Apollo.io vs Cognism
Twelve of fourteen models named Apollo.io first on the direct prompt; zero named Cognism. Apollo.io was named by thirteen of the fourteen models and Cognism by fourteen and Apollo.io carries 68 labels and Cognism 52, so the shares are not directly comparable.
San Francisco, United States, founded 2015. Named in twenty-six categories this edition.
Named in eleven categories this edition.
Share is the count of first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts over all fourteen models, for a mid-market B2B company; rank is within the category; every quote names the model and the prompt it came from. Both figures come from the sales intelligence and contact data page.
By framing
Apollo.ioFirst choices, of fourteen modelsCognism
Across every category in the October 2026 Edition, Apollo.io and Cognism were named in the same answer 305 times, of the 1056 answers naming Apollo.io and the 402 naming Cognism. In those answers Cognism took the first choice twenty-one times and Apollo.io 125.
Every model, every framing
| Model | Direct | Paraphrase | Comparative | Budget-constrained | Scale-constrained | Negative |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Claude Haiku 4.5 | | | | | | |
| GPT-5.4 mini | | | | | ||
| Gemini 3.5 Flash | | | | | | |
| Perplexity Sonar | | | | | ||
| Grok 4.20 | | | | | | |
| Mistral Small | | | ||||
| DeepSeek V4 Flash | | | | | | |
| Llama 4 Maverick | | |||||
| Qwen 3.7 Flash | | | | | | |
| Kimi K2 | | | | | | |
| GLM 4.7 FlashX | | | | | | |
| MiniMax M2.5 | | | | | | |
| GPT-6 Luna | | | | | | |
| Muse Glimmer 30B | | | | | | |
Apollo.io Cognism first choice named as an alternative argued againstblank: not namedEach cell is one answer, Apollo.io on the left and Cognism on the right.The direct prompt
Apollo.io first, Cognism an alternative
12 of 14 modelsCognism was named in the answer but not as the choice, or not at all.Neither was the first choice, one was named
1 of 14 modelsThe answer put something else first and named one of the two as an alternative.Neither was named
1 of 14 modelsThe answer made no first choice from these two in this category.Bold names in an answer are the products the judge labeled a first choice; a model naming several gives each of them that label. The full answer text for every row is in the record.
By buyer segment
Apollo.io87%#1 of 10Cognism0%#9 of 10Apollo.io73%#1 of 9Cognism2%#5 of 9What the models said about Apollo.io
Every negative label with a quote, up to three, then the highest-weighted positives, up to three. Four of four in this category shown.
“Apollo's data quality issues are well-documented and compound fast, with 20-30% bounce rates being its most critical weakness” Claude Haiku 4.5 · negative prompt · hard negative
“Both had LinkedIn pages yanked in 2024 for scraping violations and terms of service issues” MiniMax M2.5 · negative prompt · hard negative
“Apollo.io: Best "All-in-One" Platform for Budget-Conscious Mid-Market Teams... Choose Apollo.io. It combines contact databases with sequencing at an unbeatable price point.” Gemini 3.5 Flash · direct prompt · first choice
“If you're looking for a single platform that gives you both discovery and outreach, go with Apollo.io. It's the go-to all-in-one choice for mid-market teams” GLM 4.7 FlashX · paraphrase prompt · first choice
What the models said about Cognism
Every negative label with a quote, up to three, then the highest-weighted positives, up to three. Four of four in this category shown.
“and Cognism (expensive, EU-focused) if budget is your primary constraint” DeepSeek V4 Flash · budget prompt · hard negative
“Avoid ZoomInfo and Cognism for now” Kimi K2 · budget prompt · hard negative
“Cognism is particularly known for GDPR/CCPA compliance-first design and Diamond Data phone verification, making it a strong candidate if European markets are a priority.” DeepSeek V4 Flash · scale prompt · first choice
“Cognism: Highly rated for EMEA/UK mobile data (GDPR-compliant, human-verified "Diamond Data")” Qwen 3.7 Flash · negative prompt · first choice
Comparisons are drawn for the top eight products in each category, each against each. The output is the models' output; nothing here is a recommendation by the index.