Free
$0
Free
500 actions and 100 data credits a month, unlimited seats and tables, up to 200 rows per table, no phone enrichment.
API included
Comparison
Clay vs People Data Labs
Pick Clay if you want to enrich lists in a table from 150+ providers, run waterfalls and send results on, paid in actions and data credits from $185 a month. Pick People Data Labs if you are writing code against one large dataset: 1 credit per match, 100 records per bulk call and SQL or Elasticsearch search, from $98 a month. Clay can also call PDL inside a table.
Pick Clay if
- You want enrichment in a table without writing code
- You want waterfalls across many providers, charged only when data is found
Pick People Data Labs if
- You enrich in code and want a flat price of 1 credit per match
- You need bulk calls: up to 100 records per request
Clay
Data platform, Enrichment
People Data Labs
Enrichment, Sourcing
At a glance
Clay
- From
- $185/moLaunch monthly, $167 annual
- Free plan
- Yes500 actions, 100 data credits/mo
- Cost per unit
- About 1.1 credits per work email
- MCP server
- Official
People Data Labs
- From
- $98/moPerson Pro, 350 credits
- Free plan
- Yes100 credits/mo per product, contacts hidden
- Cost per unit
- 1 credit per match or record
- MCP server
- YesPartial: docs-search MCP only
Where they differ
16 points side by side. Open a value for the full detail.
| What | Clay | People Data Labs |
|---|---|---|
| Spreadsheet-style data platform, 150+ providersA spreadsheet-style data platform. Each table finds and enriches people and companies from 150+ data providers and its AI agent, then pushes results to a CRM or sequencer. | Developer API for person, company, IP dataA developer data API for person, company, IP and job-posting data, with search, enrichment, bulk enrichment and flat-file licensing for larger contracts. | |
| Launch $185/mo monthly, $167 annualPer workspace, by usage. Launch starts at $185 a month billed monthly or $167 a month billed annually; Growth at $495 or $446. Seats are unlimited. Verified 2026-10-25. | Person Pro $98/mo, 350 creditsPer dataset. Person Pro starts at $98 a month for 350 credits, or $940 a year. Company Pro is $100 a month for 1,000 records, or $960 a year. Annual billing saves 20%. Verified 2026-10-25. | |
| 500 actions, 100 data credits/mo500 actions and 100 data credits a month, up to 200 rows per table, no phone enrichment. Paid plans start with a 14-day trial. | 100 credits/mo per product, contacts hiddenUp to 100 credits a month per product. Emails, phone numbers and street addresses come back hidden as true or false until you pay for Pro. | |
| About 1.1 credits per work emailEach enrichment shows its data-credit cost per row: about 1.1 for a work email waterfall and about 10 for a mobile phone waterfall. Data credits start at $0.05 each; actions cost under $0.01. Bringing your own provider key skips data credits but still uses actions. | 1 credit per match or record1 credit per matched person, company or IP. Search costs 1 credit per record returned, so a search that returns 100 people costs 100 credits. Autocomplete, cleaners and the sandbox are free. | |
| No charge on a missNo charge when an enrichment finds no result. | Free on a miss, except Person IdentifyEnrichment is free on a miss (404). Person Identify is the exception: it bills every call that returns 200 or 404. | |
| Public API, CLI, MCP on every planThe Public API, CLI and MCP work on every plan, with search caps by plan (Free: 100 results per 30 days). The HTTP API column and webhook automation need Growth. On reading table data by API, Clay's pages differ: the developer docs list Tables on Enterprise plans, while Clay University says basic row reads work on any plan and structured queries need Enterprise. | Every plan, including FreeThe API is the product, on every plan including Free. Preview Search, Preview Enrichment and webhooks are Enterprise purchases. | |
| clay-api-key header, OAuth for MCPA clay-api-key header, with scopes picked when the key is created. The MCP server uses OAuth instead. | X-Api-Key header, api_key or SDKAn X-Api-Key header, an api_key query parameter or an SDK client. Active keys: 1 on Free, 3 on Pro, 5 on Enterprise. | |
| Not published; search caps by planA per-workspace request limit with no published number; 429 comes with Retry-After. Search results are capped by plan: 500 per request and 1,000,000 per 30 days on paid plans, with HTTP 402 past the cap. | Person enrichment 1,000/min on paidPer key, per endpoint, per minute. Person enrichment 1,000 a minute on paid plans (100 on Free), company enrichment 1,000 (10 on Free), search 10 a minute by default. Every response is capped at 1MB. | |
| 50,000-row tables, JSONL batch runsTables hold up to 50,000 rows on Launch and Growth. Bulk enrichment of more than 50,000 records at once is Enterprise only. Routines can run in batch over a JSONL file. | 1 to 100 records per callBulk person and bulk company enrichment take 1 to 100 records per synchronous call. Search pages stop at 10,000 records per query; a scroll token goes further. Flat files and delta files come with an enterprise data licence. | |
| Inbound tables and signed outboundInbound webhook tables receive JSON, capped at 50,000 submissions per source. Outbound signed webhooks fire when a routine run finishes. Webhook automation is a Growth feature. | Enterprise onlyEnterprise only: PDL posts events when records that match your registered filters change in a data release. Set up with the PDL team. | |
YesOfficial server at https://api.clay.com/v3/mcp with OAuth 2.1. It finds and enriches companies and contacts and runs published functions, at the same credit cost as the app. | Partial: docs-search MCP onlyNo official MCP server for PDL data on 25 Oct 2026. The MCP at docs.peopledatalabs.com/mcp searches the documentation only. | |
| Whatever chosen providers returnWhatever the chosen providers return: emails, phones, firmographics and signals such as job changes and company news. The pricing page counts 150+ providers. | 1.5 billion person profiles, monthly refresh1.5 billion unique person profiles, plus company, IP and job-posting datasets. Person records carry emails, phones, work history, education, skills and location. API data is refreshed monthly. | |
| PDL is a Clay providerLists People Data Labs as a provider under Settings > Enrichments, for person data, emails and segmented lists. | Use PDL inside ClayIts docs say you can use PDL inside Clay through Clay's managed connection, with no PDL key, or connect your own PDL API key. | |
| Not covered in downloaded pagesNot covered in the Clay pages we downloaded. | No resale, FCRA uses or AI trainingNo resale or products that compete with PDL without an enterprise agreement, no FCRA uses such as credit or employment screening, and no training of generative AI models on the data. | |
| SOC 2 Type II, ISO 27001, ISO 42001SOC 2 Type II, GDPR, CCPA, ISO 27001 and ISO 42001 are listed on the pricing page. | ISO and SOC 2 Type 2The pricing page says ISO and SOC 2 Type 2 compliant. | |
| No-code table over many providersTeams that enrich and qualify lists in a no-code table, combining many providers, and then push the rows to other tools. | Developers enriching in code at volumeDevelopers who enrich or search in code at volume and want one dataset with a per-match price. |
No row matches in this view.
Pricing, plan by plan
US dollars as each vendor's page showed them on 25 Oct 2026. One panel per tool; switch each between monthly and annual billing (an annual price is the monthly rate when you pay for the year up front).
Clay
4 plans · API reviewLaunch
$185/mo
billed monthly
$167/mo
billed annually
From 15,000 actions and 2,500 data credits a month, up to 50,000 rows per table, phone enrichment and signals.
API included
Plan details
Billed monthly, or annually from $167 a month; larger tiers cost more.
Growth
$495/mo
billed monthly
$446/mo
billed annually
From 40,000 actions and 6,000 data credits a month, plus CRM auto-sync, HTTP API column and webhook automation.
API included
Plan details
Billed monthly, or annually from $446 a month.
Enterprise
Custom quote
Custom price with an annual commitment, 100,000+ data credits and 200,000+ actions a month, bulk enrichment past 50,000 records.
API included
People Data Labs
5 plans · API reviewFree (Person)
$0
Free
Up to 100 credits a month.
API included
Plan details
Emails, phones and addresses are hidden as true or false.
Pro (Person)
$98/mo
billed monthly
$78.33/mo
billed annually
Starting at 350 credits a month with contact data included.
API included
Plan details
Billed monthly, or $940 a year ($78.33 a month).
Free (Company)
$0
Free
Up to 100 records a month.
API included
Pro (Company)
$100/mo
billed monthly
$80/mo
billed annually
Starts at 1,000 records a month.
API included
Plan details
Billed monthly, or $960 a year ($80 a month).
Show all 5 plansShow fewer plans
Enterprise
Custom quote
Custom volume on annual contracts, data licence feeds, webhooks, SSO.
API included
Which one to pick
Choose Clay if
- You want enrichment in a table without writing code.
- You want waterfalls across many providers, charged only when data is found.
- You want to send enriched rows straight to a CRM or sequencer.
- You want an official MCP server for enrichment from an AI assistant.
- You want PDL data too: Clay offers it as one of its providers.
Choose People Data Labs if
- You enrich in code and want a flat price of 1 credit per match.
- You need bulk calls: up to 100 records per request.
- You want to query one dataset with SQL or Elasticsearch over every field.
- You want to start at a lower monthly price: Person Pro starts at $98 a month.
- You need flat-file or delta-file data delivery under an enterprise licence.
If neither fits: If you only need verified work emails for a known list, a single email finder is a cheaper fit than either. Find the emails, then verify them before sending.
How to find a person's work email addressWant us to build it for you?
Choosing between Clay and People Data Labs, or moving from one to the other? Tell us your setup. We will show you how we would run it, and what we would check first.
Questions people ask
How does clay enrichment work?
You add an enrichment column to a Clay table and pick a provider or a waterfall of providers. Each option shows its cost per row in data credits, and rows where nothing is found are not charged. People Data Labs is one of the providers you can pick.
Can I use People Data Labs inside Clay?
Yes. PDL's docs describe two ways: Clay's managed PDL connection, which needs no PDL key and bills Clay data credits, or your own PDL API key added in Clay's connection settings. With your own key, Clay charges no data credits but still counts actions.
Which one is cheaper per record?
PDL charges 1 credit per matched record, with Person Pro from $98 a month for 350 credits. Clay prices each provider separately in data credits, from $0.05 a credit, plus actions for the platform work, and its plans start at $185 a month billed monthly. The cheaper option depends on which providers and how many rows you run.
Does the free plan include emails and phone numbers?
On PDL Free, emails, phones and addresses come back as true or false flags until you pay for Pro. Clay Free includes 100 data credits a month for emails and company data, but no phone enrichment.
Is there an MCP server for either?
Clay has an official one at https://api.clay.com/v3/mcp with OAuth. PDL had no official MCP for its data on 25 Oct 2026; its docs MCP only searches the documentation.
Related
Read from clay.com/pricing, peopledatalabs.com/pricing/person and each tool's API docs. Verified 25 Oct 2026.
