Hunter.io vs Datagma (2026): Data, Pricing and API Compared

Hunter.io and Datagma both find work emails, but they start from different places. Hunter starts from a company domain and sells credits at prices you can read. Datagma starts from a person or a profile URL, and it is built to find mobile numbers.

Verdict

• Pick Hunter.io if you need work emails from a domain or a name, want an official MCP server, and want a price list. Growth is $149 a month for 10,000 credits (Hunter pricing, September 2026).
• Pick Datagma if you need direct mobiles for a list you already have. Regular is $49 a month for 3,000 emails and 100 phones (Datagma pricing, September 2026).
• Pick neither if you pull people and companies by API at volume. Hunter's 1M price is a one-off credit purchase, and Datagma publishes no 1M price. LeadOcean is one option: Pro is $499 a month, flat.

Side by side

Data and coverage

Neither vendor publishes a database size you can compare. Hunter shows one number on its homepage: 150,430,313 email addresses verified (Hunter, September 2026). Datagma shows no count at all (Datagma API, September 2026).

Hunter is an email index. You give it a domain and Domain Search lists the addresses it found there. Give it a name and a domain and Email Finder returns the likeliest address. Domain Search filters by seniority and department inside one domain (Hunter API docs, September 2026).

Datagma is an enrichment API. Its enrich call takes a profile URL or email, or a name plus a company, and returns 50+ fields (Datagma API, September 2026). A Find People endpoint lists employees at a company, and a Job Change Detection endpoint tells you when a contact moves (Datagma API docs, September 2026).

Phones separate them. Datagma sells phone lookups as a main product and claims strong European mobile coverage (Datagma, September 2026). Hunter shows a phone_number field on some Domain Search results and has no phone endpoint in the docs we read (Hunter API docs, September 2026). If mobiles matter, Datagma is the more direct route.

Email quality is claimed, not measured, on both sides. Datagma returns only verified emails and does not bill catch-all addresses it cannot verify (Datagma API, September 2026). Hunter's Email Finder verifies what it finds, and its Verifier costs half a credit per check (Hunter help, September 2026). Run the same 500 people through both free plans before you pay.

API and developer experience

Both have a REST API, and both answer a GET. The difference is where the key goes and what you send. Hunter finds an email from a domain and a name. Placeholders below stand in for a real person (Hunter API docs, September 2026).

curl -G "https://api.hunter.io/v2/email-finder" \
  -H "X-API-KEY: $HUNTER_API_KEY" \
  --data-urlencode "domain=acme.com" \
  --data-urlencode "first_name=Jane" \
  --data-urlencode "last_name=Doe"

A miss costs no credit. One quirk matters in code: a rate-limited call returns 403, and 429 means you ran out of credits or plan quota (Hunter API docs, September 2026).

Datagma finds a verified work email from a name and a company. The key is a query parameter on every call (Datagma API, September 2026).

curl -G "https://gateway.datagma.net/api/ingress/v6/findEmail" \
  --data-urlencode "apiId=$DATAGMA_API_ID" \
  --data-urlencode "fullName=Jane Doe" \
  --data-urlencode "company=Acme" \
  --data-urlencode "findEmailV2Step=3" \
  --data-urlencode "findEmailV2Country=General"

A call with no verified result costs 0 credits. Datagma documents no request limit, so you learn its throttle by hitting it (Datagma API docs, September 2026).

Hunter documents each endpoint on its own. Email Finder and Domain Search allow 15 a second and 500 a minute. The Verifier allows 10 a second and Discover 5. Limits are per endpoint, not per plan (Hunter API docs, September 2026).

On MCP, Hunter wins on documented facts. Its server takes your API key in a header, is included in every plan and spends your plan credits (Hunter MCP, September 2026). Datagma's site and docs do not mention MCP. The only listing we found is run by Zapier, not Datagma (Zapier, September 2026).

Pricing

Figures use the monthly list price first, with the billed-yearly price after it.

At 10,000 records a month

Take 10,000 work emails. Hunter: one credit per email found, so 10,000 credits. Growth includes 10,000 credits a month for $149, or $104 a month billed yearly (Hunter pricing, September 2026).

Datagma: Popular allows 7,500 emails a month, so 10,000 needs Expert. Expert is $249 a month for 22,500 emails and 750 phones (Datagma pricing, September 2026). Annual billing takes 20% off every paid plan (Datagma pricing, September 2026).

At 10,000 emails a month, Hunter is $100 cheaper on monthly billing, and you pay only for emails found on both. Datagma includes five seats on Expert. Hunter shares one credit pool across unlimited team members.

At 1M records a month

Hunter: 1,000,000 Search credits on Data Platform cost $6,900. That is $0.0069 a credit, paid once and valid 12 months (Hunter Data Platform, September 2026). Above 1M is custom, so 1M every month is a quote.

The all-in-one route costs more. Scale is $299 a month for 25,000 credits, and the other 975,000 come from packs at up to $0.02 each. That is $19,500, so about $19,799 in total. Packs cap at 180,000 credits per purchase, so at 1M use Data Platform (Hunter help, September 2026).

Datagma: no public 1M price. Its pricing page lists plans up to Expert and sends anything larger to a sales call (Datagma pricing, September 2026). We do not multiply a plan rate out to 1M, because Enterprise may price differently.

Volume still tells you something. Expert includes 22,500 emails a month, so 1,000,000 / 22,500 is about 45 months on the biggest self-serve plan.

Time matters for Hunter too. Email Finder allows 500 a minute, so 1,000,000 / 500 = 2,000 minutes, about 33 hours.

Where Hunter.io wins

A price list you can read

Hunter publishes every plan, every credit cost and a 1M price. Starter is $49 a month, Growth $149 and Scale $299, or $34, $104 and $209 billed yearly (Hunter pricing, September 2026). You can budget before you talk to anyone.

A documented API and an official MCP server

Rate limits are written down per endpoint. The MCP server is official, included in every plan and uses the same credits as the API (Hunter MCP, September 2026). That makes an agent build predictable.

Finding and verifying by domain

Give Hunter a domain and it lists the people and addresses it found there. Verification is half a credit and returns a status. Hunter also has Sequences, a Chrome extension and a Sheets add-on, so a team can find and send in one product (Hunter, September 2026).

Where Datagma wins

Mobile numbers for a known list

Datagma finds a direct mobile from a profile URL or email, and checks WhatsApp at the same time (Datagma API, September 2026). Its enrich call also takes a name plus a company, so a list of names and employers works as it is. Hunter has no phone endpoint to match.

Pay per match, with rollover

A failed lookup costs nothing, and unverifiable catch-all emails are not billed (Datagma API, September 2026). Unused credits roll over for up to 12 months (Datagma API, September 2026). Hunter's monthly credits reset each month (Hunter help, September 2026).

Job changes and Clay

Datagma has a Job Change Detection endpoint, so you can watch for a contact who moves (Datagma API docs, September 2026). It is also a native Clay provider with bring-your-own-key support (Datagma API, September 2026).

If you need volume through an API

Both tools price per match, so your bill moves with your volume. LeadOcean is a different shape: 693M people and 63M companies behind one REST API and an MCP server with 12 tools. Pro is $499 a month, flat, with no credits and no per-record price. Free gives you 1,000 records, one-off, with no card, and POST /v1/exports pulls up to 50,000 rows per request.

It is not the cheaper choice at small volume. Hunter's published rate is $475 for 50,000 Search credits, so below that volume Hunter costs less than $499 (Hunter Data Platform, September 2026). See pricing for what is included.

FAQ