You can buy B2B leads from 8 kinds of sellers, and the price per contact runs from about 2 cents per email on Apollo's annual plan to 58 cents on UpLead's monthly plan, while agencies and enterprise platforms like ZoomInfo quote on a sales call. The cheapest contact is rarely the cheapest meeting, so the seller you pick should depend on how many contacts you need and how much checking you're willing to do.
I read the pricing pages of 11 sellers and the official rules on bought lists in the US, the EU, the UK and Germany on November 5, 2026. Below are the 8 places with what each charges, what those rules say about emailing a bought list, and 7 checks to run before you pay.
8 places to buy B2B leads
Most sellers fit one of the 8 types below, ordered roughly from self-serve data to done-for-you services, with LinkedIn's search tool last.
1. Export-based databases (Lead411)
Lead411 sells exports by the month or the year, and its annual plan works out to about 4 cents a contact. The $49 monthly plan includes 1,000 exports a month; the $490 annual plan includes 12,000 exports a year; the Blaze plan (annual only) has unlimited exports. A 7-day trial gives you 50 exports (Lead411 pricing).
How to buy: use the 50 trial exports on accounts you already know well, so you can tell at a glance whether the titles are current. Lead411 says its emails are "re-verified every 3-6 months", which is the vendor's claim and worth testing on that sample.
Example: a three-person sales team that needs 1,000 new US contacts a month would pay $49 month to month, or $490 for the year if it can commit.
2. Credit-based contact databases (UpLead, Apollo, Lusha)
Credit-based databases charge per revealed contact, and the price depends on whether you want an email or a phone number. UpLead counts one credit per contact, email and mobile included: $99 a month buys 170 credits on the monthly plan (about $0.58 each), and $74 a month billed annually buys 2,040 a year (about $0.44 each). Its trial gives 5 credits for 7 days (UpLead pricing).
Apollo and Lusha price emails and phones differently. Apollo's Basic plan is $49 per seat per month billed annually with 30,000 credits a year, where an email costs 1 credit and a phone number 8 (Apollo pricing). Lusha's Starter plan is $37.45 a month billed yearly for 4,800 credits, at 1 credit per email and 5 per phone (Lusha pricing).
How to buy: work out your cost per contact before you compare plans, because Apollo's 30,000 credits hold 3,750 phone numbers. By my math, Apollo comes to about $0.02 per email and $0.16 per phone if a seat uses all its credits, and Lusha to about $0.09 per email and $0.47 per phone. Example: a founder who only emails gets the lowest price per email on Apollo; a team that wants a mobile number with every contact gets both for one UpLead credit, at about $0.44.
3. Enterprise data platforms (ZoomInfo, Cognism)
ZoomInfo and Cognism don't publish prices: both quote on a sales call, and both count one credit per contact you export or reveal. ZoomInfo prices on features, number of licenses and credit usage, and each export costs one credit (ZoomInfo pricing). Cognism's Standard and Pro plans each include 5 seats, and one credit equals one revealed contact (Cognism pricing).
How to buy: these platforms suit teams of 5 or more that will use intent data, CRM enrichment and seats every day. Ask for the per-credit price in writing, the contract length, and what happens to unused credits. Example: a 10-person SDR team selling into European mid-market companies would ask Cognism and ZoomInfo for quotes on the same number of seats and credits, then compare the price per credit.
Pricing: custom pricing (sales call) for both.
4. List subscriptions (Salesgenie by Data Axle)
Salesgenie, Data Axle's lead and list tool, is a subscription that starts at $99 a month on a 12-month term. The price depends on the package (Basic, Pro or Team), the number of users, credits and the databases you add, and after the first 12 months it renews month to month (Salesgenie help center).
How to buy: register to explore it first (Salesgenie says it asks for no card until you decide), then ask a consultant which databases and how many credits the $99 package includes. Read the satisfaction guarantee before you sign: Salesgenie says that if you receive bad data, it will "refund your money for the undeliverable portion of your list, out-of-date or disconnected."
Example: a local services company that sells to offices in three cities builds its list by industry and area, then asks for the guarantee terms in writing before it commits to 12 months.
5. Data marketplaces (Datarade)
A data marketplace lists datasets from many providers side by side, with prices that range from a few cents per record to flat fees per file. Datarade's B2B leads category listed 261 datasets on the day I checked, from aged US leads at $0.03 a record to an APAC contact file at $400 per purchase and a global dataset at $49.50 a month. Many show a free sample preview (Datarade, B2B leads data).
How to buy: download the sample, check 20 records by hand against LinkedIn and the company website, and ask the provider how and when each field was collected. Example: an agency building a one-off list of logistics firms in Southeast Asia can compare 3 or 4 providers' samples in an afternoon.
The word "aged" in a listing means the leads are old, so check the collection dates before you buy.
6. Freelance list builders (Upwork)
A freelancer builds the list to your brief by hand, and you pay by the hour or by the project. Upwork's lead generation hiring page shows clients rating these specialists 4.7 out of 5, and the profiles featured there on November 5 listed rates from $4 to $8 an hour (Upwork, lead generation specialists).
How to buy: write the brief as a list of columns (company, website, size, person, title, profile link, source URL) and ask for 20 rows as a paid test before you commit to 500. Example: a recruitment agency that needs heads of engineering at 200 named companies gets a researched list where each row shows where it came from.
The quality varies with the person, so the test batch does the vetting for you.
7. Appointment-setting agencies (Belkins and others)
An appointment-setting agency sells booked meetings: it builds the list, runs the outreach and books calls for you on a monthly retainer. Belkins, for example, sells packages of 30+, 100+ or 200+ appointments a year, with prices tailored on a call (Belkins pricing).
How to buy: ask for the price per held meeting (not booked), who owns the list at the end, and which domains they send from. The FTC is clear that hiring someone doesn't move the legal risk: "you can't contract away your legal responsibility to comply with the law" (FTC CAN-SPAM guide).
Example: a B2B software company without an SDR team pays a retainer for 100+ meetings a year and keeps its own team for the calls. Pricing: custom pricing (sales call).
8. LinkedIn Sales Navigator (search access with no contact data)
Sales Navigator sells search and messaging on LinkedIn's own data, so you pay per seat and get no email addresses. Core costs $119.99 a month or $1,079.88 a year per license, with 50 InMails a month; Advanced costs $159.99 a month or $1,799.88 a year (LinkedIn Sales Navigator plans).
How to buy: start the free trial, which LinkedIn gives members with no paid subscription and no trial in the past 365 days, and set up your target accounts before it ends. Example: an account executive working 50 named accounts uses Sales Navigator's alerts to catch job changes at each one and messages people through InMail.
B2B lead prices at a glance
| Place to buy | Example seller | Pricing model | Entry price | Cost per contact | Link |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Export-based database | Lead411 | Exports per month or year | $49/month (1,000 exports) | About $0.04 to $0.05 | Pricing |
| Credit-based database | UpLead | Credits, 1 per contact | $74/month, billed annually | About $0.44 to $0.58 | Pricing |
| Credit-based database | Apollo | Credits per seat, 1 per email, 8 per phone | $49/seat/month, billed annually | About $0.02 per email, $0.16 per phone | Pricing |
| Credit-based database | Lusha | Credits, 1 per email, 5 per phone | $37.45/month, billed yearly | About $0.09 per email, $0.47 per phone | Pricing |
| Enterprise platform | ZoomInfo, Cognism | Seats plus credits | Custom pricing (sales call) | Ask for it in writing | ZoomInfo, Cognism |
| List subscription | Salesgenie | Subscription, 12-month term | From $99/month | Depends on package and credits | Help center |
| Data marketplace | Datarade | Per record, per file or monthly | From $0.03 a record | Varies by dataset | Datarade |
| Freelancer | Upwork | Hourly or fixed price | $4 to $8 an hour (featured profiles) | Depends on hours per row | Upwork |
| Agency | Belkins | Monthly retainer | Custom pricing (sales call) | Priced per meeting, not contact | Belkins |
| Search access | Sales Navigator | Per seat | $119.99/month | No contact data |
Prices from each seller's pricing page, checked on November 5, 2026. Cost per contact is my own math from the plan price and the credits or exports it includes.
What the rules say about bought B2B lists
The rules apply when you email the people on a bought list. Here is what the official pages say in four places. I'm not a lawyer and this isn't legal advice, so check with one before you email a bought list, especially in Europe.
- United States: the FTC's CAN-SPAM guide says the law covers all commercial email and "makes no exception for business-to-business email". Each message needs a valid postal address and an opt-out, opt-outs must be honored within 10 business days, and each separate email in violation can cost up to $53,088 (FTC).
- European Union: the European Commission says that before you acquire a contact list, the seller "must be able to demonstrate that the data was obtained in compliance with the General Data Protection Regulation" and that it may be used for advertising. You must keep the list up to date, skip people who objected, follow the ePrivacy rules for email, and tell people at the latest in your first message that you hold their data (European Commission).
- United Kingdom: the ICO says "You should check the origin and accuracy of bought-in lists", and that bought-in lists for emails or texts need very specific consent from the people on them (ICO, using marketing lists). Its email guidance adds: "You can send marketing emails or texts to companies." Sole traders and some partnerships count as individuals, though, and named work addresses (firstname.lastname@) can still raise data protection questions (ICO, electronic mail marketing). Both pages say they're under review after the Data (Use and Access) Act.
- Germany: the Act against Unfair Competition counts "advertising using an automated calling machine, a fax machine or electronic mail without the addressee's prior express consent" as an unacceptable nuisance in every case (section 7, official English translation).
The pattern across all four: a seller's compliance promise doesn't cover what you do with the list, so ask for the source of every record and keep that answer on file.
Before buying: 7 checks for a B2B lead list
A list of companies that fit tells you who could buy, and a signal tells you who might buy now. Before you pay for the first part, run these 7 checks:
- Get a sample first: Lead411 gives 50 trial exports, UpLead 5 credits, and many Datarade datasets a free preview. Check 20 records by hand against LinkedIn and the company site.
- Ask where each record comes from and when it was checked: "verified" on a pricing page tells you little without a date. A G2 reviewer of Apollo wrote: "At times, the contact data can be outdated or inaccurate, so I need to verify it before reaching out." (Rohit A., September 2026)
- Ask for the legal basis in writing: in the EU the seller has to be able to show the data was collected under the GDPR (see the Commission's page above). If a vendor can't answer, that's your answer.
- Do the per-contact math: divide the plan price by the contacts you'll really use, and count phones at their real credit cost (8 on Apollo, 5 on Lusha).
- Check coverage for your niche: a big database can still miss small companies. One UpLead reviewer on G2 wrote: "I find it challenging that I can't find some companies I'm prospecting, possibly due to their smaller size." (G2, UpLead reviews)
- Read the contract term: Lead411's unlimited Blaze plan is annual and Salesgenie starts with 12 months, while UpLead and Lead411 also sell month to month at a higher price per contact. Know which one you're signing.
- Verify before the first send: run every bought address through a verifier, and send to a small batch first, so a bad file costs you 50 bounces before it can cost you 5,000.
Find the companies that fit with Openlead
Openlead covers the step before any purchase: working out which companies fit and who to talk to at each, so you only pay for contacts you'll use. It sells no leads and holds no email addresses or phone numbers.
You write one sentence, for example "UK logistics companies with 50 to 250 employees that run their own warehouses", and Openlead searches the live web and returns up to 25 companies per search, each with what it does, where it is and why it matches, plus 1 to 3 people in the roles you name (say, operations director) with a link to their profile and the page it found them on. You then buy or look up contact details for those people only, which keeps a credit-based plan from going on companies that never fit. It's a paid tool: $50 of launch credits with no card, then plans from $29 a month billed yearly (pricing). Try Openlead free
Frequently asked questions
Where is the best place to buy B2B leads?
It depends on volume. For thousands of contacts a month, a self-serve database like Apollo or Lead411 has the lowest price per contact; for a few hundred hand-picked ones, a credit plan like UpLead's or a freelancer's researched list fits better; for meetings with no sales team, an appointment-setting agency.
How much do B2B leads cost?
From about $0.02 per email on Apollo's annual Basic plan (if every credit goes to emails) and $0.04 per export on Lead411's annual plan to about $0.58 a contact on UpLead's monthly plan, by my math from their pricing pages on November 5, 2026. Phone numbers cost 5 to 8 credits each on credit plans, and ZoomInfo, Cognism and agencies quote on a call.
Is it legal to buy B2B leads?
It depends on where your contacts are and how you contact them. The FTC says CAN-SPAM covers business email with no B2B exception, the European Commission says the seller must be able to show the data was collected under the GDPR, and Germany's unfair competition law treats email advertising without the addressee's prior express consent as an unacceptable nuisance. Ask a lawyer before you email a bought list.
Are bought leads worth it?
They're worth it when the list matches a narrow customer profile and you verify it before sending. They're a waste when you buy broad files by volume, because every bad record costs a credit, a bounce and a little of your domain's reputation.
Should I buy leads or build my own list?
Buy when you need volume fast and your market is well covered by databases; build when your buyers are small, niche or new companies that databases miss. Some teams do both: they build the target company list themselves and buy contact data only for the people they've chosen.
About the author
Julian KrethFounder, Openlead
