Explee is one of a new group of "AI outbound agents": you give it your website, it works out who you sell to, finds companies and contacts, writes the emails and sends them. If you are looking at alternatives, you are probably weighing one of three things: price per email, control over what gets sent, or whether the tool fits the rules of the countries you sell into.
This comparison is written by the team behind Outvori, which is one of the alternatives, so read it with that in mind. We have tried to describe every tool from its own public pages, list prices exactly as published on the date we checked, and say plainly where another tool is the better choice.
What Explee is
Explee started as a semantic search engine for B2B companies and decision makers. In 2026 it launched AutoGTM, an agent that turns a website URL into a running outbound campaign: it builds an ideal customer profile, finds matching companies and contacts in its own database, writes personalised cold emails and follow-ups, and sends them from pre-warmed mailboxes (launch coverage, a sponsored article). Pricing is pay-as-you-go per email sent with no subscription; check Explee's pricing page for the current rate, which has been quoted at a few cents per email.
Explee fits well if you want a hands-off agent, you are comfortable with its database as the source of your leads, and you want to pay only for what is sent.
Why people look for alternatives
The reasons we hear most often:
- Control. An autonomous agent decides who to write to and what to say. Some teams want to approve every email, or at least every campaign, before it leaves.
- Data source. A large proprietary database is convenient, but you cannot always see where a given contact came from, which matters when a recipient asks under GDPR Article 14.
- Own domains. Pre-warmed shared mailboxes get you started quickly. At higher volume many teams prefer their own domains, whose reputation they control.
- Price at volume. Per-email pricing is cheap to start and adds up at scale; flat subscriptions can be cheaper once you send thousands a month.
- European rules. Cold email to businesses needs prior consent in some countries (Germany, Austria, Denmark). A tool that does not know where the recipient's company is registered cannot keep you out of those countries for you. See B2B cold email rules by country.
The alternatives at a glance
Prices are as listed on each vendor's pricing page on 26 October 2026, in US dollars per month unless stated. Vendors change prices often; follow the links for current figures.
| Tool | What it is | Pricing model (as listed) | Mailboxes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Explee | AI outbound agent with its own B2B database | Pay per email sent, no subscription | Pre-warmed, included |
| Apollo | Prospecting database plus sequences | Per seat, Basic from $49/seat | Connect your own |
| Instantly | Cold email sending platform | Growth from $47 (5,000 emails a month) | Bring and warm your own |
| Smartlead | Cold email sending platform | Base from $39 | Bring and warm your own |
| lemlist | Multichannel outreach | Per user, from $69/user tier | Connect your own |
| Salesforge | AI cold email platform | From $40 (yearly billing) | Connect your own |
| Outvori | Register-sourced prospecting, reviewed outreach, CRM | Outreach module $69, or pay as you go at $0.045 per email | 5 warmed mailboxes included, or your own domains |
Apollo: when you want a database and a CRM-like workspace
Apollo combines a large contact database with email sequences and a dialer. It suits sales teams who want to search people by title and company attributes and work through sequences day to day. Pricing is per seat, so it scales with team size rather than with email volume. You connect your own mailboxes and are responsible for their warm-up and sending limits.
Choose it if your main need is finding named people quickly and you have reps who will work the lists.
Instantly and Smartlead: when you want cheap sending at volume
Instantly and Smartlead are sending platforms first: unlimited or high mailbox counts, inbox rotation, warm-up tools and a unified inbox, at a flat monthly price. They are the cheapest per email once you run several of your own domains and send in volume. They do not decide who to contact; you bring the list.
Choose one of them if you already have a reliable lead source, you are comfortable managing domains and DNS, and cost per email is your main constraint.
lemlist and Salesforge: when personalisation is the point
lemlist is known for personalised images and multichannel sequences (email plus LinkedIn steps). Salesforge focuses on AI-written, personalised emails across many mailboxes. Both connect to your own mailboxes and are priced per user or per tier.
Choose them if you want more control over copy and channels than an autonomous agent gives you, and you have a list to work from.
Outvori: when you sell in Europe and want to approve what is sent
Outvori is our product, so here is what it does and does not do, without adjectives:
- Lead source: companies come from 23 free official registers and open data sources (for example Bolagsverket and SCB in Sweden, Brønnøysund in Norway, PRH in Finland, Sirene in France, Companies House in the UK). The source is stored with every company. Sole traders and companies with an advertising opt-out flag are left out. Read more in finding B2B leads in EU company registers.
- Country rules built in: Outvori never prospects in Germany, Austria or Canada, and companies from the Danish register cannot be added to email campaigns.
- Review before sending: every email is drafted for you to approve. You can later let the workspace auto-approve drafts that pass every check, but only after you have approved the first ones yourself, and a spam complaint or a rise in hard bounces switches it back to manual.
- Sending: five warmed mailboxes on a sending domain are included in the Outreach module ($69/month for 1,000 emails) and the Start plan ($99/month). Each mailbox sends at most 30 cold emails a day after a 14-day ramp. Extra domains are $39/month. You can also pay as you go at $0.045 per email with no subscription.
- Sender identity: every campaign email carries your legal company name, postal address and an unsubscribe link, and campaigns cannot go live without them.
- Beyond email: SEO articles, social posts and community posting are separate modules in the same workspace.
Where Outvori is not the best fit: if you need large volumes of named contacts in Germany or Austria, if you mainly want a phone dialer, or if you already run your own sending infrastructure and only want the cheapest per-email price, a sending platform such as Instantly or Smartlead is likely cheaper.
How to choose
Answer four questions:
- Where do your leads come from? If you need a database, look at Explee, Apollo or Outvori. If you have one, a sending platform is enough.
- Who approves the emails? Fully autonomous (Explee), drafted for your approval (Outvori), or written and scheduled by you in a sequence tool (Apollo, lemlist, Salesforge, Instantly, Smartlead).
- Whose mailboxes? Shared pre-warmed mailboxes get you started today; your own domains protect your reputation long term. Read how many cold emails per mailbox per day before you plan volume.
- Which countries? If you sell into Europe, check that the tool knows where each recipient's company is registered and can keep you out of consent-only countries.
Run a small, honest test: the same list, the same number of emails, two weeks, and compare replies, not opens.
Try Outvori
The free plan includes a website analysis, an ideal customer profile and 50 trial emails from warmed Outvori mailboxes, with no card needed. Start with the free brand scan to see which registered companies match your offer, or compare plans and prices.
