Head to head
ContactOut vs People Data Labs
As a ai candidate sourcing tools API, People Data Labs rates higher on the APIbenchmarks Index, 84.9 to 55, a 29.9-point gap. Here is how they compare on each criterion.
Criterion by criterion
| Criterion | ContactOut | People Data Labs |
|---|---|---|
| Documentation & DX | ||
| Reliability | ||
| Ecosystem & SDKs | ||
| Accessibility | ||
| APIbenchmarks Index | 55.0 | 84.9 |
Specifications
| ContactOut | People Data Labs | |
|---|---|---|
| Best for | LinkedIn-based email and phone lookup for recruiters and sales | Bulk person/company data for builders |
| Free tier | 5 emails, 5 phones, 5 exports/day in the app; API not included | 100 person/company lookups/mo (emails/phones obfuscated) |
| Pricing | Credits (search, email, phone) on a quoted API plan | Per enrichment credit |
| Official SDKs | 4 languages | 7 languages |
Is ContactOut better than People Data Labs?
On the APIbenchmarks Index, People Data Labs rates higher (84.9 vs 55). It leads on the four weighted criteria, but price is reported separately, so the best choice still depends on your budget.
Verdict in one line
People Data Labs leads by 29.9 points (84.9 vs 55) and wins 4 of 4 criteria.
Winner by criterion
| Criterion | Winner | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Documentation & DX | 70 | 88 | |
| Reliability | 58 | 82 | |
| Ecosystem & SDKs | 50 | 80 | |
| Accessibility | 35 | 90 |
Choose ContactOut if… / choose People Data Labs if…
- →your use case matches its focus: linkedin-based email and phone lookup for recruiters and sales
- →documentation & dx matters most to you (88 vs 70)
- →reliability matters most to you (82 vs 58)
- →ecosystem & sdks matters most to you (80 vs 50)
- →accessibility matters most to you (90 vs 35)
- →you need broad SDK coverage (7 official SDKs vs 4)
- →your use case matches its focus: bulk person/company data for builders
Pricing side by side
- Model
- Credits (search, email, phone) on a quoted API plan
- Free tier
- 5 emails, 5 phones, 5 exports/day in the app; API not included
- Free$0
- Email~$49-$99/mo (sources conflict)
- Email + Phone~$99-$199/mo (sources conflict)
- Team / APICustom quote
- Model
- Per enrichment credit
- Free tier
- 100 person/company lookups/mo (emails/phones obfuscated)
- Free$0/mo
- ProFrom ~$98/mo
- EnterpriseCustom (commonly $20k-$100k+/yr)
Vendor-published pricing, verified 2026-10-07 (ContactOut) and 2026-06-27 (People Data Labs).
SDK and language coverage
Both · 0
None
Only ContactOut · 4
REST API (token header auth)Webhooks for async bulk v2Third-party MCP via Composio and viaSocketNo official SDKs or OpenAPI spec found
Only People Data Labs · 7
PythonJavaScript / TypeScript (Node + browser)GoRubyRustcURL / RESTOpenAPI (Swagger) specification
Strengths and weaknesses
- +Public API reference with auth, endpoint credit rules and per-endpoint rate limits
- +Bulk enrichment up to 1,000 profiles per v2 job with webhook delivery
- +Boolean search, decision-maker and company endpoints plus email and phone verification
- –API is not on self-serve plans; Team/API requires a custom quote
- –Free app plan (5/5/5 per day) does not include API access
- –962 outages tracked by StatusGator over the past year, with a minor outage on the verification date
- +Pay only for successful matches (HTTP 200), missed lookups are not billed
- +Very large breadth: 3B+ person profiles across 200+ countries and ~70M company profiles
- +Developer-first REST API with Elasticsearch-style search queries praised as flexible and well-documented
- –Data refreshes roughly monthly, so job titles and employers can be weeks-to-months stale
- –Heavy reliance on LinkedIn means non-LinkedIn people are under-represented and some self-reported titles leak through
- –Verified emails and direct-dial phones often require extra Person Identify calls at higher per-match cost
ContactOut vs People Data Labs: questions
- Which has better documentation, ContactOut or People Data Labs?
- People Data Labs scores higher on documentation and developer experience: 88 vs 70 out of 100.
- Which is more reliable, ContactOut or People Data Labs?
- People Data Labs scores higher on reliability: 82 vs 58 out of 100.
- Do ContactOut and People Data Labs have a free tier?
- ContactOut: yes (5 emails, 5 phones, 5 exports/day in the app; API not included). People Data Labs: yes (100 person/company lookups/mo (emails/phones obfuscated)).
- How are ContactOut and People Data Labs priced?
- ContactOut: Credits (search, email, phone) on a quoted API plan. People Data Labs: Per enrichment credit.
- Which has more official SDKs?
- People Data Labs lists 7 official SDKs, ContactOut lists 4.