pay, not the headline price.
- Listening is not monitoring: a listening tool analyses sentiment and trends, while a monitoring tool only collects mentions — buy the analysis, not the alert.
On this page
Quick comparison
| Tool | Best for | Starting price | Free plan |
|---|---|---|---|
| Brand24 | Small and mid-size teams that want dedicated social listening without an enterprise sales call | $249/mo | No (14-day trial) |
| Awario | Solo marketers and small teams that need real listening on the smallest budget in this list | $49/mo | No (7-day trial) |
| Sprout Social | Teams that want listening next to publishing, inbox and reporting in one suite | $99/seat/mo | No (30-day trial) |
| Hootsuite | Teams that already publish with Hootsuite and want listening in the same workflow | $99/user/mo | No (14-day trial) |
| Mention | Mid-market teams that need review-site monitoring alongside social listening | Custom quote | No (14-day trial) |
| Brandwatch | Enterprise research and insights teams that need years of historical conversation data | Custom quote | No (demo only) |
| Talkwalker | Enterprise comms and insights teams that need analyst-grade listening with unlimited users | Custom quote | No (demo only) |
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Request a listingThe best social media listening tools
Brand24
Best for: Small and mid-size teams that want dedicated social listening without an enterprise sales call
Brand24 is the dedicated listening tool most teams should start with: it watches social networks, news, blogs, forums, podcasts and review sites for your keywords, then scores every mention for sentiment so you can see whether the conversation is turning for or against you. Individual costs $249 a month, or $199 billed annually, and covers 3 keywords, 2,000 mentions a month and one user, with updates every 12 hours.
The catch is the ceiling. A brand with a busy launch week can burn through 2,000 mentions quickly, and real-time updates wait for Pro at $499 a month. Buy Brand24 when listening is the job itself and you want alerts, sentiment and reports without buying a publishing suite; buy Awario when the budget is the deciding factor.
What we like
- Tracks mentions across social networks, news, blogs, forums, podcasts and review sites from one dashboard
- AI sentiment analysis is included on the entry plan, not held for the top tier
- 14-day free trial needs no credit card, so the mention volume can be tested on real keywords
- Unlimited users from the Team plan, so the bill grows with mentions rather than headcount
Watch out for
- Individual covers 1 user and updates every 12 hours — real-time updates wait for Pro at $499/month
- Only 3 keywords and 2,000 mentions a month on Individual, so a busy brand outgrows it fast
- No free plan, and the entry price rose from $149 to $249 a month during 2026
Awario
Best for: Solo marketers and small teams that need real listening on the smallest budget in this list
Awario is the cheapest real listening tool in this list, and the gap is not small: Starter costs $49 a month, or $29 billed annually, against $249 for Brand24 Individual. For that you get 3 topics, 30,000 new mentions a month, Boolean search and sentiment analysis, which is more mention volume than any other entry plan here by a wide margin.
The trade-offs are scope and polish. Starter covers one team member, so a second seat needs Pro at $149 a month, and the analytics are shallower than Brand24 or Brandwatch, with fewer report formats. Pick Awario when one person owns listening and the budget is tight; pick Brand24 when the whole team needs alerts and deeper reports.
What we like
- The cheapest entry price here: $29 a month billed annually for a real listening tool
- Boolean search on every plan, so alerts can exclude noise instead of drowning in it
- 30,000 mentions a month on Starter — fifteen times the volume of Brand24 Individual
- Lead-finding surfaces people asking for recommendations, not just brand mentions
Watch out for
- Only 3 topics and 1 team member on Starter — a second seat needs Pro at $149/month
- Analytics are shallower than Brand24 or Brandwatch, with fewer report formats
- The 7-day trial is the shortest here, so testing takes planning
Sprout Social
Best for: Teams that want listening next to publishing, inbox and reporting in one suite
Sprout Social is the suite option: listening sits next to publishing, the inbox and reporting, so a mention can be answered without switching tools. Essentials costs $99 per seat a month, or $79 billed annually, and covers 5 social profiles with publishing and reporting — but it has no keyword monitoring, so the listening price is really Standard at $199 per seat a month billed annually.
That tier adds the consolidated inbox, keyword and location monitoring and review management, and Professional at $299 adds unlimited profiles and competitor insights. Buy Sprout Social when one team runs publishing and listening together; buy a dedicated tool when listening is the whole job and per-seat pricing would punish a growing team.
What we like
- One login covers publishing, the inbox, reporting and listening, so mentions can be answered in place
- Keyword and location monitoring start on Standard at $199/seat/month, with review management included
- The longest trial here at 30 days, with no credit card required
- The largest review base in this list, with 7,557 G2 reviews behind the 4.4 rating
Watch out for
- Real listening costs more than the headline: Essentials has no keyword monitoring, so the listening price is really Standard at $199/seat/month
- Every seat is billed separately, so a three-person team pays three times the headline price
- Advanced listening features such as inbox sentiment and spike alerts wait for Advanced at $399/seat/month
Hootsuite
Best for: Teams that already publish with Hootsuite and want listening in the same workflow
Hootsuite is the longest-running name in social management, and listening is built into every paid plan rather than sold as an add-on. Standard costs $99 per user a month on annual billing and covers 10 social accounts, unlimited scheduled posts, listening and competitive benchmarking, while Professional at $199 adds Quick Search across 30 days of conversations.
The pricing has two catches. The monthly-billing rate is $149 a user, so $99 only applies on annual billing, and every seat is billed separately, so three people cost $297 a month on Standard. Deep listening with 13 months of history is Enterprise-only. Buy Hootsuite when the team already publishes there; buy Talkwalker itself when research-grade listening is the priority.
What we like
- Listening and competitive benchmarking are included on Standard, not sold as a separate module
- Professional at $199/user/month adds Quick Search across 30 days of conversations
- Owns Talkwalker, so its advanced listening on Enterprise is the same engine as a dedicated suite
- The largest review base for a publishing suite here, with 7,599 G2 reviews
Watch out for
- No monthly-billing price is published, so the $99 figure only applies to annual billing
- Per-user pricing means a three-person team pays $297 a month on Standard before any add-on
- Deep listening with 13 months of history is Enterprise-only, behind a sales call
Mention
Best for: Mid-market teams that need review-site monitoring alongside social listening
Mention changed more than any tool in this list during 2025: the Solo, Pro and ProPlus plans were retired in July, and the only plan left for new customers is Company, sold by custom quote. The pricing page shows no figure, and third parties report about $599 a month on an annual contract, but that number is not vendor-verified, so budget on a sales call.
What the money buys is broad: 5 alerts, 50,000 mentions a month, unlimited users, sentiment analysis and monitoring across more than 75 review sites alongside social and news. Publishing and responding were removed in January 2026 and moved to Agorapulse, which now owns Mention. Buy it for review-site coverage at mid-market scale; skip it if you need a published price.
What we like
- Monitors more than 75 review sites alongside social, news, blogs and forums
- A single Company plan covers unlimited users, so the whole team can watch alerts
- 50,000 mentions a month is the largest allowance among the mid-market tools here
- Now owned by Agorapulse, so publishing and replies are handled in the sister product
Watch out for
- No price is published: the pricing page routes buyers to a demo request, and third parties report about $599 a month
- The Solo, Pro and ProPlus plans were retired in July 2025, so there is no low-cost entry left
- Publishing and responding were removed in January 2026 and moved to Agorapulse
Brandwatch
Best for: Enterprise research and insights teams that need years of historical conversation data
Brandwatch is the research-grade option in this list, built for insights teams rather than daily mention alerts. Its Consumer Intelligence product covers social, news, blogs, forums and review sites with advanced Boolean queries, AI sentiment and audience segmentation, and Brandwatch says its archive holds 1.7 trillion historical conversations back to 2010.
There is no published price and no trial: every deal is a custom quote on an annual contract, and third parties report entry figures near $800 a month. Reviewers also call the setup complex enough to need a trained owner. Buy Brandwatch when the question is a research question — how a category talked about pricing three years ago — not when you need a quick alert.
What we like
- The deepest historical archive here: Brandwatch says it holds 1.7 trillion conversations back to 2010
- Advanced Boolean queries and audience segmentation suit research questions, not just alerts
- Covers social, news, blogs, forums and review sites with AI sentiment in more than 80 languages
- The highest-rated enterprise option here at 4.4 on G2 from 730 reviews
Watch out for
- No published price and no trial — budgeting starts with a sales call, and third parties report entry figures near $800 a month
- Annual contracts are the standard, with most deals running 12 to 24 months
- Reviewers call the setup complex enough to need a trained owner
Talkwalker
Best for: Enterprise comms and insights teams that need analyst-grade listening with unlimited users
Talkwalker, now sold as Lumen by Talkwalker since Hootsuite bought it in 2024, is the analyst-grade option for enterprise comms teams. Core, Analyze and Business are all custom quote, with no trial and no published price, and every plan includes unlimited users. Talkwalker's own pricing page puts its coverage at 150 million sources across more than 30 social platforms.
Analyze doubles Core's results volume and adds 25 topics, while Business multiplies it further, and the AI Agent answers questions about the conversations it finds. Third-party benchmarks put entry deployments around $500 to $1,250 a month. Buy Talkwalker when an enterprise team needs deep, analyst-grade listening; buy Brand24 or Awario when a published price matters.
What we like
- Unlimited users on every plan, so the bill does not grow with headcount
- Covers 150 million sources across more than 30 social platforms, per Talkwalker's own pricing page
- AI Agent and LLM insights analyse conversations and answer questions about them
- Now part of Hootsuite, so it pairs with the widest-known publishing suite
Watch out for
- No published price and no trial — every plan ends in a demo request and a custom quote
- Third-party benchmarks put entry deployments around $500 to $1,250 a month, so small teams should expect enterprise pricing
- Analyze and Business only add volume multipliers, so the quote is hard to compare without a scoping call
The best social media listening tools do more than collect mentions: they tell you whether the conversation is turning for or against you, who is driving it, and what to do next. We ranked the seven tools below by fit for the most common buyer — a marketing team that needs to hear customers, competitors and critics across social networks, news, blogs and forums — and every price was checked on the vendor's own pricing page on November 6, 2026.
How to choose the best social media listening tools
- Count your mentions first. Awario Starter allows 30,000 mentions a month while Brand24 Individual allows 2,000, so a busy brand can outgrow the dearer tool first. Estimate your monthly volume before you compare prices.
- Check what counts as a mention. Some tools count every match, others count only new mentions, and review sites or podcasts may sit on higher tiers. Ask what a mention costs you before you buy.
- Decide whether listening sits alone or inside a suite. A dedicated tool such as Brand24 or Awario does one job deeply; Sprout Social and Hootsuite bundle listening with publishing, which suits teams that answer mentions in the same place they post.
- Check the history you get. Brandwatch looks back years, Hootsuite Professional looks back 30 days, and the enterprise plans hold more. If you need last year's conversation, the entry plan may not have it.
- Try it on your own brand name. Run the trial on your real keywords, not a demo brand: the trial shows whether the sentiment scoring and the noise filters work on your market.
Listening is one system in your stack, not the whole stack. If the business also needs to protect its name online, our guide to brand reputation management tools covers the wider job. And before you publish new pages for the services you sell, run your titles through the free SERP snippet preview tool — it shows exactly how the title and description will look in Google.
Whatever you shortlist, trial it with real data before you pay. The trials in this list run from 7 to 30 days, which is long enough to test one genuine launch week — your brand name, your competitors, your keywords — and that week tells you more than any review can. Check two things in the trial: that the sentiment scores match what a human would say, and that the alert volume is useful rather than overwhelming. Every tool here lets you export your keyword lists, so a trial costs you nothing if you switch.
Social media listening pricing: what you will actually pay
Take a one-person team that tracks a single brand. On list prices, the subscription costs $49 a month on Awario Starter, $99 a month on Sprout Social Essentials or Hootsuite Standard, and $249 a month on Brand24 Individual. Annual billing cuts those to $29, $79, $99 and $199 a month — $348, $948, $1,188 and $2,388 a year — so the same one person and the same brand cost $348 a year at the cheap end and $2,388 at the dear end.
Two of those numbers need adjusting before they are real. Sprout Social Essentials has no keyword monitoring, so a listener on Sprout Social really pays Standard at $199 per seat a month billed annually, or $2,388 a year for one seat — the same as Brand24 Individual. And Hootsuite's $99 is the annual-billed figure; the monthly-billed rate is $149 a user, so a buyer who will not commit to a year should budget on that figure.
A three-person team changes the maths again. Awario Starter still costs $49 a month, because it is priced per topic rather than per seat — though a second team member needs Pro at $149 a month. Sprout Social Standard for three seats is $597 a month, Hootsuite Standard for three users is $297 a month, and Brand24 Team is $349 a month with unlimited users. Mention, Brandwatch and Talkwalker are custom quote at any team size; third parties report roughly $599 a month for Mention and entry figures near $800 a month for Brandwatch, but neither figure is vendor-verified, so treat them as a budgeting guess, not a price.
Know the difference: social listening vs social monitoring vs social management
The confusion in this category is between three jobs that share one feed. Social monitoring collects mentions and sends alerts: your brand was named, here is the link. Social listening analyses those mentions — sentiment, trends, share of voice, who is driving the conversation — and explains why a spike happened. Social management is the third job: publishing posts and answering replies in the same tool.
Every tool in this list does listening, but the suites bundle all three jobs and the dedicated tools do one. That is why Sprout Social and Hootsuite look dearer than Awario: you are paying for publishing and inbox as well as listening, and for a team that answers mentions where it posts, that bundle is worth it. For a team that only needs to hear the conversation, the bundle is waste.
There is a second, quieter confusion: a free alert tool is not a listening tool. Google Alerts tracks web pages, not social posts, and scores no sentiment. It is a useful tripwire for a brand nobody talks about yet, but the moment mentions arrive faster than one person can read them, the analysis — sentiment, trends, volume — is the part you are paying for, and no free tool does it.
A third distinction is the history behind the alert. A monitoring tool tells you what happened today; a listening tool with a deep archive tells you whether today is normal. Brandwatch looks back to 2010, Talkwalker sells history as part of its enterprise tiers, and Hootsuite's advanced listening holds 13 months. If a crisis hits, the team that can compare today with last year answers faster than the team that only sees today.
Quick comparison: tool type by need
| Buyer | Best pick | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Solo marketer on a budget | Awario | Real listening from $49/month, with 30,000 mentions included |
| Most teams, dedicated listening | Brand24 | Alerts, sentiment and reports from $249/month, no suite needed |
| Team that wants listening plus publishing | Sprout Social | One suite for publishing, inbox and listening, from $99/seat/month |
| Team already publishing on Hootsuite | Hootsuite | Listening built into Standard at $99/user/month, billed annually |
| Mid-market team, review sites matter | Mention | More than 75 review sites tracked, priced by custom quote |
| Enterprise research team | Brandwatch | Years of historical data and deep research tools, priced by custom quote |
Mistakes to avoid
- Budgeting on the annual price while paying monthly. Brand24 Individual is $199 a month billed annually but $249 month to month, and Awario Starter is $29 against $49. The monthly figure is the one that matters if you will not commit to a year.
- Buying on the headline price when listening sits on a higher tier. Sprout Social Essentials at $99 has no keyword monitoring; the listening price is Standard at $199. Hootsuite's deep listening is Enterprise-only. Check the plan feature list, not the price card.
- Ignoring the mention cap that bites first. A tool can be cheap and still be the wrong buy: Brand24 Individual at $249 is no bargain once you pass 2,000 mentions a month, and Awario Starter at $49 is no bargain once you need a second team member.
- Paying for enterprise depth you never use. Brandwatch and Talkwalker are research tools with annual contracts and sales calls. If the job is daily alerts and sentiment, a dedicated tool at a published price does it for a tenth of the cost.
- Forgetting the per-seat multiplier. Sprout Social and Hootsuite bill every seat separately, so a three-person team pays three times the headline price. Brand24 Team, Mention and Talkwalker charge by mentions or by quote, not by headcount.
How we chose
We checked each vendor's own pricing page on November 6, 2026 and recorded the starting price exactly as shown, including the annual-billing figure where the page lists one, and we ranked the tools by fit for the most common buyer — a marketing team that needs to hear customers, competitors and critics — not by brand size. Mention, Brandwatch and Talkwalker publish no starting price, so we list them as custom quote; the $599-a-month figure for Mention and the entry figure near $800 a month for Brandwatch come from third-party reports, not from the vendors, and we do not present them as verified prices. Ratings come from G2 review pages, with scores and counts taken from fresh G2 page crawls dated November 1–6, 2026. No vendor paid for a place in this list, and none of the links here are affiliate links.
What to do next
Start with the trial of your top pick and run one real launch week through it: your brand name, your competitors, your keywords. Check that the sentiment scores match what a human would say and that the alert volume is useful rather than overwhelming before you commit to a year. If listening is sorted but new customers are not finding you, our monthly SEO service handles the visibility side — or compare suites in our guide to AI social media management tools. Once your tools are in place, find out what's holding your rankings back.
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Get a free audit→Sources we checked (14)
- Brand24 pricing — brand24.com/pricing (checked November 6, 2026)
- Awario pricing — awario.com/pricing (checked November 6, 2026)
- Sprout Social pricing — sproutsocial.com/pricing (checked November 6, 2026)
- Hootsuite plans — hootsuite.com/plans (checked November 6, 2026)
- Mention pricing — mention.com/en/pricing (checked November 6, 2026)
- Brandwatch pricing — brandwatch.com/pricing (checked November 6, 2026)
- Talkwalker pricing — talkwalker.com/pricing (checked November 6, 2026)
- Brand24 reviews — g2.com/products/brand24/reviews (checked November 6, 2026)
- Awario reviews — g2.com/products/awario/reviews (checked November 6, 2026)
- Sprout Social reviews — g2.com/products/sprout-social/reviews (checked November 6, 2026)
- Hootsuite reviews — g2.com/products/hootsuite/reviews (checked November 6, 2026)
- Mention reviews — g2.com/products/mention/reviews (checked November 6, 2026)
- Brandwatch reviews — g2.com/products/brandwatch/reviews (checked November 6, 2026)
- Talkwalker reviews — g2.com/products/lumen-by-talkwalker/reviews (checked November 6, 2026)
Shamim
Founder of SerpAstra
A full-stack SEO and digital marketer who spends most days on Local SEO for dental practices, AI search visibility and lead generation.
Frequently asked questions
What is the best social media listening tool?
Brand24 is the best fit for most teams: dedicated listening, AI sentiment and real-time alerts from $249/month, with a 14-day trial. Awario is the best budget pick at $49/month. Sprout Social and Hootsuite suit teams that also need publishing, while Brandwatch and Talkwalker are the enterprise research picks.
How much does social media listening cost?
Published entry prices run from $49 a month for Awario to $249 a month for Brand24, with Sprout Social and Hootsuite starting at $99 per seat a month. Mention, Brandwatch and Talkwalker publish no price and sell by custom quote, with third parties reporting roughly $599 a month for Mention.
Is there a free social media listening tool?
None of the seven tools here has a free plan. Google Alerts is free but only tracks web pages, not social posts, and has no sentiment analysis. The practical free route is a trial: Sprout Social gives 30 days, Brand24 and Hootsuite give 14 days, and Awario gives 7 days.
What is the difference between social listening and social monitoring?
Monitoring collects mentions and sends alerts; listening analyses them. A listening tool scores sentiment, spots trends, compares share of voice and explains why a spike happened, while a monitoring tool only tells you the spike exists. Every tool in this list does listening, not just monitoring, though the depth varies by tier.
Which social media listening tool is best for a small business?
Awario is the best pick for a small business on a budget: $49 a month, or $29 billed annually, for 3 topics and 30,000 mentions a month. Brand24 is the better pick once one person watches listening full time, because its alerts, sentiment and reports are deeper, though Individual costs $249 a month.
Do Sprout Social and Hootsuite include listening on their cheapest plans?
Hootsuite does: listening and competitive benchmarking are included on Standard at $99 per user a month. Sprout Social does not: Essentials has no keyword monitoring, so real listening starts on Standard at $199 per seat a month. Check the plan feature list, not the headline price, before you buy either suite.
Can I switch social listening tools later?
Yes, but plan the move around your history. Export your keyword lists, Boolean queries, historical mentions and reports before the old subscription ends, because most tools do not carry history across vendors. Rebuild the alerts in the new tool and run both side by side for two weeks to check nothing is missed.
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