Hunter.io alternative for company website contacts: when a pay-per-usage Apify Actor is enough

Updated 14 Oct 2026 · Disclosure: the Apify Actor compared here is built and published by Unadhi. Competitor facts below come only from their own public pages, read on 14 Oct 2026; each is linked in Sources. We did not log in, start trials or read paywalled material. No ratings, no reviews, no scores of our own.

Partner programme opening soon: join the free waitlist. Planned terms are 50% of each referred sale (75% once you have 5+ paying customers), single level, paid through Gumroad only from revenue received.

Short answer: Hunter.io is an email finder, verifier and cold-email tool with its own B2B database. Its pricing page lists Free ($0, 50 credits a month), Starter ($49 a month, or $34 a month billed yearly), Growth ($149 / $104) and Scale ($299 / $209). If your real job is narrower — “I have a list of company websites and I want the contact details each one publishes: role emails, phone numbers, WhatsApp and social links, one row per site” — our Website Contact Scraper on Apify does that, is free during launch, and you pay only Apify platform usage (Apify's free plan includes $5 of usage a month). If you need a named person's email, bulk verification or sequences, Hunter is the better pick.

The pain this page is about

You exported 300 businesses from Google Maps or a trade directory. Now you need to reach them, and opening each website to copy the contact page takes an afternoon. The question is whether you need a database subscription for that, or a tool that just reads the sites you already have.

Side by side (function and price, from public pages)

	Hunter.io	Unadhi Website Contact Scraper (Apify)
Main job	Find and verify email addresses (Domain Search, Email Finder, Email Verifier), B2B lead database, cold-email sequences	Visit each website you give it and return the public contact details it publishes
Where data comes from	Hunter's own data and search (per its pricing page and product)	Only the websites in your list: homepage first, then contact/about/impressum pages, usually 3–4 pages per site
Output	Emails found and verified; saved leads; CSV export	One de-duplicated row per site: emails (MX-checked), phones in E.164, WhatsApp/Telegram links turned into numbers, 16 social and messaging networks, and the page each was found on
Personal emails	Email Finder looks up a named person's address	Off by default: only role mailboxes (info@, sales@) are returned; personal addresses are dropped and counted unless you switch them on
Verification	Email Verifier (0.5 credit per verified email)	Free DNS/MX check only — not a mailbox verifier
Outreach	Sequences included (1 to 20 connected email accounts by plan)	None. Export the rows to your own mail tool
Price (public, 14 Oct 2026)	Free $0 (50 credits/mo) · Starter $49/mo or $34/mo yearly (2,000 credits/mo) · Growth $149 / $104 (10,000) · Scale $299 / $209 (25,000) · Enterprise custom	Actor fee: free during launch. You pay Apify platform usage only; Apify Free plan $0 with $5 usage/month included
How usage is counted	1 credit per email found; 0.5 per verification; no credit if nothing found	Apify compute and storage used by the run; blocked, failed and terms-blocked sites are skipped and not charged
Users	Unlimited users on all plans, sharing credits	Your Apify account
Cancel	Change or cancel any time; access to the end of the cycle	Nothing to cancel: no subscription with us

Who should pick Hunter.io instead

You need a specific person's work email (for example the purchasing head), not the company's shared inbox.
You already have a list of addresses and want them verified before a campaign.
You want finding, verifying and sequences in one tool, shared across a team.
You do not want to run cloud jobs or read JSON at all.

Who our Actor fits better

You start from a list of websites (a Google Maps run, a directory, a trade-fair list) and want what each site publishes.
You care about phones and WhatsApp as much as email — common for Indian SMEs, clinics, shops and dealers.
You want a privacy-first default: role mailboxes only, robots.txt respected, sites whose terms forbid scraping skipped.
You want to pay nothing to the developer during launch and keep costs inside Apify's free $5 monthly usage while you test.

Our own test numbers (not a review)

From the Actor's Store page, measured by us on 20 real company websites on 29 Sep 2026: 14 of 20 returned data — every site that allowed crawling — with 0 errors; 2 sites disallowed bots and 4 returned HTTP 403, and none of those 6 were charged. Average 3.8 pages per site. These are our measurements, not an independent benchmark.

Try it on five of your own websites first

Actor fee: free during launch · you pay only Apify platform usage

The Website Contact Scraper: Emails, Phones & WhatsApp is a pay-per-usage Actor on Apify. Apify's own docs explain the model: you pay only for the platform resources the run uses, with no extra charge from the developer (Apify docs). Apify's free plan is $0 and includes $5 of platform usage a month, with no credit card (apify.com/pricing). We do not quote a cost per 1,000 sites, because it depends on the sites; Apify suggests a small test run to measure it. Sites that block bots, disallow crawling or forbid scraping in their terms are skipped and not charged. Built and published by Unadhi (disclosure).

Open the Actor on Apify (free during launch)

Free gift: copy-paste input for a five-site test

{ "urls": ["example-one.com", "example-two.in", "example-three.com", "example-four.co.uk", "example-five.de"], "maxPagesPerSite": 4, "checkEmailMx": true, "includePersonalEmails": false, "defaultCountry": "IN" }

Replace the five domains with real ones from your list. Check the rows by hand against two of the sites before you run hundreds. More walk-throughs: find public role emails on a company website · add emails and phones to a Google Maps export.

Frequently asked questions

What is a good Hunter.io alternative for getting contact details from company websites?

If you already have a list of company websites, Unadhi's Website Contact Scraper on Apify reads each site and returns the contacts it publishes: role emails, phones, WhatsApp and Telegram links and social profiles, one row per site. Our Actor is free during launch; you pay only Apify platform usage, and Apify's free plan includes $5 of usage a month. Hunter.io is better when you need a named person's email.

How much does Hunter.io cost in 2026?

Hunter's pricing page, read on 14 Oct 2026, lists Free at $0 with 50 credits a month, Starter at $49 a month or $34 billed yearly, Growth at $149 or $104, and Scale at $299 or $209. Enterprise is custom. One credit is used per email found and 0.5 per verification.

Can the Apify contact scraper find a specific person's email like Hunter's Email Finder?

No, not by default. It has no database and reads only what each website publishes. It returns shared role mailboxes such as info@ and sales@; personal addresses are dropped unless you switch them on, which you should do only with a lawful basis under India's DPDP Act or GDPR.

Does the website contact scraper verify email addresses?

It runs a free DNS/MX check on each domain, which confirms the domain can receive mail. It is not a mailbox verifier. If you need each address verified before a campaign, Hunter's Email Verifier does that, at 0.5 credit per verified email according to its pricing page.

Which is cheaper for 1,000 websites, Hunter.io or the Apify Actor?

There is no honest single number for the Actor, because Apify usage depends on the sites. Run 10 to 20 sites first and read the usage in Apify billing. Sites that block bots or forbid scraping are skipped and not charged. Hunter's cost depends on emails found and verified against your credit plan.

Is the Unadhi contact scraper really free?

The Actor itself charges nothing during launch. It is a pay-per-usage Actor, so you pay Apify for the platform resources your run uses. Apify's free plan includes $5 of platform usage a month, per apify.com/pricing (read 14 Oct 2026).

Does Hunter.io have a free plan?

Yes. Hunter's pricing page lists a Free plan at $0 with 50 credits a month that do not roll over. Paid plans start at Starter, $49 a month or $34 a month billed yearly.

Not legal advice. Work emails and phone numbers of identifiable people are personal data under India's DPDP Act 2023 and the EU/UK GDPR; you decide what to do with the output and you stay responsible for it. Competitor prices and plans change; re-check their pricing pages before you decide. Spotted an error about any product on this page, including ours? Write to mininglife7@gmail.com and we correct it.

Sources

Hunter.io plans and pricing (Free, Starter, Growth, Scale; credit rules) — https://hunter.io/pricing (read 14 Oct 2026)
Unadhi Website Contact Scraper on Apify Store (pricing model, features, test figures) — https://apify.com/laudable_instrument/contact-details-scraper-half-price (read 14 Oct 2026)
Apify docs: pay-per-usage Actors — https://docs.apify.com/platform/actors/running/actors-in-store#pay-per-usage (read 14 Oct 2026)
Apify pricing (Free plan $0, $5 usage included) — https://apify.com/pricing (read 14 Oct 2026)

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Unadhi Guides are free, independent explainers. We correct errors as soon as we find them: write to mininglife7@gmail.com.