Head to head
Sprout Social vs Zoho Social
Last updated 4 June 2026
vs
Sprout Social is the high-end suite: publishing, a shared inbox, listening, and reporting that goes deep, sold by the seat and priced for businesses with a budget. There's no free plan; the cut-down Essentials tier is $79 a seat each month on annual billing, and the main plans start at $199.
- From
- $79 per user / mo
- Free plan
Zoho Social is the scheduler inside Zoho's wider business suite: capable publishing, a monitoring dashboard, and reporting that plugs straight into Zoho CRM. Pricing splits into single-brand business plans, billed per brand per member, and flat agency plans for managing many brands.
- From
- $10 /mo
- Free plan
Bottom line
Sprout Social and Zoho Social both cover the basics; the right one comes down to how you post. Sprout Social is the stronger pick for Businesses running social as a core function; choose Zoho Social for Businesses already using Zoho CRM or the wider Zoho suite.
Features compared
| Feature | Sprout Social | Zoho Social |
|---|---|---|
| AI captions | Yes | Yes |
| Basic analytics | Yes | Yes |
| Advanced reports | Yes | Yes |
| Bulk upload | Yes | Yes |
| Evergreen recycling | No | Partial |
| Team roles | Yes | Yes |
| Approvals | Yes | Yes |
| Link in bio | Yes | Yes |
Platforms compared
| Network | Sprout Social | Zoho Social |
|---|---|---|
| Auto | Auto | |
| Auto | Auto | |
| X (Twitter) | Auto | Auto |
| Auto | Auto | |
| TikTok | Auto | Auto |
| Auto | Auto | |
| YouTube | Auto | Auto |
| Threads | Auto | Auto |
| Bluesky | Auto | Auto |
| Google Business | No | Auto |
| Mastodon | No | Auto |
| Auto | No | |
| Snapchat | Auto | No |
| Telegram | No | Auto |
Pricing
Sprout Social
Essentials
$99 per user / mo
$79/mo billed annually
- Seats
- 1
- Accounts
- 5
- Scheduled posts
- Unlimited
- $79 per seat/mo on annual, $99 monthly
- Up to 5 social profiles
- Publishing, calendar, and the Smart Inbox
- Profile and post-level reporting
Standard
$249 per user / mo
$199/mo billed annually
- Seats
- 1
- Accounts
- 5
- Scheduled posts
- Unlimited
- $199 per seat/mo on annual, $249 monthly
- Up to 5 social profiles
- Smart Inbox, review management, and tasks
- Unlocks paid add-ons: Listening, Premium Analytics, Advocacy
Professional
Popular$399 per user / mo
$299/mo billed annually
- Seats
- 1
- Accounts
- Unlimited
- Scheduled posts
- Unlimited
- $299 per seat/mo on annual, $399 monthly
- Unlimited social profiles
- Competitor, tag, and paid reporting
- Message tagging and scheduling for optimal send times
Advanced
$499 per user / mo
$399/mo billed annually
- Seats
- 1
- Accounts
- Unlimited
- Scheduled posts
- Unlimited
- $399 per seat/mo on annual, $499 monthly
- Unlimited social profiles
- Chatbots, automated workflows, and helpdesk integrations
- AI-enhanced replies, message spike alerts, and the Sprout API
Enterprise
Custom
- Accounts
- Unlimited
- Custom pricing
- SSO and advanced security
- Premium Listening, Advocacy, and Influencer Marketing add-ons
- Dedicated support and professional services
- Priced per seat: the headline rate is for one user and multiplies by everyone you add. Sprout charges every extra seat at the same plan rate, with no volume discount.
- No free plan. There's a 30-day trial with no card required.
- Annual billing is paid upfront and is cheaper per seat than monthly: Essentials $79 vs $99, Standard $199 vs $249, Professional $299 vs $399, Advanced $399 vs $499.
- Premium Analytics, Listening, and Employee Advocacy are paid add-ons on Standard and up, quoted on request, so the real bill runs higher than the seat price.
- Prices are USD list, read off the live pricing page (which renders in USD here); the monthly figures come from the billing FAQ on that page.
Zoho Social
Free
Free
- Seats
- 1
- Accounts
- 6
- 1 brand, 6 channels (Facebook, Instagram, X, LinkedIn profile and page, Google Business), 1 member
- Home dashboard, drafts, basic publishing, 5 AI credits
- Forever free after the 15-day all-access trial
Standard
$15 /mo
$10/mo billed annually
- Seats
- 1
- Accounts
- 12
- $15/mo, $10 on annual (per brand, per member)
- 1 brand, 12 channels (adds YouTube, Pinterest, TikTok, Mastodon, Threads, Bluesky), 1 member
- Publishing calendar, multi-channel publishing, zurl shortener, summary reports, 40 AI credits
Professional
$40 /mo
$30/mo billed annually
- Seats
- 1
- Accounts
- 12
- $40/mo, $30 on annual (per brand, per member)
- 1 brand, 12 channels, 1 member
- Adds bulk scheduling, repeat posting, post insights, monitoring dashboard, media library, RSS, messages, first comment
Premium
Popular$65 /mo
$40/mo billed annually
- Seats
- 3
- Accounts
- 14
- $65/mo, $40 on annual (per brand)
- 1 brand, 14 channels (adds WhatsApp Business and Telegram Business), 3 members
- Adds SmartQ, unified Inbox, content approvals and workflow, custom reports, UTM, Zoho CRM and Desk integration, 80 AI credits
Agency
$320 /mo
$230/mo billed annually
- Seats
- 5
- Accounts
- 140
- $320/mo, $230 on annual
- 10 brands, up to 140 channels, 5 members
- Client invite, customizable client portal, agency-branded reports, all Premium features
Agency Plus
$460 /mo
$330/mo billed annually
- Seats
- 5
- Accounts
- 280
- $460/mo, $330 on annual
- 20 brands, up to 280 channels, 5 members
- All Agency features, with 10 more brands available as add-ons
- Zoho splits into business plans (one brand) and agency plans (many brands). The business tiers (Standard, Professional, Premium) are billed per brand per team member, so the headline is for a single brand with the bundled members; the agency tiers bundle 10 or 20 brands at a flat price.
- Extra brands and members are add-ons: roughly $19.50 a brand each month and $10 a member each month on annual billing (a little more monthly, and the brand rate varies by plan), so a single-brand business with a few people climbs past the sticker price.
- Annual billing is up to about 33% cheaper: Standard $10 vs $15, Professional $30 vs $40, Premium $40 vs $65 a month.
- There's a forever-free plan (1 brand, 6 channels, 1 member) that kicks in after the 15-day all-access trial, no card required.
- Records are USD. The live pricing page geo-locates and showed Australian dollars including GST here, so the USD list figures were taken from Zoho's US pricing and current third-party listings, then cross-checked by stripping the 10% GST from the AUD and converting (for example Premium A$66.91, less GST, times about 0.66, lands near $40).
Pros and cons
Sprout Social
- Polished, deep platform: inbox, listening, and reporting together
- Strong analytics and presentation-ready reports
- Wide network list, including Reddit, Bluesky, and Snapchat
- Genuinely good for customer care and approval-heavy teams
- Expensive, and per-seat pricing has no volume discount
- No free plan, and the main plans start at $199 a seat each month
- Listening, Premium Analytics, and Advocacy cost extra on top
- Overkill if you only schedule a few accounts
Zoho Social
- Deep Zoho CRM and Desk integration, a genuine differentiator
- Direct publishing to a dozen channels, with monitoring and a unified inbox
- Forever-free plan and a clear annual discount
- Flat agency plans for managing many brands
- Per-brand-per-member pricing plus add-ons gets fiddly
- WhatsApp and Telegram are Premium-only
- No evergreen recycling queue or visual feed planner
- Listed business-plan prices are before brand and member add-ons
Sprout Social vs Zoho Social: FAQ
- Is Sprout Social or Zoho Social cheaper?
- Zoho Social is cheaper to start, from $10 against $79 for Sprout Social. The unit each one charges by differs, so the real bill depends on how many channels or seats you run.
- Does Sprout Social or Zoho Social have a free plan?
- Zoho Social has a free plan; Sprout Social does not, though it offers a 30-day trial.
- Which is better, Sprout Social or Zoho Social?
- Sprout Social is the stronger pick for businesses running social as a core function, while Zoho Social is the better fit for businesses already using Zoho CRM or the wider Zoho suite. We don't score them; the right call comes down to how you post.