9 Best Hootsuite Alternatives in 2026 (Pricing Checked)

The best Hootsuite alternative depends on what you use Hootsuite for. Most teams leave because of the per-user price. Some need the full suite and want a better one; most mainly schedule posts and pay for far more than they use.

Below are nine alternatives, sorted by need. Every price and plan limit links to the vendor's own pricing page, checked on 28 September 2026. Where a vendor does not show a number, we say so instead of guessing.

Pick by need

• A similar all-in-one suite: Sprout Social.
• The same scheduling for much less: SocialPilot, Metricool or Buffer.
• A free plan: Buffer, Metricool or Publer.
• An agency with approvals and client reporting: Metricool Advanced or SocialPilot.
• Visual, Instagram- and TikTok-first planning: Later.
• Open source you can self-host: Postiz.
• AI content at volume, with credits for images and video: Blotato.
• Your AI assistant does the posting: Antwork.

What you are comparing against: Hootsuite

Hootsuite's plans: paid plans start at $99 for Standard (10 social accounts), $199 for Professional (unlimited accounts) and up to $399 for Advanced, per user a month. Enterprise is custom. Each plan has a 14-day free trial; there is no free plan.

The 9 alternatives compared

Prices are USD and monthly unless noted. Vendors change pricing without notice, so open the linked page before you decide.

The alternatives, one by one

Antwork

Best for: people who already work in Claude, ChatGPT or Cursor and want the assistant to draft, schedule and publish, instead of opening a separate dashboard. You add Antwork to your AI app once; after that you ask for posts in the conversation, and the assistant writes them from your recent posts and schedules them on your word.

Pricing: 2 accounts free, then $5 a month for each account after. No plans or seats; every feature applies to every account. It publishes to LinkedIn, X, Instagram, Threads, TikTok, YouTube, Facebook and Pinterest.

Limitations: no unified inbox for comments and DMs, and no social listening, both of which Hootsuite has. If your team lives in Hootsuite's inbox, Antwork does not replace that part. Compare it directly: Antwork vs Hootsuite.

Sprout Social

Best for: teams that need an all-in-one suite with listening, reporting and customer care, and want a more polished one. Sprout Social's pricing: Essentials $79 per seat a month billed yearly ($99 monthly) for up to 5 profiles, Standard $199, Professional $299 and Advanced $399 per seat, with a 30-day free trial.

Limitations: also per seat, so it does not solve Hootsuite's cost problem. Antwork vs Sprout Social.

SocialPilot

Best for: agencies and small teams that mainly schedule and report. SocialPilot's plans: Essentials $30 a month for 7 accounts and 1 user, Standard $50 for 15 accounts and 3 users, Premium $100 for 25 accounts and 6 users, Ultimate $200 for 50 accounts and unlimited users. Annual billing lowers each by 15%.

Limitations: no free plan, only a free trial.

Metricool

Best for: analytics and agencies on a budget. Pricing scales by number of brands: Starter from $20 a month for 5 brands to $36 for 10, Advanced from $53 for 15 brands to $210 for 50. Advanced adds team and client management and a post approval system. The free plan covers 1 brand and 20 posts a month.

Limitations: not a customer-care inbox tool in the way Hootsuite is. Antwork vs Metricool.

Buffer

Best for: small teams that just need scheduling. Buffer's pricing: a free plan for 3 channels and 10 scheduled posts per channel; Essentials $5 per channel a month; Team $10 per channel a month with unlimited team members; channels above the tenth cost less.

Limitations: billed per channel, which adds up past a handful of channels. See Buffer alternatives and Antwork vs Buffer.

Publer

Best for: a generous free plan and bulk scheduling. Publer's plans: the free plan includes 3 social accounts (X excluded) and 10 scheduled posts per account. Paid plans are priced per social account, and "for every 9 social accounts, the 10th one is free". Business lists access to the Publer API and MCP.

Limitations: the free plan cannot connect X. Paid prices are shown in its interactive calculator rather than as a fixed figure.

Later

Best for: visual, Instagram- and TikTok-first planning. Later's pricing, billed yearly: Starter $18.75 a month for 1 social set (8 profiles) and 1 user, Growth $37.50 for 2 sets (16 profiles) and 2 users, Scale $82.50 for 6 sets (48 profiles) and 4 users.

Limitations: no free plan (a 14-day trial), and the pricing page shows yearly-billed prices only.

Postiz

Best for: open source and self-hosting. Postiz's pricing: Standard $29 a month for 5 channels, Team $39 for 10, Pro $49 for 30, Ultimate $99 for 100, about 20% less billed yearly. It is open source, and self-hosting is available, though Postiz says the hosted platform is where its agent features ship first.

Limitations: no free hosted plan, only a 7-day trial on every plan.

Blotato

Best for: AI-generated content at volume, including images and video. Blotato's pricing: Starter $29 a month with 20 social accounts and 1,250 AI credits, Creator $97 with 40 accounts and 5,000 credits, Agency $499.

Limitations: the free trial excludes the API, and heavy AI use is bounded by monthly credits.

When to stay on Hootsuite

If your team relies on Hootsuite's shared inbox, listening and enterprise controls, the only like-for-like move is Sprout Social, and it is priced the same way. The alternatives above win when most of what you do is scheduling and reporting, when the per-user bill is the problem, or when you want an AI assistant to do the drafting and scheduling for you.