Robot VisibleCredit-based AI visibility monitoring
Robot Visible vs AthenaHQ
By Marcus Bransbury · Founder, Robot Visible · Published 19 July 2026
The short answer
AthenaHQ published a free Essential plan carrying $25 of credit (300 credits), a Starter plan at $295/month including $300 of monthly credit (3,600 credits) across ChatGPT, Perplexity, AI Overviews, AI Mode, Gemini, Claude, Copilot and Grok, and custom Enterprise pricing, all checked on 19 July 2026. Robot Visible charges £29/month for Monitor and £99/month for Fix & Prove, with a free scan. AthenaHQ suits engine-heavy monitoring where volume changes month to month.
AthenaHQ pricing
Free tier available; Starter $295/month (3,600 credits). Figures below are copied from AthenaHQ’s own pricing page and were checked on 19 July 2026.
| Plan | Published price | Includes |
|---|---|---|
| Essential | Free | $25 free credit (300 credits), ChatGPT, Perplexity, AI Overviews, Gemini, Claude, unlimited members |
| Starter | $295/monthdiscounted on annual billing | $300/month credit (3,600 credits), 8+ engines, API access and integrations |
| Enterprise | Custom | Custom credits, white-glove setup, Athena Citation Engine (ACE) |
| Robot Visible | Free · £29 · £99/month | Free scan with no account; Monitor at £29/month; Fix & Prove at £99/month with reviewable fix publishing and post-change verification. See plans |
AthenaHQ meters usage in credits instead of fixed prompt counts, so comparing it against per-prompt pricing means estimating your monthly query volume first.
Who each one suits
Choose AthenaHQ when
Teams that want wide engine coverage metered as credits instead of fixed prompt counts, with API access and integrations, and that would rather flex monitoring volume up and down than commit to a fixed allowance.
Choose Robot Visible when
Predictable billing matters more to you than metered flexibility, or the job is repairing one site instead of monitoring many engines at volume.
Where the two differ
Credits or fixed allowances
AthenaHQ charges by credit consumption, which flexes with how many engines and queries you run but makes the monthly bill harder to predict. Robot Visible's plans carry fixed page, question and competitor allowances. That is less flexible and considerably easier to budget for.
Engine coverage against site delivery
AthenaHQ's paid tier covers eight or more engines, which is among the broadest here. Robot Visible checks fewer surfaces on purpose and puts the difference into the technical scan, the ranked fix, the supported publishing path and the check afterwards.
Two free tiers doing different jobs
AthenaHQ's free Essential plan gives you a small credit balance to sample monitoring across engines. Robot Visible's free scan gives a technical and content diagnosis of a page with no account at all. One shows you what engines said, the other shows you what is broken.
Common questions
How much does AthenaHQ cost?
AthenaHQ published a free Essential plan including $25 of credit (300 credits), a Starter plan at $295/month including $300 of monthly credit (3,600 credits) with API access, and custom Enterprise pricing, all checked on 19 July 2026. Annual billing carries a discount on the Starter tier.
Does AthenaHQ have a free plan?
Yes. AthenaHQ's Essential tier is free and includes $25 of credit, roughly 300 credits, covering ChatGPT, Perplexity, AI Overviews, Gemini and Claude with unlimited team members. It is one of the few genuinely free tiers in this category, alongside Semrush's and Ahrefs' free plans and Robot Visible's free scan.
How do AthenaHQ credits compare with prompt allowances?
One credit does not equal one prompt, because running the same question across more engines burns more credits. To compare AthenaHQ against per-prompt tools like Peec AI or OtterlyAI, work out your monthly question count multiplied by the engines you actually need, then compare that against the headline price.
What is a good AthenaHQ alternative?
Scrunch AI ($250/month) and Rankscale Growth ($385/month) sit closest on price. Rankscale also meters in credits if you like that model. For cheaper monitoring, OtterlyAI ($29/month), Knowatoa ($59/month) and Trakkr (£79/month) undercut it substantially. Robot Visible scans free and starts at £29/month for diagnosis and fix publishing.
How this comparison was prepared
Every price on this page was copied from AthenaHQ’s own published pages on 19 July 2026. Where a vendor does not publish a price, this page says so rather than reproducing a third-party estimate. Products and prices change quickly, so the vendor’s own pages remain the source of truth. This comparison describes product focus and published packaging; it does not claim that any platform controls or guarantees inclusion in AI-generated answers.
The full rules we follow when publishing another company’s prices, and a dated log of every correction we have made, are on our methodology and corrections page.
Think something here is out of date or unfair? Tell us and we’ll review it.
Sources
- Plans & Pricing — AthenaHQ. First-party source for AthenaHQ's Essential, Starter, and Enterprise credit allowances and prices (checked 19 July 2026).
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Run the free Robot Visible scan before choosing a platform. You get a concrete technical baseline and the issues to investigate first, without creating an account.