How much do B2B leads cost? A per-contact price guide
How much do B2B leads cost? On cheapleads.io one lead is one contact at a business, and it runs from $0.012 down to $0.004 each depending on volume. Other routes charge for a file, an hour, a retainer or a booked meeting, so compare them on cost per usable contact, not on the headline number. This post covers B2B contacts only: people at companies you want to email. It does not cover consumer leads, homeowner leads or exclusive inbound leads.
What does cost per lead mean when you buy B2B contacts?
In B2B data, a lead is one contact: a named person at a company, with a title and usually a work email. Cost per lead is total spend divided by contacts you receive. Ad platforms use the same phrase for a stranger who filled in a form. Those two numbers measure different things.
A cost per lead from an ad is the price of someone raising a hand. A cost per contact is the price of a row in a spreadsheet. Nobody on that row has responded yet. You do the outreach yourself, and the replies are your job. So keep the two numbers apart when you compare options.
If you are after roofing homeowners, solar prospects or other consumer leads, this is the wrong post. If you want founders, owners, directors and managers at businesses, keep reading.
How do brokers, platforms, freelancers, agencies and setters charge?
Each one charges for a different unit. Brokers sell a file, credit platforms sell a row or a reveal, freelancers sell hours or a batch, agencies sell a retainer, and appointment setters sell booked meetings. Only a row price is a cost per contact. Everything else needs converting before you can compare.
This post does not quote prices for those routes. The table compares how each one charges. Get a quote, then run it through the formula in the next section.
| Source | You pay for | Your cost per contact is | Ask before you buy |
|---|---|---|---|
| Broker list | A fixed file | File price divided by all rows, including rows you cannot use | How old is it, can I filter before paying, what happens to bad rows |
| Credit platform | Credits per row or per reveal | Visible per row, but check what one credit buys (email, phone, or both) | Do credits expire, are failed rows charged, is there a monthly seat fee |
| Freelancer | Hours or a batch | Total fee divided by rows delivered | How are emails checked, who fixes bad rows, can I see a sample |
| Agency | A retainer for a service | Not a contact price. It bundles list, copy, sending and replies | Who owns the list, what happens if the list is poor |
| Appointment setter | Booked meetings | A cost per meeting, not per contact | What counts as a qualified meeting, who writes the outreach |
The agency and setter rows are not cheaper or dearer versions of a list. They sell a result and a service. If you only need contacts, you are paying for work you may not want. If you need the whole job done for you, they can be the right buy. Just do not put their fee next to a per-row price and call it a comparison.
How do you work out cost per usable contact?
Divide everything you pay by the number of contacts you can actually send to. Remove rows with no email, bad syntax, addresses you will not send to, and people you already have. The result is never lower than the sticker price per row, and it is the only number worth comparing.
Here is an example, not a quote from any source. You pay $100 for 1,000 rows. Only 600 have an email you are willing to send to. The sticker price is $0.10 a row. Your cost per usable contact is $100 divided by 600, which is about $0.17.
Count everything that goes into the top number. Tool subscriptions, hours spent cleaning, and any rows you pay for twice all count. Then decide which email statuses you will send to. Our guide to valid vs catch-all emails explains how to send to valid addresses first and handle catch-all addresses as a separate, smaller batch.
How much do cheapleads.io leads cost?
One credit buys one lead. One-time credits cost $0.012 each for the first 2,500, $0.007 up to 10,000, $0.005 up to 25,000, and $0.004 up to 50,000. The minimum purchase is 1,000 credits, or $12. Credits never expire, and you are charged only for rows in the final CSV.
The rate applies to the credits inside each band, so $0.004 is the price of credits 25,001 to 50,000, not your average. Here is the full math. Monthly plans are 20% off the one-time total.
| Leads | One-time total | Average per lead | Monthly plan | Average per lead (monthly) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1,000 | $12.00 | $0.012 | n/a | n/a |
| 2,500 | $30.00 | $0.012 | $24 | $0.0096 |
| 5,000 | $47.50 | $0.0095 | $38 | $0.0076 |
| 10,000 | $82.50 | $0.00825 | $66 | $0.0066 |
| 25,000 | $157.50 | $0.0063 | $126 | $0.00504 |
| 50,000 | $257.50 | $0.00515 | $206 | $0.00412 |
Before delivery, every email is checked for syntax, disposable domains, unread inboxes like noreply@, and whether the domain can receive mail. Rows that fail are dropped and replaced, and you are not charged for them. That narrows the gap between sticker price and usable contact. It is not a delivery promise, and some addresses will still bounce. If you turn on the toggle for email marked valid, catch-all addresses are skipped too.
If price is your main constraint, read how to buy cheap B2B leads that are not junk for what to check besides the rate.
Do tighter filters raise the price per lead?
No. The price per lead is set by how many credits you buy, not by your filters. Tighter filters only shrink the match count. Ten thousand narrow, valid-email contacts cost the same as ten thousand broad ones. What changes is whether enough people match to fill your order.
So filter for fit first. A list of 10,000 well-matched contacts at $82.50 one-time beats a list of 30,000 loose ones, because you send fewer emails to people who will never care.
How many decision-makers can you buy, and what do the counts mean?
Plenty. On 2026-11-02 the cheapleads.io live count showed 5.29M US decision-makers at companies with 11 to 500 employees. Adding a valid work email cut that to 2.15M. The counts below show how each filter narrows the pool. Counts change as the data refreshes monthly.
All counts below were measured with the cheapleads.io live count on 2026-11-02.
| List | Matches | What it means for you |
|---|---|---|
| US owners, founders, CEOs, presidents, VPs and directors at companies with 11 to 500 employees | 5,290,316 | The full pool before any contact filter |
| Same, with a valid work email | 2,149,717 | About 41% of the pool. This is the part you can email |
| Same, with a mobile number | 2,958,667 | About 56% of the pool. Useful if you also call or text |
| US software founders and CEOs at companies with 1 to 200 employees, valid work email | 58,642 | A narrow niche. One 50,000 list would take most of it |
| US marketing agency owners and founders, valid work email | 84,927 | Enough for several separate campaigns |
| US sales and marketing VPs, directors and managers at companies with 51 to 500 employees, valid work email | 327,665 | Room to split by title or company size and test |
Two things stand out. First, the valid-email filter removes more than half of the broad pool, so a list built on valid email is a smaller, cleaner set than one built on any email. The mobile count is a separate filter and does not require an email, so do not add the two together.
Second, in a narrow niche the count runs out before your budget does. A 50,000 list is about 2% of the 2.1M broad pool, but about 85% of the software founder pool. If your niche is that tight, buy what you need and keep the rest for a later round. To size that order, see how many leads you need for a cold email campaign. To pick titles, see how to choose job titles for a B2B lead list.
How do you build a priced list in cheapleads.io, step by step?
This example builds the software founder list from the table. You can also describe your ideal customer in plain words and let the builder fill the filters, then check them.
- Open the cheapleads.io list builder.
- Set job titles to Founder, Co-Founder and CEO. Titles match whole words, so add any variants you want.
- Set industry to Software Development and IT Services and IT Consulting.
- Set company size to 1 to 10, 11 to 50 and 51 to 200.
- Set country to United States.
- Turn on the toggles for has a work email and email marked valid.
- Read the live match count. On 2026-11-02 it was 58,642. Check the masked sample of real matches to see if the titles and companies fit.
- Choose how many leads you want. For 5,000, the one-time cost is $47.50 and the monthly plan is $38.
- Download the CSV. It stays available for 24 hours and is also emailed to you.
New accounts get 3,000 free leads with no card, which is enough to test this process before you spend anything.
What should you check before you send to a purchased list?
Check the law where your recipients live, then check your own list. In the US, CAN-SPAM covers commercial email, including B2B. It requires accurate sender information, a valid physical postal address and an opt-out that you honor. See the FTC's CAN-SPAM guide for the rules.
If you email people in the EU or UK, data protection rules can apply to business email addresses that identify a person. The text of the regulation is at gdpr-info.eu. This is not legal advice.
Then start small. Send a test batch, read the bounces and replies, and fix your filters before you buy a bigger list. A cheap list you never send to is still wasted money.
Is there a minimum spend?
The minimum one-time purchase is 1,000 credits, which is $12. One-time credits never expire. Monthly plans start at 2,500 leads for $24 and run to 50,000 for $206.
Do I pay for rows that fail the email check?
No. Rows that fail the checks for syntax, disposable domains, unread inboxes and mail-receiving domains are dropped and replaced. You are charged only for rows in the final CSV. This is not a delivery promise, so some addresses can still bounce.
Can I see the contacts before I buy?
You see a live match count as you set filters, plus a masked sample of real matches before you pay. New accounts also get 3,000 free leads with no card, so you can test a full list first.
How many leads should I buy first?
Start with the 3,000 free leads or the 1,000 credit minimum. Send to them, read your bounces and replies, and adjust titles and company size. Then buy a larger batch once the filters are doing what you want.