| Quick answer |
|---|
| The best competitor analysis tools for AI search optimization are Gauge from $99 a month for daily competitor benchmarking, Ahrefs Brand Radar for the widest surface coverage — listed from $199 a month, with its seven-surface bundle reported at $398 — and Profound at $399 on Growth. Semrush now folds AI visibility into its SEO + AI Search plans, from $199 a month. |
| How we compare |
|---|
| Tools are judged on whether competitors run through the same prompt set you use, whether the cited sources behind a rival’s mentions are exposed, and what the entry tier really includes. Prices were read on vendor pages on 12 September 2026, with Profound and Semrush re-checked on 12 September 2026, and labelled where only third-party figures exist. We ran no head-to-head lab test — no prompt set was scored across these tools. Every price was re-checked against the vendor’s own pricing page in September 2026, and figures available only from third-party trackers are marked as reported. No vendor paid for placement. |
Table of Contents
What competitor analysis means in AI search
In organic search, competitor analysis means comparing rankings and backlinks for a keyword. In AI search it means something narrower and harder: on this prompt, which brands did the model name, and whose page did it cite?
An AI answer typically names two or three brands, not ten, and there is no page two. Being fourth is identical to being absent, so the analysis is a binary: in the answer, or out of it.
Best competitor analysis tools for AI search optimization compared
| Tool | Entry price | Competitor feature | Citation sources exposed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gauge | $99/mo | Competitor benchmarking, daily prompt tracking | Yes, citation analysis |
| Peec AI | EUR 85/mo | Brand rankings against a competitor set | Yes, citation sources |
| Profound | $99 Starter, $399 Growth | Comparison across engines from Growth up | Yes, on higher tiers |
| Semrush SEO + AI Search | $199/mo Starter | Competitor and prompt research inside the suite | Yes |
| Ahrefs Brand Radar | From $199/mo plus base plan; $398 bundle reported | Brand versus brand across seven surfaces | Yes |
| Qwairy | €79/mo (€65 annual) | Competitor benchmarking plus crawler analytics | Yes |
Three questions that separate these tools
- Can you define the competitor set yourself? A tool that picks your competitors by domain similarity will report on companies you do not sell against.
- Does it run competitors on your prompts? Some tools track your brand on your prompts and competitors on theirs. Those two numbers cannot be compared.
- Does it show the citation, not just the mention? A mention builds awareness. A citation sends a session. Tools that only report mentions overstate how well you are doing.
Ask all three in the trial; every vendor answers yes on the marketing page.
How to calculate AI share of voice yourself
The arithmetic is simple enough for a spreadsheet.
Fix a prompt set of 40 to 60 buyer-phrased prompts. Run each one and list every brand named in the answer. Your share of voice is your mentions divided by total brand mentions across the whole set. Record citation rate separately: the share of your mentions that carried a link to your domain.
Two numbers, one prompt set, frozen for a quarter — the same measurement discipline behind our LLMEO execution playbook. That is the entire model these platforms automate.
What one tracked prompt costs, and what the next one costs
Competitor tools are sold on features but billed on prompts, so the comparable numbers are price divided by prompt allowance, then the marginal price of the next prompt. Neither is published, so both are computed below from figures the vendors do print.
| Tier | Published inputs | Cost per tracked prompt | Cost of the next prompt |
|---|---|---|---|
| Peec AI Starter | EUR 85/mo, 50 prompts | EUR 85 ÷ 50 = EUR 1.70 | (205 − 85) ÷ 100 = EUR 1.20 |
| Peec AI Pro | EUR 205/mo, 150 prompts | EUR 205 ÷ 150 = EUR 1.37 | (425 − 205) ÷ 200 = EUR 1.10 |
| Peec AI Advanced | EUR 425/mo, 350 prompts | EUR 425 ÷ 350 = EUR 1.21 | — |
| Ahrefs Brand Radar, Select (reported) | $398/mo, 2,500 custom prompt checks | $398 ÷ 2,500 = $0.16 per check | Within the monthly allowance |
| Qwairy Starter | €79/mo, 100 prompts | 79 ÷ 100 = €0.79 | (199 − 79) ÷ 200 = €0.60 |
| Gauge | Prompt allowance not confirmed at the quoted price | Not computable | — |
Read the units before the numbers. An Ahrefs custom prompt check and a Peec daily-tracked prompt are not the same thing, so the sixteen cents means Brand Radar is priced for breadth and Peec for a curated set, not that Ahrefs is ten times cheaper. Inside one vendor the comparison is exact, and the curve bends sharply: Peec’s first fifty prompts cost EUR 1.70 each, prompts 151 to 350 cost EUR 1.10.
A 40 to 60 prompt set sits on the steepest part of every curve, so the entry tier is where you pay most per prompt and where unit price should count for least. Pick the entry tier on the three questions above, and start caring about per-prompt cost once the set passes a hundred.
The tools in detail
Gauge
Built around competitor benchmarking rather than bolted on to it, with daily prompt tracking and citation analysis. Entry tier is $99 a month with a free trial; the Growth plan at $599 adds multi-model coverage across Gemini, Perplexity and Copilot. Connects to GA4, Search Console and Semrush. Gauge’s pricing page did not load for us in September 2026, so these figures are carried over from August.
Profound
Profound’s pricing page moved to self-serve tiers in June 2026: Starter $99 a month tracking ChatGPT only, Growth $399 adding Perplexity and Google AI Overviews, Enterprise custom with up to nine engines. Competitor comparison is strongest on Growth and above, because one engine is not a share of voice.
Ahrefs Brand Radar
Ahrefs lists Brand Radar AI from $199 a month; trackers report Select Platforms at $398 covering AI Overviews, AI Mode, ChatGPT, Perplexity, Copilot, Gemini and Grok with 2,500 custom prompt checks a month, and All Platforms at $699 with the full organic prompt pool. It requires an Ahrefs base plan from $129, so budget above $300 at minimum.
Semrush SEO + AI Search
Semrush sells AI visibility two ways. Its standalone AI Visibility toolkit is $99 a month per domain billed annually for 25 daily prompts, and the SEO + AI Search pricing page, re-checked on 12 September 2026, lists Starter at $199 a month ($165.17 billed annually) with 50 prompts tracked daily and one domain, Pro+ at $299 ($248.17) with 100 prompts, and Advanced at $549 ($455.67) with 200 prompts and API access. The bundles cost more than the toolkit, so they fit only if you want the SEO tooling too.
Peec AI
Priced by prompt volume, and Peec’s pricing page confirms the tier sizes: Starter EUR 85 for 50 prompts, Pro EUR 205 for 150, Advanced EUR 425 for 350, with 15 per cent off annually. Extra engines are add-ons at roughly EUR 20 to 30 each. Prompt-led pricing suits a wide competitor set on a narrow engine list.
Qwairy
Qwairy is a generative engine optimisation platform with competitor benchmarking, AI crawler analytics and Search Console integration, tracking ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, Gemini, Copilot, Grok, AI Overviews, Mistral and DeepSeek among ten-plus engines. Its pricing page lists Starter at €79 a month (€65 annually) for up to 100 prompts, Growth at €199 for 300 and Business at €449 for 800.
What competitor data does not tell you
Knowing a rival is named on a prompt where you are not is a diagnosis, not a treatment. The follow-up is always the same: find the pages the engine cited for them, and work out what those pages answer directly that yours answers vaguely.
Our guide to generative engine optimisation covers that page-side work, answer engine optimisation tools covers the wider tooling category, and AI search monitoring tools covers monitoring beyond the competitor angle. When the diagnosis points at one engine in particular, our guide to getting cited in ChatGPT is the narrower fix.
Frequently Asked Questions
What are the best competitor analysis tools for AI search optimization?
Gauge at $99 a month is the most competitor-focused option, and Ahrefs Brand Radar — listed from $199 a month, with a $398 bundle reported — gives the widest surface coverage. Profound costs $99 to $399, Semrush SEO + AI Search from $199, Peec AI from EUR 85 for 50 prompts and Qwairy from €79 for 100. Only compare tools that run your competitors on the same prompts you do.
How do you pick the competitors to track in AI search?
Start with the three to five brands you actually lose deals to, then add any brand the engines already name on your category prompts, even if you never meet it in a sales cycle. Define the list yourself rather than accepting a tool’s domain-similarity suggestions, and keep it fixed for the quarter so share of voice stays comparable.
Can AI competitor analysis tools show which sources an AI engine cites for a competitor?
Yes, where the engine shows citations. Gauge, Ahrefs Brand Radar and Semrush all log the cited URLs and domains behind an answer, so you can see which pages are feeding a competitor’s mentions and go after the same sources. The limit is that citation behaviour varies by engine: Google AI Overviews and Perplexity link heavily, while an assistant answering from parametric memory may name a brand with no source at all. Google’s own documentation on AI features in Search is the reference for how links are surfaced on its surfaces.
How often should you re-run a competitor analysis in AI search?
Let the tool track daily or weekly, but review monthly and re-baseline each quarter. Answers vary between runs, so a single week rarely means anything; a month of samples on a frozen prompt set shows real movement, and the quarterly review is the right point to add or retire prompts and competitors.
How much do AI competitor analysis tools cost?
In September 2026: Gauge from $99 a month with $599 for multi-model coverage (carried over from August), Profound $99 Starter or $399 Growth, Semrush SEO + AI Search from $199 a month, Peec AI from EUR 85, Qwairy from €79, and Ahrefs Brand Radar AI from $199 on top of an Ahrefs plan from $129, with $398 and $699 bundles reported.
Conclusion
If competitor comparison is the reason you are buying, Gauge at $99 is the closest fit because benchmarking is the product rather than a tab inside it. Ahrefs Brand Radar earns its reported $398 bundle price when you need seven surfaces and thousands of prompt checks, and Semrush makes sense when the competitor set already lives in your account.
If this sits alongside the rest of a small marketing stack, our round-up of AI tools for marketers covers what else the same budget has to fund. Whatever you pick, insist on two things: you define the competitor list, and competitors run on your prompts. Without both, the share of voice number on the dashboard is a comparison between two different questions.
