7 Best Email Finder APIs in 2026 (Compared)

An email finder API is an HTTP endpoint, or an MCP tool, that takes a person you can identify and returns a work email you can send to. Developers, RevOps teams and agent builders use one when a list is too large to look up by hand. The differences that hurt are rate limits, the price of a miss and what happens at 1M lookups. Hunter answers a rate-limited call with 403, not 429. LeadMagic caps its email finder at 600 requests a minute. Prospeo's Starter plan allows 2,000 enrichments a day.

This page ranks seven APIs on those limits, with list prices checked in September 2026. We ran no find-rate test, so we quote none. Each rival has its own page: Icypeas, Anymail Finder, Hunter, FullEnrich, Prospeo and LeadMagic.

TL;DR

"1M records" means 1M work-email lookups that return a result, at list price.

What we evaluated

• Endpoints and input: what you send (name and domain, profile URL, filter) and what comes back with the email.
• Rate limit: the stated speed, whether it is per plan or per endpoint, and the error code you get when you hit it.
• Cost of a miss: whether a lookup that finds nothing is billed, and whether repeats are free.
• MCP: whether an agent can run lookups, and how it signs in.
• Price at 1M: the public list price of 1M work-email lookups. Where none is published, we say so and do not multiply a rate out.

1. LeadOcean: best for pulls by filter, domain or agent with no credits

LeadOcean is a people and company database you query over REST or MCP. It holds 693M people, 366M with an email and 166M with a phone number, plus 67M companies. It is not a name plus domain finder. Enrich takes exactly one of linkedin_url, email, phone or person_id.

For a company, list people with GET /v1/companies/{domain}/people, then get the address from GET /v2/people/email/work with the person_id. A work email call returns one current-employer address, or data as null when none exists (LeadOcean docs, September 2026).

curl -s -G "https://api.leadocean.io/v2/people/email/work" \
  --data-urlencode "linkedin_url=https://www.linkedin.com/in/jane-doe" \
  -H "x-api-key: $LEADOCEAN_API_KEY"

Solo is $97 a month and Agency $497, with no credits. Each paid plan has a fair-use pace: Agency's is 1M enrichments a day, and past it the key slows until the window resets. Rate limits are 5 requests a second on Free, 50 on Solo and 200 on Agency, so 1M calls fit in under two hours on Agency. The MCP server at https://api.leadocean.io/mcp signs in with OAuth 2.1 and exposes 13 tools (LeadOcean MCP docs, October 2026).

Pros

• Agency is $497 a month with no credit meter and no overage invoice.
• 200 requests a second on Agency, and REST and MCP on the Free plan too.
• Every email comes with an email_status from 13 values, so you filter before you send.
• Free counts to size a pull, and a POST /v1/people/enrich miss is a free 404.

Cons

• No name plus domain lookup and no CSV upload to match your own list.
• A /v2/people/email/work miss counts one record. It sits inside the plan's pace, but it is not free.
• No waterfall, and no refund or credit-back for bounced emails.
• Exports are capped at 500,000 rows a day, so 1M exported rows takes two days.

Best for: engineers, RevOps and agents that pull emails by filter or by domain at a fixed bill.

Pricing: Free is 1,000 records, one-off, no card. Solo $97, Agency $497 and Platform $1,997 a month (LeadOcean pricing, October 2026).

2. Icypeas: best for the lowest public credit price at volume

Icypeas charges 1 credit per email found, and a search that finds nothing costs nothing (Icypeas docs, September 2026). Basic is $19 a month for 1,000 credits. Hypergrowth starts at $499 for 100,000 credits, and its selector lists a 1,000,000-credit tier at $3,992 a month (Icypeas pricing, September 2026).

Single email search, verification and domain search each allow 10 calls a second. Bulk search takes up to 5,000 rows per call at 1 call a second, and it is asynchronous: you submit, then poll (Icypeas docs, September 2026). The bulk route is the one to use at volume.

API and MCP are on every plan. The hosted MCP server at https://mcp.icypeas.com/mcp lists 21 tools and signs in with your API key (Icypeas MCP guide, September 2026). Credits roll over with no expiry.

Pros

• Lowest public 1M price after LeadOcean, with no charge for misses.
• Credits never expire, even after a cancellation.
• API and MCP on every plan, with a 0.1-credit verifier.

Cons

• Phone Finder is listed as coming soon, so there are no mobiles.
• The 1,000,000-credit tier sits in a selector that is hidden in the text view of the page. Check it live before you budget.
• Limits are 10 calls a second on single search, and Icypeas says they can change at any time.

Best for: teams that want the lowest public credit price for emails at volume.

Pricing: Basic $19, Premium $39, Advanced $89 and Hypergrowth $499 a month. Yearly Basic is $190 (Icypeas pricing, September 2026).

3. Anymail Finder: best for pay-per-find lookups

Anymail Finder is the closest to the classic finder: send a name and a company, get a verified email. A person email costs 1 credit, a decision-maker search 2 and a verification 0.2. Searches that find no verified email are free, and a repeat within 30 days is free (Anymail Finder pricing, September 2026).

The API docs state no rate limits and no daily call cap. Bulk jobs take up to 100,000 rows (Anymail Finder API docs, September 2026). A verified email that bounces can be reported for a credit back after review.

Monthly plans run from $29 for 400 credits to $799 for 100,000. Past that you buy one-time packs, up to 1,000,000 credits for $4,990. The MCP server at https://api.anymailfinder.com/mcp signs in through a browser, or takes an API key, and has five actions (Anymail Finder MCP page, September 2026).

Pros

• Free misses, free repeats and a credit back for bounces after review.
• No stated rate limit or daily cap, so the pace is yours to find out.
• Unlimited team members share one credit pool.

Cons

• The largest monthly plan is 100,000 credits. Bigger volume is a one-time pack or a volume quote.
• The MCP server covers single lookups, not bulk files or webhooks.
• The pricing page shows Canadian dollars to visitors in Canada. Add ?currency=usd for dollars.

Best for: teams that look up people by name and domain and want to pay only for verified finds.

Pricing: $29 a month for 400 credits, up to $799 for 100,000. Packs from 5,000 credits for $249. The free offer is 100 credits when you verify a card (Anymail Finder pricing, September 2026).

4. Hunter: best for documented per-endpoint limits and a Data Platform for volume

Hunter sells two routes. The all-in-one plans are Free (50 credits a month), Starter at $49 for 2,000, Growth at $149 for 10,000 and Scale at $299 for 25,000. The Data Platform is API and bulk only, and 1,000,000 Search credits cost $6,900, paid once and valid 12 months (Hunter Data Platform, September 2026).

Limits are documented per endpoint, not per plan. Email Finder, Domain Search and the enrichment endpoints allow 15 calls a second and 500 a minute (Hunter API docs, September 2026). At 500 a minute, 1M lookups take about 33 hours.

A found email costs 1 credit and nothing is charged when none is found (Hunter help, September 2026). The official MCP server at https://mcp.hunter.io/mcp takes an API key in a header and is included in all plans (Hunter MCP, September 2026).

Pros

• A published price for 1M lookups ($6,900), cheaper than the all-in-one route.
• Per-endpoint limits are documented, and a repeat lookup in the same billing period is free.
• MCP is included on every plan.

Cons

• A rate-limited call returns 403, and 429 means you hit your credit quota. Retry code written for 429 will not catch the rate limit.
• On monthly plans, unused credits do not carry over.
• The all-in-one route to 1M is about $19,799, because packs cap per purchase.

Best for: teams that want a finder, a verifier and an app, with a Data Platform for API volume.

Pricing: Starter $49, Growth $149 and Scale $299 a month. Yearly Starter is $34 a month ($408 a year) (Hunter pricing, September 2026).

5. FullEnrich: best for waterfall emails and mobiles in one call

FullEnrich queries 25+ data sources per contact and charges only for what it finds. A work email is 1 credit, a personal email 3 and a mobile 10. A not-found result costs 0 (FullEnrich docs, September 2026). It states an average work-email find rate of about 80% (FullEnrich pricing, September 2026). That is the vendor's figure, not ours.

Pro starts at $29 a month for 500 credits, or $26 a month billed yearly. The top monthly tier is 100,000 credits for $3,500 a month, and above that you contact sales. API, MCP, search and bulk CSV are on every plan, including the free trial.

The API allows 60 calls a minute across Enrich, Reverse Email and Search, and a bulk request takes up to 100 contacts. Over the limit it returns 429 with code error.rate.limit (FullEnrich docs, September 2026). The MCP server uses OAuth and covers search, enrich and export (FullEnrich help, September 2026).

Pros

• Waterfall across 25+ sources in one call, with misses and landlines free.
• Bulk requests of 100 contacts, so 60 calls a minute still moves 6,000 contacts.
• MCP can search, enrich and export.

Cons

• No public 1M price. The monthly list stops at 100,000 credits.
• Mobiles cost 10 credits each.
• A burst of single calls hits 60 a minute fast, so batch.

Best for: teams that want one call to try many providers for emails and mobiles.

Pricing: Pro from $29 a month for 500 credits. The free trial is 50 credits, no card (FullEnrich pricing, September 2026).

6. Prospeo: best for seat-based teams that want an app and an API

Prospeo bills per user. Starter is $49 a month for 2,000 credits, Growth $99 for 5,000 and Pro $249 for 15,000. Billed yearly, Starter is $37 a month (Prospeo pricing, September 2026). Credits from every seat go into one team pool.

A verified email is 1 credit and a mobile 10. A search with no result is 0, and a repeat lookup within 90 days is free (Prospeo help, September 2026). Unused credits expire at the end of each cycle.

Enrich limits are per second, minute and day. Starter gets 5, 300 and 2,000. Pro gets 30, 1,800 and 500,000 (Prospeo API docs, September 2026). The hosted MCP server at https://mcp.prospeo.io has 8 tools and signs in with OAuth 2.0 or an API key (Prospeo MCP docs, September 2026).

Pros

• A daily enrich limit of 500,000 on Pro, the highest stated daily ceiling here.
• OAuth or API key on the MCP server.
• Search and enrichment in one app, with a Chrome extension.

Cons

• Reaching 1M means 44 Pro seats plus the largest add-on on monthly billing.
• Credits expire each cycle, and add-ons need a paid plan.
• Starter allows 2,000 enrichments a day, so a 100,000-row list takes 50 days.

Best for: sales teams that work in an app and want an API on the side.

Pricing: Free $0 for 100 credits a month. Starter $49, Growth $99 and Pro $249 per user a month (Prospeo pricing, September 2026). The add-on slider ends at 350,000 credits a month for $3,500 (Prospeo help, September 2026).

7. LeadMagic: best for agents that sign in with OAuth and run many tools

LeadMagic is an email finder with a wide tool set. Email Finder costs 1 credit per valid email and a miss is free. A personal email is 2 credits, a mobile 5 and an email validation 0.25 (LeadMagic pricing explained, September 2026).

Email Finder is capped at 600 requests a minute, with a burst of about 10 a second (LeadMagic docs, September 2026). At that cap, 1M lookups take about 28 hours. The search API is zero-credit only on Professional and Ultimate, and on lower plans it bills about 1 credit per person returned.

LeadMagic runs a hosted MCP server with search, validation and job change tools. Sign-in is OAuth only, and static API keys are not accepted (LeadMagic MCP page, September 2026). That suits a desktop agent and is awkward for a server-side job.

Pros

• A free miss on Email Finder, and monthly credits roll over up to 2x the monthly allocation.
• MCP tools for search, validation and job change checks.
• Zero-credit search in the app on every paid plan.

Cons

• No free plan. It is pay-as-you-go from $99 a month, with a 14-day money-back guarantee on the first payment.
• No public 1M price. Self-serve plans stop at 100,000 credits.
• OAuth-only MCP sign-in rules out a key in a headless job.

Best for: agent builders who want a large tool set behind one OAuth sign-in.

Pricing: Essential $99, Growth $249, Professional $499 and Ultimate $849 a month. Billed yearly, Essential is $83 a month (LeadMagic pricing, September 2026).

Comparison table

How to choose

• Pulling by filter, by domain or by agent at a fixed bill: LeadOcean. Agency at $497 a month, REST and MCP on every plan.
• Name plus domain lookups and free misses: Anymail Finder, with no stated rate limit. Icypeas if the lowest credit price matters more.
• The lowest public price per credit at 1M: Icypeas, at $3,992 a month.
• Per-endpoint limits you can plan around: Hunter, with the Data Platform for volume.
• Emails and mobiles from many providers in one call: FullEnrich. Batch 100 contacts per request.
• A seat-based sales app with an API: Prospeo.
• An agent that signs in with OAuth and needs many tools: LeadMagic.
• A wider shortlist: read what an email finder is, then best email finder tools or the UK list.

Verdict

LeadOcean wins for pulls by filter, domain or agent. It is the only API here with a plan price at 1M and no credits, and its MCP server returns records. It does not take a name plus domain, so it fits teams that build lists rather than clean them. Anymail Finder wins for name plus domain lookups, Icypeas on public credit price and Hunter on documented limits. FullEnrich wins on waterfall, Prospeo for seat-based sales teams and LeadMagic for OAuth agents. Start on the free plan and run the same ten lookups in two tools before you pay.

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