Soku AISemrush vs SpyFu (2026): Which Is Better for PPC Competitor Research?
Semrush vs SpyFu through a PPC lens, verified 2026-10-12. SpyFu Pro + AI: $119/mo or $89/mo yearly with unlimited exports. Semrush Advertising toolkit: $99 Base, $220 Pro. Ad history, spend estimates and seat costs at 1, 3 and 5 users.
Prices and feature claims last verified against both vendors' own published pages on 2026-10-12.
"Semrush vs SpyFu" usually gets answered as an SEO question: whose keyword database is bigger, whose backlink index is fresher. That is not what most people searching it need. SpyFu built its name on one job, seeing which Google Ads keywords and ads a competitor runs, and Semrush now sells that job as a separate Advertising toolkit. So this comparison looks at the two through a PPC lens only: paid keyword coverage, ad history, spend estimates, and what it costs to put your team on either one.
Here is how we built it.
- Both vendors' own pages, read on 2026-10-12. Prices come from spyfu.com/pricing, semrush.com/prices and semrush.com/pricing/advertising. Method claims come from each vendor's help center. Sources are listed at the end.
- We didn't buy either tool. We hold no paid seat on Semrush or SpyFu. The plan was to run the same five competitor domains through both and compare paid keyword counts. That only works if both tools show data logged-out. SpyFu does: its domain overview loads without an account. Semrush doesn't: its Advertising Research report showed no data when we loaded it logged-out on 2026-10-12. A one-sided test isn't a comparison, so we didn't run it.
- What we built instead is a PPC-lens capability matrix from each vendor's documentation, a seat-cost table at 1, 3 and 5 users, and a list of places where each vendor's own pages contradict each other. Where we add judgment, we label it.
Neither product is ours. Where Soku fits is a short note at the end. For SpyFu by itself, see our SpyFu review. For the wider field of SpyFu replacements, see SpyFu alternatives.
The Short Answer
- Pick SpyFu if your paid work is Google search ads and you want the most competitor history and exports for the money. Pro + AI is $89 a month billed yearly for unlimited results and exports, 10+ years of ad history and API credits.
- Pick Semrush if you also need Google Shopping research, display, video or social ad intelligence, a tool that launches Google and Meta campaigns, or a full SEO suite under the same login. Expect to pay for two products: an SEO + AI Search plan and the Advertising toolkit.
- Don't pick either one for its spend number. Both tools sample Google's results from the outside, and both vendors' help centers say their spend figures are estimates to compare against, not measurements.
What Each Product Is Today
SpyFu is a competitor research tool for Google search. Its navigation splits into SEO Research, PPC Research and Keyword Research. The PPC side has a PPC Overview, Competitors, Kombat (a shared-keyword comparison), PPC Keywords, Ad History, a Google Ads Advisor and Google Ads Templates. One subscription covers everything, and SpyFu's pitch is unlimited data: no row caps on Pro + AI and Team/Agency. Newer additions include a Site Audit, RivalFlow content suggestions, a ChatGPT integration and AI brand monitoring.
Semrush is a suite of toolkits. Its main subscription combines the SEO and AI Visibility toolkits in plans called SEO, Starter, Pro+ and Advanced. Its subscription article describes specialist toolkits, including Traffic & Market, Local, Content, Social, Advertising and AI PR, that you "add on top". PPC research lives in the Advertising toolkit, which Semrush's toolkit article says includes:
- Advertising Research: competitors' paid keywords, positions, ad copy, ad history and landing pages
- PLA Research: Google Shopping campaigns
- AdClarity: display, video and social ads, on the Pro plan only
- Ads Launch Assistant: creates ads with AI and launches them to Google or Meta
- Ads AI Agent: a chatbot that gives recommendations for your own campaigns
The structural difference matters for budget. SpyFu sells one product with PPC built in. Semrush sells PPC research as a separate line item next to its SEO plans.
The Verified Price Tables
SpyFu (read from spyfu.com/pricing on 2026-10-12)
| Plan | Monthly billing | Annual billing | Users included | Extra user | Results and exports | Ad history | API |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Basic | $39/mo | $29/mo ($348/yr) | 1 | $15 | 10k rows | Not included | No |
| Pro + AI | $59 first month, then $119/mo | $89/mo ($1,068/yr) | 1 | $30 | Unlimited | 10+ years | Yes, $40 in API credits |
| Team/Agency | $249/mo | $187/mo ($2,244/yr) | 5 | $30 | Unlimited | 10+ years | Yes, $100 in API credits |
Pro + AI and Team/Agency also include pre-built Google Ads campaigns, Search Console integration and white-label reports. Tracked keyword rankings are 5k, 15k and 50k a week across the three plans. SpyFu offers a 30-day money-back guarantee and says you can cancel by email, live chat, phone or the account page. There's no free plan, but the logged-out domain overview shows headline numbers for any domain.
Semrush Advertising toolkit (read from semrush.com/pricing/advertising on 2026-10-12)
| Plan | Price | Advertising Research and PLA Research | AdClarity | Ads Launch Assistant | Extra user |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Base | $99/mo | Yes, unlimited Google Ads exports | No | Yes: unlimited ad spend and launches, 100 AI Google ad copies and 100 AI Meta ad copies a month | $20/mo |
| Pro | $220/mo | Yes | Yes: 1 geo location, 3 months of history, 1 channel (display, social or video), 5 campaign results, up to 50 reports and 5 exports | Yes | $20/mo |
The pricing page showed the same $99 and $220 on both the monthly and the annual toggle, so there's no annual discount on this toolkit. Both plans have a 7-day free trial, per Semrush's plans article.
Semrush SEO + AI Search plans (read from semrush.com/prices on 2026-10-12)
| Plan | Monthly | Annual (per month) | Results per report | Reports per day | Extra user | API |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | $0 | Not listed | 10 | Not listed | No |
| SEO | $139 | $117.33 | 10,000 | 3,000 | $45 | No |
| Starter | $199 | $165.17 | 10,000 | 3,000 | $45 | No |
| Pro+ | $299 | $248.17 | 30,000 | 5,000 | $80 | No |
| Advanced | $549 | $455.67 | 50,000 | 10,000 | $100 | Yes |
Each plan includes 1 user. Historical data is listed from Pro+ up. Semrush's help center notes that paid traffic figures appear in Domain Overview as well as in Advertising Research. Even so, the toolkit article puts Advertising Research inside the Advertising toolkit. If competitor ads are the reason you're buying, budget for the toolkit.
The PPC-Lens Matrix
This is the original part of this page. It's built only from what each vendor documents, because we couldn't run the same domains through both tools. Read each row as "what the vendor says", not "what we measured".
| PPC question | SpyFu | Semrush |
|---|---|---|
| Where paid data comes from | Captures Google results pages: the first 100 organic results plus page-one ads, with advertiser, ad copy and landing page. Keeps a cached screenshot of each captured page as proof | Third-party providers collect Google results pages for "hundreds of millions" of keywords. Advertising Research tracks the top 8 paid positions |
| Channels covered | Google search only. Google search data in 32 listed countries; "we don't have full results for any countries outside" them | Google search (Advertising Research), Google Shopping (PLA Research), and display, video or social through AdClarity on Advertising Pro |
| Database size, as each vendor states it | Homepage: 13.1 billion keywords, 7.2 trillion search results indexed, 152 million websites | Help center: 28.8 billion keywords, 808 million domains, 142 geographic databases, over 1 billion Google Ads (the stats page says 28.9 billion keywords) |
| Ad history depth | "10+ Years Ad History" on Pro + AI and Team/Agency; not on Basic. Homepage claims "18+ years historical data" | Google Ads back to January 2012. Google Shopping from 2022. AdClarity: 3 months on Advertising Pro |
| What the spend number is | Estimated Budget, built up from captured ads plus click and cost-per-click inputs that are "estimates that come from other sources", chiefly Google's keyword tools | Traffic Cost: estimated paid clicks × current cost per click, from average click-through rates and top-8 positions, using national, not local, data |
| What the vendor says about that number | It can be "consistently wrong in an industry". Calibrate it: if SpyFu says you spend $10k and you really spend $20k, double its estimate for competitors in your industry | The numbers "are not intended to tell you how much you are spending on Google Ads". Use them as a benchmark between competitors |
| Known blind spots, per the vendor | Countries outside its list. Anything that isn't Google search | Campaigns that run only at a local level. Google's paid results change many times a day, so "it is impossible for any company to gather all of this data perfectly" |
| Refresh | Rolling. Most keywords with more than 100 monthly searches update about once a month; higher-volume keywords update more often | Ongoing, "from once a day to once a month" depending on keyword popularity |
| Exports | 10k rows on Basic; unlimited on Pro + AI and Team/Agency | Unlimited Google Ads exports on the Advertising toolkit. SEO plan reports cap at 10,000 to 50,000 results |
| Acting on the research | Pre-built Google Ads campaigns (Pro + AI and up), a Google Ads Advisor and Google Ads Templates | Ads Launch Assistant creates, launches and manages Google and Meta ads. Ads AI Agent gives campaign recommendations |
| API | Pro + AI ($40 of credits included) and Team/Agency ($100) | Advanced SEO plan only ($549 a month, or $455.67 billed yearly) |
| Without paying | Logged-out domain overview: paid keyword count, estimated PPC clicks, estimated Google Ads budget, top paid competitors | Free plan with an account: 1 demo project, 10 reports a day. The logged-out Advertising Research page showed no data on 2026-10-12 |
How to read this (our analysis). The two tools collect the same kind of raw material: snapshots of Google's paid results. They differ in packaging and range, not in their basic view of the auction. SpyFu goes deeper and cheaper on Google search: more history and no row limits. Semrush goes wider: Shopping, display, video, social and a launch path. Neither can see a competitor's bids, budgets, Quality Scores or audiences. That data exists only in the advertiser's own account and, in part, in Google's Auction Insights report for auctions you entered.
A note on database sizes. SpyFu's Semrush comparison page says SpyFu "has far more keywords than Semrush". Semrush's help center lists 28.8 billion keywords, more than double the 13.1 billion on SpyFu's homepage. Both can be true if the two companies count different things. That's the point: headline database sizes measure different things, so they aren't comparable. The only fair test is the one we couldn't run, the same domains through both paid tools. If you're choosing between them, use SpyFu's money-back window and Semrush's 7-day trial to run your own competitors through both in the same week.
What It Costs at Your Headcount
Here's our arithmetic on the list prices above. We show the cheapest configuration that gives each user full PPC data, which rules out SpyFu Basic because it has no ad history and caps exports. Monthly billing first, annual billing in brackets.
| Users | SpyFu Pro + AI | SpyFu Team/Agency | Semrush Advertising Base | Semrush SEO plan + Advertising Base |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | $119 ($89) | $249 ($187) | $99 ($99) | $238 ($216.33) |
| 3 | $179 ($149) | $249 ($187) | $139 ($139) | $368 ($346.33) |
| 5 | $239 ($209) | $249 ($187) | $179 ($179) | $498 ($476.33) |
How we got there:
- SpyFu Pro + AI adds $30 per extra user. Team/Agency includes 5 users. SpyFu lists one extra-user price per plan, which we applied to both billing cycles.
- Semrush Advertising Base adds $20 per user, per its pricing page.
- The Semrush stack adds $45 per extra user on the SEO plan and $20 per user on the toolkit. Semrush's pages don't say whether a teammate needs a seat on both, so treat that column as the upper bound and confirm with Semrush.
Three things stand out.
Semrush's Advertising toolkit is the cheapest full-data option at every size, as long as PPC research is all you need. $99 for one user and $20 per extra seat undercuts SpyFu Pro + AI. Its subscription article says toolkits sit on top of a plan, and the plans start at Free, so the toolkit appears to be buyable without a paid SEO plan. Check this at checkout before you budget on it.
SpyFu is cheaper once you also want SEO research. Every SpyFu plan includes its SEO tools. A Semrush user who wants SEO data and ad research pays for two subscriptions: $216.33 a month billed yearly for one person, against $89 on SpyFu Pro + AI.
SpyFu Team/Agency only makes sense at 5 users. At 4 users, Pro + AI costs $179 billed yearly. At 5, Team/Agency's $187 undercuts Pro + AI's $209 and adds 50k weekly rank tracking and unlimited automated reports.
Where the Vendors' Own Pages Disagree
We read both vendors' pages on the same day and found these mismatches. None of them is a scandal, but each one changes a number you might quote.
| Claim | Where it differs |
|---|---|
| SpyFu country coverage | Help center lists 32 countries. Homepage says 38 countries |
| SpyFu history | Pricing page says 10+ years of ad history. Homepage and Semrush-comparison page say 18+ years |
| SpyFu entry price | Pricing page: $39 a month, or $29 billed yearly. Site footer: "Membership starts at just $33/month" |
| Semrush prices on SpyFu's comparison page | SpyFu compares itself with Semrush "Pro" at $139.95 and "Guru" at $249.95. Semrush's live pricing page lists SEO at $139 and Starter at $199, and no longer uses those plan names. Semrush's own SEO toolkit limits article still shows the old $139.95, $249.95 and $499.95 prices |
| Semrush AdClarity markets | Plans article: 30+ global markets. Toolkit article: 50+ markets |
| Semrush keyword count | Help center: 28.8 billion. Stats page: 28.9 billion |
When figures differ, we used the pricing page for prices and the more specific help-center article for data claims.
Decision Matrix by Team Type
This is our editorial reading of the verified facts above.
| Your situation | Better fit | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Solo Google Ads manager researching search competitors | SpyFu Pro + AI | $89 a month yearly for unlimited exports, 10+ years of ad history and SEO data in one plan |
| Only need occasional lookups | SpyFu's free overview, or Semrush Free | SpyFu shows headline paid data without an account. Semrush Free gives 10 reports a day after sign-up |
| Paid-only team that wants competitor research and a launch tool | Semrush Advertising Base | $99 covers Advertising Research, PLA Research and the Ads Launch Assistant for Google and Meta |
| Competitors spend heavily on display, YouTube or social | Semrush Advertising Pro, with care | AdClarity is the only non-search ad view on either side, but it's limited to 1 channel, 1 location and 3 months of history |
| Ecommerce running Shopping campaigns | Semrush | PLA Research covers Google Shopping. We found no Shopping ad research on SpyFu's pricing page or in its navigation |
| Agency of 5 doing SEO and PPC for clients | SpyFu Team/Agency | 5 seats, white-label reports and unlimited data for $187 a month yearly, against $476 a month for 5 users on the Semrush stack |
| In-house team already on Semrush for SEO | Add the Advertising toolkit | One login, and Semrush's paid data sits next to the organic data you already use |
| Markets outside SpyFu's 32 countries | Semrush | 142 geographic databases, against SpyFu's own warning about countries off its list |
The Honest Verdict
SpyFu is the better PPC research tool per dollar if Google search is your channel. It does one job, competitor paid keywords and ad history, and prices it lower and with fewer limits than anything Semrush sells for the same data. Its weaknesses are the edges: Google search only, a limited country list, and spend estimates its own help center tells you to calibrate.
Semrush is the better platform if paid search is one channel among several. The Advertising toolkit adds Shopping and, on Pro, a narrow view of display, video and social ads. It also adds the one thing SpyFu doesn't offer, a path from research to launched Google and Meta ads. You pay for that breadth with a separate subscription on top of any SEO plan.
Don't choose on the spend number. Both vendors tell you, in their own help centers, that a competitor's estimated budget is a relative benchmark. For the most reliable picture, combine either tool with Google's own data. Our guide to finding competitors' PPC keywords shows how to cross-check five sources, and the CPC calculator-calculator) helps you sanity-check any estimate against your own numbers.
Where Soku Fits
Since we build in this space: Soku isn't a keyword database and doesn't compete with either tool on history or exports. It's an AI advertising agent that connects to your own ad accounts, including Meta, Google, TikTok and ChatGPT Ads, reads what is actually performing, and produces and launches ad creative, including images and video, with your approval before anything goes live. Its Google Ads competitor analysis draws on third-party keyword data and Google's Ads Transparency Center. That means it has the same blind spots as any outside estimate, so it's no substitute for SpyFu's history. Soku is useful for the step after research: turning what you learned into ads and measuring them in your own account. If your team already runs on Semrush data, see the Semrush integration.
Sources
All read on 2026-10-12:
- SpyFu plans, plan comparison and money-back guarantee: https://www.spyfu.com/pricing
- SpyFu homepage data claims: https://www.spyfu.com/
- SpyFu comparison page: https://www.spyfu.com/semrush-alternative
- SpyFu data method and accuracy: https://help.spyfu.com/en/articles/3040771-how-accurate-is-spyfu
- SpyFu update frequency: https://help.spyfu.com/en/articles/7130181-how-often-does-spyfu-update-its-data
- SpyFu country coverage: https://help.spyfu.com/en/articles/2968557-which-countries-does-spyfu-collect-data-in
- SpyFu logged-out domain overview: https://www.spyfu.com/overview/domain
- Semrush SEO + AI Search plans, plan comparison and add-ons: https://www.semrush.com/prices/
- Semrush Advertising toolkit pricing and plan comparison: https://www.semrush.com/pricing/advertising/
- Semrush Advertising toolkit plans and limits: https://www.semrush.com/kb/1551-advertising-toolkit-pricing-and-plans
- Semrush Advertising toolkit overview: https://www.semrush.com/kb/801-advertising-toolkit
- Semrush subscriptions and toolkits: https://www.semrush.com/kb/1011-subscriptions
- Semrush data sources and database size: https://www.semrush.com/kb/998-where-does-semrush-data-come-from, https://www.semrush.com/stats/
- Semrush paid traffic method: https://www.semrush.com/kb/883-data-in-advertising-research
- Semrush Positions report (Traffic Cost definition): https://www.semrush.com/kb/508-ad-research-positions-report
Comparing something else? Browse all competitor breakdowns.