Head to head
ContactOut vs FullContact
As a data enrichment API, FullContact rates higher on the APIbenchmarks Index, 68.4 to 55, a 13.4-point gap. Here is how they compare on each criterion.
Criterion by criterion
| Criterion | ContactOut | FullContact |
|---|---|---|
| Documentation & DX | ||
| Reliability | ||
| Ecosystem & SDKs | ||
| Accessibility | ||
| APIbenchmarks Index | 55.0 | 68.4 |
Specifications
| ContactOut | FullContact | |
|---|---|---|
| Best for | LinkedIn-based email and phone lookup for recruiters and sales | Identity resolution / Identity Graph |
| Free tier | 5 emails, 5 phones, 5 exports/day in the app; API not included | 100 API calls/mo (Developer plan) |
| Pricing | Credits (search, email, phone) on a quoted API plan | Per matched API call |
| Official SDKs | 4 languages | 7 languages |
Is ContactOut better than FullContact?
On the APIbenchmarks Index, FullContact rates higher (68.4 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
FullContact leads by 13.4 points (68.4 vs 55) and wins 3 of 4 criteria.
Winner by criterion
| Criterion | Winner | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Documentation & DX | 70 | 70 | Tie |
| Reliability | 58 | 70 | |
| Ecosystem & SDKs | 50 | 62 | |
| Accessibility | 35 | 72 |
Choose ContactOut if… / choose FullContact if…
- →your use case matches its focus: linkedin-based email and phone lookup for recruiters and sales
- →reliability matters most to you (70 vs 58)
- →ecosystem & sdks matters most to you (62 vs 50)
- →accessibility matters most to you (72 vs 35)
- →you need broad SDK coverage (7 official SDKs vs 4)
- →your use case matches its focus: identity resolution / identity graph
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 matched API call
- Free tier
- 100 API calls/mo (Developer plan)
- Developer (Free)$0
- Growth$99/month
- Basic~$500/month
- Premium~$2,000/month
- Enterprise$10,000+/month (custom)
Vendor-published pricing, verified 2026-10-07 (ContactOut) and 2026-06-27 (FullContact).
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 FullContact · 7
Go (official V3 client)Java 8 (official V3 client)Java 11+ (official V3 client)Python (official V3 client)Ruby (archived/legacy)PHP (archived/legacy)Postman collection
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
- +Multi-field enrichment: accepts many identifier types (email, phone, name+address, social URLs/usernames, MAIDs, plus Resolve PersonIDs) to lift match rates
- +Deep attribute coverage, 900+ appendable data attributes via Person Insights Bundles (demographics, household, employment history, affinities, shopping habits)
- +Tunable confidence: ML 'Belief Vector' lets callers set confidence thresholds per request to balance precision vs. match rate
- –Real-world match rates often far below the advertised 93%, reviewers report ~40-50%, especially outside the U.S.
- –Data-quality complaints of false positives in age, employment, and education fields, with no data-freshness timestamps on attributes
- –Rate limit (~600 queries/min) too low for large batch enrichment jobs
ContactOut vs FullContact: questions
- Which has better documentation, ContactOut or FullContact?
- ContactOut and FullContact score the same on documentation and developer experience (70).
- Which is more reliable, ContactOut or FullContact?
- FullContact scores higher on reliability: 70 vs 58 out of 100.
- Do ContactOut and FullContact have a free tier?
- ContactOut: yes (5 emails, 5 phones, 5 exports/day in the app; API not included). FullContact: yes (100 API calls/mo (Developer plan)).
- How are ContactOut and FullContact priced?
- ContactOut: Credits (search, email, phone) on a quoted API plan. FullContact: Per matched API call.
- Which has more official SDKs?
- FullContact lists 7 official SDKs, ContactOut lists 4.