Quick overview
Lusha
Founded in 2016 in Israel, Lusha has become a go-to for SDRs who want to grab an email or phone number in two clicks from LinkedIn. Its Chrome extension is probably the most widely used in the market. By the numbers: over 800,000 users, an estimated 100M+ contacts in its database, $205M Series B in 2021.
Lusha primarily targets individual SDRs and small teams that prospect one account at a time and need to enrich records on a case-by-case basis.
Ovalead
Ovalead is a younger European tool focused on maintaining existing CRM databases. Rather than offering on-demand enrichment, Ovalead processes entire batches (CSV, CRM exports) and identifies changes since the last check. Parallel multi-worker architecture, native HubSpot sync, open source.
Feature-by-feature comparison
| Feature | Lusha | Ovalead |
|---|---|---|
| Chrome extension (single lookup) | ✓ The most-used in the market | Partial — extension exists but not the focus |
| Batch lookup (CSV) | ✓ Available | ✓ Core use case |
| Job change detection | Available as an upsell | ✓ Native |
| Phone numbers | ✓ The product's strength | — No |
| Business emails | ✓ SMTP-validated | ✓ Via Skrapp.io |
| Recurring automatic refresh | — No (one-shot enrichment) | ✓ Schedulable cycles |
| Parallel multi-account (user) | — N/A | ✓ |
| Native HubSpot sync | ✓ | ✓ |
| Salesforce sync | ✓ | On the roadmap |
| Free plan (no credit card) | — No | ✓ |
| Clear GDPR compliance | Varies by source | To validate — public sources |
Pricing comparison
Lusha
Lusha charges per seat (user) and per credit (each enrichment uses 1 credit for the email, 1 credit for the phone).
- Free: 5 credits/month — for testing
- Pro: $39/seat/month — 480 credits/year, basic features
- Premium: $69/seat/month — 1,920 credits/year, CRM exports
- Scale: custom quote — teams > 5 SDRs
For 5 SDRs on the Premium plan: ~$345/month + any credit overages.
Ovalead
- Free: €0 / month — 100 enrichments
- Cloud Pro: €49/month — 5,000 checks/month, per workspace
- Enterprise: custom quote
For 5 SDRs: €49/month total (the plan is per workspace, not per seat).
When to pick Lusha
- You prospect one account at a time via LinkedIn and need an email/phone instantly
- The phone is central to your approach (B2B cold calling)
- Your strategy relies on the volume of records enriched account by account, not on maintaining a database
- Your team prefers a Chrome extension UX over a batch workflow
- You're starting with one or two SDRs and don't have a database to maintain yet
When to pick Ovalead
- You already have a built-out CRM database (1k to 50k contacts) to maintain
- You want to spot job changes in your existing database to re-prospect at the right time
- Your team is 3+ SDRs and Lusha's per-seat cost becomes prohibitive
- You want to keep your data inside your CRM without depending on an external database
- You regularly process large batches (5,000+ contacts) that justify the parallel architecture
Lusha limits to know
The freshness problem
Lusha (like Apollo, Cognism, ZoomInfo) maintains a centralized database refreshed on a schedule. Concretely: a contact who changed companies 2 months ago may still be tagged "VP Sales at OldCorp" in Lusha, while LinkedIn already shows the new info. For one-off prospecting, that's acceptable. To keep a 10,000-contact database fresh, it doesn't work.
The credit cost
Each enrichment uses one credit. On the Premium plan (1,920 credits/year), an SDR enriching ~150 contacts/month burns through their quota in 13 months. Beyond that, you pay overages at ~€0.30 per credit. For serious B2B volumes, the bill stacks up fast.
No refresh cycle
You enrich a contact today = you pay. You want to verify they're still there in 6 months = you pay again. Ovalead, by contrast, treats freshness as a continuous cycle within the same monthly plan.
The hybrid scenario
For teams that need both one-off enrichment and database maintenance, the hybrid stack works very well:
- Lusha for SDRs doing active sourcing account by account (Chrome extension)
- Ovalead at the RevOps level for monthly maintenance passes on the entire database
- Both push data into HubSpot/Salesforce, which becomes the single source of truth
This double-layer stack typically costs less than a 5-seat Lusha Premium with overages, while covering both distinct use cases.
Honest strengths and weaknesses
Lusha — strengths
- The most polished Chrome extension on the market
- Phone numbers (strong differentiator)
- Rigorous email validation (SMTP)
- Mature ecosystem, excellent documentation
- GDPR compliance handled better than US competitors
Lusha — limits
- No automatic refresh cycle for your database
- Per-seat × credit cost scales fast
- Data not live at lookup time (cached)
- No "delta" view: impossible to know which contacts changed since the last session
Ovalead — strengths
- Cyclic automatic refresh of the entire database
- Native career change detection (re-prospecting signal)
- Per-workspace pricing (cost-effective for teams)
- Parallel multi-account to scale large volumes
- Open-source, data independence
Ovalead — limits
- No phone numbers
- No polished Chrome extension (the core use case is batch)
- Not for one-off sourcing (no database to explore)
- Still few native CRM integrations (HubSpot only today)
The verdict
Lusha and Ovalead complement each other rather than compete. If you have to pick just one, ask yourself the right question:
- "I need to prospect a new account right now" → Lusha
- "I need to keep my 5,000-contact database fresh" → Ovalead
- "I need phone numbers to do cold calling" → Lusha
- "I need to know who changed companies last month" → Ovalead
For most mid-market B2B teams, the combination of Lusha for one-offs + Ovalead for the recurring side gives the best price-quality ratio in the stack.