Email verification
Asked as “email verification service”, and as “email list validation tool”, on behalf of a mid-market B2B software company. 51 first choices recorded across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, six models each.
01The standing
Share is the count of first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, over all six models, for a mid-market B2B software company. Ordered by share.
ProductFirst-choice shareNegative rateLabelsQuadrant
Show the three products at 0%, ordered by negative rate
Bars are the share of first choices, 0 to 100Every product with at least 10 labels here. Every product name links to its vendor page.
Recommended versus criticized
Every product with at least 10 labels here, on both axes. The 30% line names a quadrant, not the verdict above: that one needs more than 40%.
Criticized challengerCriticized default
Negative label rate →
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11Accepted challengerEndorsed leader
0%First-choice share → · lines at 30% share and 25% negative40%
Key
01ZeroBounce29%
ZeroBounce29%02Bouncer24%
Bouncer24%03Hunter10%
Hunter10%04Clearout6%
Clearout6%05Kickbox4%
Kickbox4%06EmailListVerify4%
EmailListVerify4%07DeBounce4%
DeBounce4%08NeverBounce2%
NeverBounce2%09Emailable0%
Emailable0%10Snov.io0%
Snov.io0%11MillionVerifier0%
MillionVerifier0%02What they warned about
A high negative share on a product with few labels is a warning. A low share on a product with many labels is salience, not sentiment.
MillionVerifier50%
7 of 14 labels negative · 5 of 6 models · 3 hard negative
“MillionVerifier — questionable support and billing.** The cheapest options often hide the most pain” DeepSeek V4 Flash, negative prompt
NeverBounce8%
3 of 39 labels negative · 3 of 6 models · 1 hard negative
“**Verdict**: Avoid for critical campaigns due to reliability and support issues” Mistral Small, negative prompt
Hunter10%
4 of 39 labels negative · 3 of 6 models
“Many prospecting suites (like Hunter.io or Snov.io) bundle email verification into their monthly subscriptions... avoid tools that force you into recurring plans” Gemini 3.5 Flash, negative prompt
ZeroBounce8%
4 of 53 labels negative · 3 of 6 models
“Several providers (ZeroBounce, NeverBounce, Bouncer's monthly credits) expire credits, which punishes infrequent users” DeepSeek V4 Flash, budget prompt
03What they cite
Citations exist only for the models that return a source list: four of the six in this edition.
Sites the answers cite
21 of 72 answers in this category came back with a source list, from 4 of 6 models: citations where the model returns them, or the search results it consulted. 5 of those lists are Google grounding redirects that name no site and are left out of the counts. 209 links across 91 sites, every framing counted. Ranked by the number of answers carrying the site or page. The other 2 models searched through a gateway that returned no source list on this edition.
vendor site · Hunter12 answers · 13 citations · 3 models
vendor site · ZeroBounce9 answers · 12 citations · 2 models
7 answers · 13 citations · 2 models
6 answers · 6 citations · 2 models
vendor site · DeBounce5 answers · 5 citations · 2 models
vendor site · Mailtrap5 answers · 5 citations · 2 models
vendor site · Overloop5 answers · 5 citations · 1 model
vendor site · Snov.io5 answers · 5 citations · 2 models
vendor site · ZoomInfo4 answers · 9 citations · 2 models
vendor site · Allegrow4 answers · 4 citations · 2 models
vendor site · MyEmailVerifier4 answers · 4 citations · 2 models
vendor site · Skrapp4 answers · 4 citations · 2 models
Pages the answers cite
The ten pages named in the most answers, by full address. A page here is one the models returned with a recommendation, not one the index endorses.
9 answers · 3 models
6 answers · 2 models
5 answers · 2 models
5 answers · 2 models
5 answers · 1 model
5 answers · 2 models
5 answers · 1 model
5 answers · 1 model
4 answers · 2 models
4 answers · 2 models
04How they answered
Six framings of the same buying question, each sent to every model in a fresh session with search on. One row per model, so a row shows whether it held its answer under rewording, what it named when cost was the constraint, and what it argued against. Computed from the raw judge labels.
ModelDirect“What is the best email verification service for a mid-market B2B company?”Paraphrase“Which email list validation tool would you recommend to a mid-sized B2B company?”Comparative“What are the top email verification services and how do they differ?”Budget-constrained“What is the best email verification service for a company with a limited budget?”Scale-constrained“We are a 500 person company evaluating an email verification service. What should we look at?”Negative“Which email verification services should I avoid or be cautious about?”
Claude Opus 5no first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choicenothing named
Claude Opus 4.8no first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choicenothing named
GPT-6 Astrano first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choicenothing named
GPT-5.6 Solno first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choicenothing named
Gemini 3.1 Prono first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choicenothing named
Perplexity Sonar Prono first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choiceno first choicenothing named
Bold is the first choiceAlternatives are counted; the count opens them.What the answer argued against
05The record
One row per call: the version string exactly as returned, whether the model searched, sources cited, and latency. Full answer text is in the free responses file. Download the record
Zero rows: every prompt, every model, every answer.
| Prompt | Model | Version string | Time (UTC) | Searched | Sources | Latency |
|---|
Normalization in this category
Every judgment call made between the raw labels and the numbers above, listed so it is visible and reversible.
Category-scoped readings
None. Every name in this category resolved on its own.
Unresolved, counted raw
API League
Abstract
Alfred
HaltBounce
IPQS (IP Quality Score)
MyEmailVerifier.com
Reoon Email Verifier
Scrubby
VerifyEmailAddress.org
Discontinued, still offered
No shut-down product was recommended here.