Side-by-side matrix
| What you get | CitunaThat’s us | LLMrefs | Rankscale |
|---|---|---|---|
| Entry price / month | $39 | $79 | $20 |
| Pricing model | Flat tiers | Flat monthly | Credit-based |
| AI engines at entry | 6 | 11 | 9+ |
| Claude tracked | |||
| Grok tracked | |||
| Microsoft Copilot | |||
| Google AI Overviews | Not published | Not published | |
| Refresh cadence | Daily | Weekly | Not published |
| Search Console integration | |||
| MCP access at entry | |||
| Generated fixes | Free tools | Page audits | |
| Free trial | 3 days (card) | 3 days + free tier | Free credits |
Compiled from each vendor’s public pricing page: LLMrefs figures from llmrefs.com/pricing, checked July 16, 2026; Rankscale figures from rankscale.ai/pricing, checked July 16, 2026. Rankscale: credit-based; cost moves with usage. “Not published” marks a row the vendor does not state publicly; it is not a “no”. Cituna checks all six engines daily and does not track Microsoft Copilot. MCP read tools are included from $39, write tools from Pro ($119); MCP is not exclusive to us. Prices change often: verify before buying. Spot an error? Tell us and we will correct it.
Reading the difference
On cost per engine at entry, the crudest useful way to normalise these two, LLMrefs works out at about $7.18 per engine per month ($79 across 11) and Rankscale at about $2.22 ($20 across 9+). Rankscale is the better ratio, by roughly $4.96 per engine. Treat that as a sanity check rather than a verdict: an engine you do not care about is not worth anything, and LLMrefs’s number improves immediately if its engine mix happens to be the one you need.
On every capability both vendors publish, LLMrefs and Rankscale match. That is a genuinely unusual result in this category and it changes the decision: with no feature to separate them, the choice comes down to price, refresh cadence, and whether the output is a dashboard or a change you can ship.
Worth knowing before you shortlist either: neither LLMrefs nor Rankscale offers Search Console integration and an MCP server. If any of those is a requirement, this comparison is the wrong shortlist and you should widen it rather than pick the better of two tools that both miss what you need.
The tier ladders are worth reading side by side, because the entry price means something different on each. LLMrefs: Free single-keyword tier · paid from $79. Rankscale: Credit packs from ~$20. That is where most of the apparent price gap between these two either disappears or widens sharply, depending on which engines you actually need.
They also genuinely overlap on Claude, Grok, Microsoft Copilot and generated fixes, so those rows should not carry weight in the decision even though both vendors market them.
One practical difference that does not appear in any feature list: LLMrefs bills as flat monthly and Rankscale as credit-based. A credit-metered plan and a flat plan are hard to compare over a year because only one of them has a predictable ceiling, so run your expected prompt volume through both before treating the entry prices as comparable at all.
Which to choose
Choose LLMrefs if…
LLMrefs is the longest engine list in the category, refreshed weekly. Against Rankscale specifically, you are paying $59 a month more than Rankscale for it, it covers more engines at entry (11 against 9+) and and it bills as flat monthly where Rankscale bills as credit-based.
- eleven engines, the longest published list of any tool here, including Claude, Grok and Copilot
- a genuinely free single-keyword tier that keeps working rather than expiring
- a set of free standalone tools alongside the tracker
What you give up:
- a weekly refresh rather than daily, so a change made on Monday may not be visible until the following week
- no Search Console integration and no MCP server
- the free tier is limited to one keyword, which is a snapshot rather than a monitor
Choose Rankscale if…
Rankscale is the widest engine list at the lowest nominal entry, paid for in credits. Against LLMrefs specifically, it is the cheaper entry by $59 a month, it covers fewer engines at entry (9+ against 11) and and it bills as credit-based where LLMrefs bills as flat monthly.
- the lowest nominal entry price in the category alongside a nine-plus engine list, including Claude, Grok and Copilot
- free credits to start, so the first scan costs nothing
- broad coverage without an enterprise conversation
What you give up:
- credit-based billing means the $20 is an entry ticket, not a monthly cost: heavy use is not predictable from the headline
- no Search Console integration and no MCP server
- page audits rather than generated fixes, so the output is a finding rather than the change
Drafted with AI assistance from our own research and Search Console data, and reviewed by Rahul A before publishing. Rules and prices change; check the linked official source before you act.