The best HARO alternatives in 2026 are Featured (which now owns HARO itself), Qwoted, Source of Sources, SourceBottle, and ProfNet, and the right pick depends on whether you want free daily emails or a paid dashboard. Cision shut Connectively, the rebranded HARO, on December 9, 2024, then sold the HARO name to Featured.com in April 2025. Muck Rack’s State of Journalism 2026 survey of 897 journalists found that 88% immediately discard pitches outside their beat, so the tool matters less than whether you answer only queries you can answer well.
HARO started in 2008, and Cision bought it in 2014 through the Vocus merger. Then Cision folded it into a rebrand, killed the rebrand, and pointed customers to CisionOne, its media database and monitoring suite. Qwoted, Featured, Source of Sources, and Press Plugs filled the gap.
This post covers what is real, what each tool costs on its own pricing page, and where each one falls short. Prowly, Muck Rack, and the ProfNet service from PR Newswire are in the mix too, because they solve a different version of the same problem. Prices below come from vendor pages as of October 2026. Where a vendor does not publish a price, the post says so instead of guessing.
Press helps AI visibility only if it gets cited. See your current AI visibility with the free audit.
What happened to HARO and Connectively?
Cision discontinued Connectively, the rebranded HARO platform, on December 9, 2024, and said it wanted to focus on CisionOne, which it describes as having more than 600,000 media profiles. On April 15, 2025, Cision announced the sale of HARO to Featured.com. No financial terms were disclosed.
That means “HARO” is back as a brand, but it is not the old product under Cision. Featured’s own release says the relaunched HARO stays free for journalists and sources, funded by newsletter advertising, with daily emails of reporter queries. The current helpareporter.com site says “free daily media queries” and is “Powered by Featured.” Connectively itself is gone. If you see a page offering a Connectively login, it is not Cision’s.
Featured describes itself as connecting experts with publishers across more than 2,500 outlets, with a community of over 50,000 experts who have submitted more than 1 million answers. Those are the company’s own figures. Terkel, a separate expert-answer platform, rebranded to Featured in July 2023, so the old terkel.io address now lands on Featured.
Which HARO alternatives are free, and which cost money?
Source of Sources, SourceBottle, and the relaunched HARO are free to join. Qwoted and Featured have free tiers with limits, and ProfNet, Muck Rack, and Press Plugs are sold by quote or trial. The table shows each option with a reason to pick it and the limit you should expect.
| Option | Cost (vendor page) | Best for | Real limitation |
|---|---|---|---|
| HARO (now run by Featured) | Free, ad supported | Anyone testing whether query pitching works at no cost | Daily emails are high volume and many experts see the same query |
| Featured | Free; Lite $29/month and Pro $79/month on annual billing | Experts who want queries matched by AI and sent to Slack or email | Plans differ by AI usage credits, so heavy use means paying; outlet quality varies |
| Qwoted | Basic free; Pro $149/month; Teams custom | PR pros and founders who want pitch analytics and an expert profile | Free tier allows 2 pitches a month with a 2 hour delay on new opportunities |
| Source of Sources | Free | Solo experts who want a clean, no-sales-pitch feed | Up to three emails a day, no analytics, and off-topic replies get you removed |
| SourceBottle | Free for journalists and sources; optional paid pitching service | Australian and New Zealand media opportunities | Mostly regional, so US trade press is thin |
| ProfNet (PR Newswire, a Cision company) | Not published; request through a form | Teams already buying PR Newswire distribution | Pricing is opaque and the public query submission form was removed |
| Press Plugs | 7 day free trial; later pricing not published on the page I checked | UK businesses chasing UK press | UK focus; confirm the price before the trial ends |
| Muck Rack | Not published; Starter, Standard, Premier by quote | Teams that pitch journalists directly and need monitoring | A media database, not a query feed, and priced for teams |
| Prowly (now Semrush AI PR Toolkit) | 7 day trial; plan pricing not shown on the page I checked | Teams that want outreach, a database, and coverage tracking in one place | Different job than HARO, and you do all the outreach yourself |
| Done-for-you placement, for example Subscribe PR | Quoted per engagement | Founders who want placements without answering queries daily | You pay a service fee and give up some control of the pitch |
Which free options are worth your time?
HARO under Featured, Source of Sources, and SourceBottle cost nothing but time. Time is the real price, because you scan dozens of queries a day and most will not fit you. These three differ mainly in volume, audience, and geography.
1. HARO (run by Featured)
Pick it if you want the closest thing to the original: a free daily email of reporter queries. The limit is the one the old HARO had. Every expert in your field sees the same query, so speed and specificity decide who gets quoted. The newsletter also carries ads, which is how Featured says it funds the free model.
2. Source of Sources
Peter Shankman, who founded HARO, runs Source of Sources. It is free, sends up to three emails a day, and says it serves more than 20,000 journalists, which is the site’s own claim. Shankman’s rule on the site is to reply only if you have something productive to add, and sales pitches get you removed. That strictness makes the feed cleaner. The cost is that you get no dashboard, no pitch tracking, and no way to see whether anyone read your reply.
3. SourceBottle
SourceBottle began in 2009 and is free for both journalists and sources. It leans Australian, with outlets such as the Sydney Morning Herald and The Guardian Australia on its site. A paid pitching service exists for sources who want help, but the core directory and call outs cost nothing. If your market is the US or UK, the volume will not match the bigger feeds.
Help a B2B Writer’s old web address now redirects to MentionMatch, which lists no price I could find, so test it before paying anything.
When is a paid platform like Qwoted or Featured worth it?
A paid tier is worth it when you pitch often enough that the pitch cap, delay, or analytics cost you real placements. Qwoted’s free Basic plan allows 2 pitches a month with a 2 hour delay, and Pro at $149 a month raises that to 35 pitches with no delay. Featured prices by AI usage instead.
For a deeper look at the Qwoted decision, see Is Qwoted worth it for earning press in 2026, which walks through who should skip the paid tier.
4. Qwoted
Pick Qwoted if you pitch regularly and want an expert profile that reporters can search. Pro adds an events and awards database and pitch intelligence, and Teams adds white labeling and an admin dashboard. The limit is cost per pitch: at $149 for 35 pitches, a month with few relevant queries is expensive. Qwoted does not publish placement rates, so you cannot compare it to alternatives on results.
5. Featured
Featured’s pricing page states that every plan, including Free, has access to all PR tools: journalist request matching, podcast discovery, and media monitoring. Plans differ only by AI capacity. Lite is $29 a month and Pro is $79 a month on annual billing, with annual plans saving 20% compared to monthly. That is cheaper than Qwoted Pro, and the free tier is a fair test. The limit is that credits cap how much AI drafting you get, and a faster draft does not make a weak answer win.
Do database tools like Muck Rack, Prowly, and ProfNet replace HARO?
No. They solve a different problem. HARO and its alternatives bring you reporter queries. A media database lets you find reporters and pitch them first. Muck Rack, Prowly, and CisionOne sit in that second group, and ProfNet sits between the two.
6. Muck Rack
Muck Rack does not publish prices. Its pricing page says cost depends on the number of users and offers Starter, Standard, and Premier plans by custom proposal. Add-ons such as press release distribution and API access are sold separately. Skip it if you only want to answer queries. Our best media databases for PR in 2026 post compares it with eight other databases.
7. Prowly and ProfNet
Prowly is now sold as the Semrush AI PR Toolkit, with a media database, AI drafted outreach, and media monitoring, and a 7 day trial. ProfNet, run by PR Newswire, delivers journalist queries to subscribed experts, but it does not list pricing and has removed its public query form. Both fit teams with a budget and a process. Neither fits a solo expert who wants free daily queries.
How well do these platforms actually convert?
Poorly for most people, and no platform publishes a response to placement rate I could verify. Muck Rack’s State of Journalism 2026 survey (897 journalists responding, fielded January 30 to March 2, 2026) found that 86% say at least some of their work began with a PR pitch. It also found that 88% immediately discard pitches outside their beat.
Read those together: pitches produce stories, but off-topic ones die at once. A query gives you a topic match, but dozens of other experts see the same query, so reply speed and a specific credential decide who runs.
I could not find a primary source that gives an average win rate for HARO, Qwoted, Featured, or Source of Sources, and the vendors do not publish one. Any “you will land X placements a month” claim has not been tested in public data. Treat these tools as a low-odds, low-cost channel, and budget time, not just dollars.
Our guide to how to pitch a magazine editor covers the 1:1 pitch route when queries run dry.
Should you do this yourself or hire it out?
Do it yourself if you can answer queries inside an hour of receiving them and have real expertise to quote. Hire it out if your time is worth more than the placements or your topic is too narrow for daily query volume.
Query platforms and database tools are DIY: you read, decide, write, and follow up. A done-for-you service reads the opportunities, drafts the pitch, and handles outlets. That costs more and gives you less control over every word. If you want to see how Subscribe PR approaches placement, the get placed page lays out the process, and it is one option among those above, not a replacement for testing a free feed first.
A sensible order: run HARO and Source of Sources for a month, track how many replies become a published quote, then decide whether Qwoted Pro or Featured Lite is worth paying for.
Start with a baseline. Request your free AI visibility audit.
FAQ
Q: Is HARO still available in 2026?
Yes, but under new ownership. Cision discontinued Connectively, its HARO rebrand, on December 9, 2024, and announced the sale of HARO to Featured.com on April 15, 2025. The site helpareporter.com now offers free daily media queries and says it is powered by Featured. It is a relaunch, not the old Cision product, so expect a different email format and ad supported newsletters.
Q: What is the best free HARO alternative?
Source of Sources is the cleanest free option because Peter Shankman limits it to up to three emails a day and removes sales pitches. The relaunched HARO is the closest match to the original format. SourceBottle is free and best for Australian media. Pick based on region and volume, then track which one produces a published quote for you.
Q: Is Qwoted better than HARO?
They do different things. Qwoted is a paid-tier platform with an expert profile, pitch limits, and analytics: Basic is free with 2 pitches a month, and Pro is $149 a month for 35 pitches. HARO is a free daily email. Qwoted is better if you pitch often and want tracking. HARO is better if you want a free test with no cap on replies.
Q: Does Featured replace Terkel?
Terkel rebranded to Featured in July 2023, so Featured is the same company under a new name, and the old terkel.io address redirects there. Featured now also owns HARO. Its pricing page lists Free, Lite at $29 a month, and Pro at $79 a month on annual billing, with all tools on every plan and differences only in AI usage.
Q: Are HARO alternatives worth paying for?
Only after a free trial period shows they work for you. Journalists discard off-beat pitches fast: Muck Rack’s 2026 survey found 88% do so immediately. A paid tier buys speed, volume, or analytics, not relevance. If your free replies rarely get quoted, a $149 plan will not fix fit.
Q: Do journalist query platforms help AI visibility?
Only if the resulting story gets cited by AI engines, which you have to check for your own topic. A published quote does not automatically appear in ChatGPT or Google AI answers. Measure your current visibility first. Whether a given placement changes citations has not been tested here.
The short version
HARO is not dead, but it is not Cision’s anymore, and the market it left is split into free feeds, paid pitch tools, and databases. Start free, count your wins, and pay only for the cap or feature that is actually costing you placements.
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