Small business▲+4Since September 2026: 13% → 17%, +4 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.
17%from 13% in September 2026
Inside the floor by 7 pointsRank 2 → 3 of 51
1 category · RankedHunter Email Verifier
92Judge labels
12First choices
8Negative labels
14 / 14Models named it
1Category
October 2026 Edition. Every number here is derived from the raw labels under vendor table v2026-10-05.2, every buyer segment counted.
Best standing
18% in Email verification for small business buyers
Rank 5 of 65 in the mid-market standingaccepted challenger
0 of 14 models made it the first choice on the direct prompt; 7% of its 29 labels there were negative.
What the models named instead of Hunter Email Verifier →By buyer segmentStrongest at small business.
Small business2 of 56
18%46 labels
accepted challenger
Mid-market5 of 65
4%29 labels
accepted challenger
Enterprise19 of 52
0%17 labels
criticized challenger
In email verification · each standing computed within its segment · bars are 0 to 100 · the accent bar is the product's own best reading
Standing by category
Every category where a model named Hunter Email Verifier for a mid-market B2B company. Share is first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts; rank is within every product named in that category.
| Category | Function | Share | Rank | Negative rate | Labels | Quadrant | Since September 2026 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Email verification | GTM data and infrastructure | 4% | 5 of 65 | 7% | 29 | accepted challenger | ▼−6Since September 2026: 10% → 4%, −6 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked. |
Movement
Since September 2026, Hunter Email Verifier held within the floor in its one category: no change cleared 11 points.
Best category · Email verification · by segment
Mid-market▼−6Since September 2026: 10% → 4%, −6 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.
4%from 10% in September 2026
Inside the floor by 5 pointsRank 3 → 5 of 61
Enterprise▼−6Since September 2026: 6% → 0%, −6 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.
0%from 6% in September 2026
Inside the floor by 5 pointsRank 3 → 16 of 50
All categories · Mid-market
| Category | September 2026 | Now | Change | Reading | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Email verification | 10% | 4% | ▼−6Since September 2026: 10% → 4%, −6 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked. | Within noise | Rank 3 → 5 of 65 |
Shares here are read over the models both editions asked, so they can differ by a point or two from the standing above, which counts every model in this edition.
The floor is 11 points of share, measured: how far the models move a leader on their own when the same questions are asked twice with nothing changed. A larger change is movement; a smaller one is noise, and both are shown. Movement is read over the twelve models both editions asked; GPT-6 Luna, Muse Glimmer 30B joined this edition and are in the standing but not yet in the comparison. How the floor is measured · The editions
By model
How each model treated Hunter Email Verifier across every prompt where it was named for a mid-market B2B company. Fourteen models, six prompts per category.ShowHide
By model
How each model treated Hunter Email Verifier across every prompt where it was named for a mid-market B2B company. Fourteen models, six prompts per category.
ShowHide| Model | First choice | Alternative | Mention | Negative | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Claude Haiku 4.5 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| GPT-5.4 mini | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| Gemini 3.5 Flash | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 |
| Perplexity Sonar | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 2 |
| Grok 4.20 | 0 | 4 | 0 | 1 | 5 |
| Mistral Small | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 |
| DeepSeek V4 Flash | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| Llama 4 Maverick | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Qwen 3.7 Flash | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 3 |
| Kimi K2 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| GLM 4.7 FlashX | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| MiniMax M2.5 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| GPT-6 Luna | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Muse Glimmer 30B | 0 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 3 |
By framing
Which of the six questions produced the naming. By model says how often; this says asked what. The first-choice count on the right carries the marks of the models that produced it.
FramingLabels by classFirst choices
Direct19 labels3
Paraphrase19 labels7
Comparative26 labels2not counted in share
Budget-constrained9 labels2
Scale-constrained9 labelsNone
Negative10 labels2not counted in share
First choiceAlternativeMentionNegative92 labels in all, every segment counted; 12 of the 16 first choices count toward share, since the comparative and negative framings do not. The bar is one segment per label class, to scale within the framing.
What the models said for it
Verbatim evidence the judge attached to positive labels.
“Best All-Rounder: Hunter.io ... is the strongest recommendation for mid-sized teams looking to consolidate tools.” Qwen 3.7 Flash · Email verification · paraphrase prompt · first choice
“The most consistently reliable tier ... is NeverBounce, ZeroBounce, Hunter, and Bouncer” DeepSeek V4 Flash · Email verification · negative prompt · first choice
“the best choice is usually MillionVerifier or Hunter's free plan” GPT-5.4 mini · Email verification · budget prompt · first choice
“All-in-One Sales Prospecting & Verifying ... Best For: Outbound sales teams that want to find leads and verify them in a single workspace.” Gemini 3.5 Flash · Email verification · comparative prompt · alternative
And against it
Verbatim evidence attached to negative labels. A warning on a product with few labels is a warning; on a product with many, it is one voice among them.
“Be cautious for pure verification ... better as a combo tool than standalone verifier.” Grok 4.20 · Email verification · negative prompt · soft negative
“Using Hunter for mass cleaning is often overpriced and yields lower accuracy stats.” Qwen 3.7 Flash · Email verification · negative prompt · soft negative
Named alongside
The products named in the same answers as Hunter Email Verifier, over the 92 answers that named it. Took the first choice instead counts the answers where the other product was the first choice and Hunter Email Verifier was named but was not.ShowHide
Named alongside
The products named in the same answers as Hunter Email Verifier, over the 92 answers that named it. Took the first choice instead counts the answers where the other product was the first choice and Hunter Email Verifier was named but was not.
ShowHideProductSame answerTook the first choice insteadHead to head
A head-to-head page exists where both products are among a category's top eight. The other rows are the same fact without a page behind them, so they link to the product instead.
What carried it into the answer
The sites and pages cited by the answers that named Hunter Email Verifier. A fact about retrieval, not a lever on the model.
Citations exist only for the models that return a source list, five of the fourteen in this edition, so these counts come from 79 of the 92 answers that named Hunter Email Verifier and are not a share of its labels.
Domains cited
hunter.ioYour site47
kickbox.com41
usebouncer.com37
sender.net34
zerobounce.net31
overloop.com29
pipeline.zoominfo.com28
sparkle.io28
mailtrap.io23
instantly.ai22
273 of the 320 domain citations in answers naming Hunter Email Verifier came from somebody else's page.
Pages cited
Pages are listed as the models cited them.
Search and answers
hunter.io ranks 5 on Google for the category's searches. In the answers, Hunter Email Verifier takes 4% of first choices and ZeroBounce takes 42%.ShowHide
Search and answers
hunter.io ranks 5 on Google for the category's searches. In the answers, Hunter Email Verifier takes 4% of first choices and ZeroBounce takes 42%.
ShowHideIn search
Google, US estimatesPosition for “email verification service”
5
Position for “best email verification service”
–
not in the top ten
- Searches for its name, Google
- 5,400 a month (“hunter email verifier”)
- AI search demand for its name, est.
- 0 a month
- Organic visits to its site
- about 152,782 a month
- Searches its site ranks for
- 7,884 · 1,012 in the top three
- Sites linking to it
- 12,056
- Paid Google search
- No ads found in the estimate; that does not mean it runs none
In answers
This editionShare of first choices
4%
rank 5 of 65 in email verification
Segment leader
42%
ZeroBounce
- First choices
- 12 across its categories
- Named in
- 92 answers
- Its own site cited
- in 79 of the answers that named it
Search figures are US estimates from DataForSEO, read September 28, 2026; AI search demand is its modeled, directional estimate, not a count of queries to any assistant. The answers are this edition's. Two measurements side by side: neither is read as the cause of the other.
What it publishes
ShowHide
What it publishes
ShowHideAddresses on hunter.io
3,694
subdomains included
Content
854
counted in the table below
Documentation
254
Product · Integration
2 · 11
| Kind | Pages | Last 90 days | 2025-10 to 2026-09 | Latest | Categories named |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Template or tool | 547 | undated | |||
| Blog | 209 | 12 | 2026-09-28 | ||
| Case study | 46 | 5 | 2026-07-17 | ||
| Podcast or video | 16 | undated | |||
| Webinar or virtual event | 13 | undated | |||
| Conference or event | 8 | undated | |||
| Comparison | 8 | 1 | 2026-09-08 | ||
| Report or ebook | 4 | undated | |||
| Glossary or explainer | 2 | 0 | 2025-05-12 | ||
| News or press | 1 | undated |
Most recent
- 2026-09-28Data provenance for ai agents blog
- 2026-09-24Email infrastructure blog
- 2026-09-16Should you email more than one person per company blog
- 2026-09-0811891855 static vs dynamic lists in hunter leads comparison
- 2026-09-01Llms get email data wrong blog
- 2026-08-2515 ways to find similar leads blog
How it is countedHide how it is counted
Every page hunter.io exposes, subdomains included. Kind is read from the address and title. The last 90 days, the latest date and the twelve months count pages by when they were published, from the site's feeds, a date in the address, or the page's own publication date, read from up to a hundred of its most recently changed pages; a page that says only when it last changed is counted in its kind but not in when, so the recent counts are a floor, and a kind none of whose pages gives a publication date reads undated. An event counts as online when its address or title says so (webinar, on demand, virtual or online summit); a conference, summit, trade show, expo or roadshow that does not say so is counted as a conference or event, which on a vendor's site is mostly in person. Read September 29, 2026.
Names read as Hunter Email Verifier
What the judge wrote, as written, with how often. The vendor table decides that these count as Hunter Email Verifier; a claim can dispute any of them.
Hunter 16Hunter.io 10Hunter (Email Verifier) 2Hunter (Email Finder & Verifier) 1
Follow Hunter Email Verifier
An email the morning each edition publishes: where this product moved, where it held, and by how much against the noise floor. One address, confirmed by a click; a stop link in every email.
Already following? Everything you follow, with a stop for each.
The company
Hunter.io is the company behind Hunter Email Verifier.ShowHide
The company
Hunter.io is the company behind Hunter Email Verifier.
ShowHideOn record
Wikidata- Website
- hunter.io
- Headquarters
- United States
- Founded
- 2015
Fetched September 14, 2026. These describe the company, not the product's standing, and a claimed page can dispute any of them. · Wikidata · LinkedIn · Crunchbase
In its own words
Stated by the vendor, not checked- Positioning
- A free email checker to instantly spot risky or fake email addresses.
- For
- sales teams, marketers, recruiters, founders, PR professionals, event organizers/community managers
- Price stated
- free hunter.io/email-verifier
- Starting price
- 0.00 hunter.io/email-verifier
- Free plan or trial
- no signup needed; Free plan lets you verify up to 100 email addresses per month hunter.io/email-verifier
- Customers named
- ClazarCanvaPlanhat CRMLatticeAcquire.com
- Not stated on the pages read
- Integrations, certifications, hosting
What Hunter Email Verifier's own pages state, read October 5, 2026: hunter.io/email-verifier, hunter.io, hunter.io/pricing, hunter.io/technologies/categories/security, hunter.io/technologies/platformos. A claimed page can correct any of them.
Is this your product?
Claim this page
Claiming is free and changes nothing in the data. A claimed page shows a verified contact who is told when each edition publishes and when Hunter Email Verifier's standing changes by more than the noise floor; the right to propose corrections to the vendor table, meaning names the judge wrote that should or should not read as Hunter Email Verifier, applied by version and listed in the change log; and a one-line description supplied by the vendor and marked as such.
What a new claim receivesHide what a new claim receives
A new claim receives the current edition's vendor brief for Hunter Email Verifier by email, built from the raw record of the edition. It shows:
- where Hunter Email Verifier is named, by buyer and by framing, and which cells hold its first choices;
- the claims the models make when they name it, ranked, with the strongest and the weakest quoted;
- its vocabulary against the segment leader's, and the pages the models cited;
- who was chosen in the answers that did not name Hunter Email Verifier, and every reason the record gives;
- a battlecard for each top rival: the head-to-head split, why they win, and the reservation quoted against them;
- one page of published figures cleared to show a buyer.