AlsoAsked vs Topicfinder in 2026: Live PAA question trees vs competitor content crawling with AI-scored titles
One tool renders Google's People Also Asked tree in real time from $12 a month. The other crawls thousands of competitor pages to surface proven topics and scores AI-generated titles, starting at $39 a month with a free trial.
AlsoAsked
Topicfinder- AlsoAsked pulls live Google People Also Asked question trees; Topicfinder crawls thousands of competitor domains in parallel to surface pages already earning real traffic. Neither relies on traditional search-volume estimates.
- Topicfinder scores AI-generated title variations by SEO potential and character length for every topic it surfaces. AlsoAsked has no title generation feature; it exports question data only.
- AlsoAsked starts at $12/month with unlimited user seats on every plan. Topicfinder starts at $39/month and caps the Trial and Starter plans at a single user seat.
- Topicfinder offers a free trial with no credit card required, capped at 100 competitor searches and 3,000 topics a day. AlsoAsked has no registered free plan, only 3 free searches a day for unregistered visitors.
- Neither tool has a public API on its standard plans. AlsoAsked gates API access to its $47/month Pro plan; Topicfinder has no API on any plan, including the $149/month Business tier.
- AlsoAsked offers city-level international targeting across every Google-supported language. Topicfinder has no geographic targeting; it works from domain-level competitor crawling regardless of region.
- AlsoAsked is the sharper tool for mapping search intent and content structure. Topicfinder is the sharper tool for finding proven topics fast when you already have a competitor in mind.
AlsoAsked and Topicfinder both skip traditional keyword volume data, but they replace it with completely different signals. AlsoAsked queries Google's live People Also Asked boxes and renders the question tree for a seed term, mapping exactly what Google expects a page to answer. Topicfinder starts from your domain and one competitor, then crawls thousands of similar sites in parallel to surface pages that are already earning real traffic, adding AI-generated title variations scored by SEO potential on top. AlsoAsked is the cheaper way in at $12 a month with unlimited seats on every plan; Topicfinder costs more at $39 a month but includes a free trial with no credit card and a Business-tier team workspace that AlsoAsked does not offer until its top plan. Both tools have real gaps: AlsoAsked has no competitor data at all, and Topicfinder has no public API on any plan. Choosing between them depends on whether the research question is what Google expects a page to answer, or what is already working for a specific competitor.
The tools at a glance
AlsoAsked
Live People Also Asked data with intent clustering, bulk exports, and city-level international targeting for content strategy
AlsoAsked has one job: pull Google's live People Also Asked data for a seed term and render it as a branching question graph. Nothing else is bolted on, no volume, no difficulty score, no competitor tracking, which keeps the tool fast and the output easy to hand straight to a writer as a visual brief.
Every plan, including the $12/month Basic tier, ships with unlimited user seats and full access to every region and language Google supports, down to the city level. Monthly credits scale with plan (100 on Basic, 300 on Lite, 1,000 on Pro), and CSV export, bulk search, and API access unlock progressively, with bulk search and the API reserved for the $47/month Pro tier.
The narrowness that makes AlsoAsked fast also limits it. There is no way to see what a competitor is already ranking for, no traffic estimate attached to any question, and search history is capped at 24 hours on the entry plan. Teams that need competitive context alongside their PAA data will need to run a second tool.
| Feature | Basic $12/month | Lite $23/month | Pro $47/month |
|---|---|---|---|
| Credits per month | 100 | 300 | 1,000 |
| Unlimited user seats | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Search history | 24 hours | 1 month | 1 year |
| CSV export | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Bulk searches | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| API access | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
Topicfinder
Multi-threaded competitive content research that crawls thousands of competitor pages, surfaces proven topics, and generates AI-optimized title suggestions in one tool
Topicfinder works from a different starting point entirely: give it your domain and one competitor, and it crawls thousands of similar sites in parallel to surface the pages already earning real traffic for that competitor. The premise is that a page already ranking somewhere else is a proven opportunity, not a guess based on search-volume estimates.
Every topic that comes back is paired with AI-generated title variations scored by SEO potential and character length, with titles that meet Google's length requirements flagged as ready to use. Advanced filters let you cut a report down by traffic threshold or content type in real time, and everything is stored in a cloud dashboard rather than a spreadsheet, with a free trial (no credit card) available on the Starter tier.
There is no public API on any plan, including the $149/month Business tier, so data leaving Topicfinder does so as a CSV export. The Starter plan also caps daily research at 100 competitors and 3,000 topics, workable for a solo operator but tight for an agency running several client research sessions in a day, and Agency-tier pricing is not published, so budgeting for that tier means a sales call.
| Feature | Trial Free | Starter $39/mo | Business $149/mo | Agency Contact |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Competitors searched per day | 100 | 100 | 500 | Custom |
| Topics found per day | 3,000 | 3,000 | 15,000 | Custom |
| AI title generation | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Team workspace | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Public API | ✗ | ✗ | ✗ | ✗ |
Head-to-head feature comparison
| Feature | AlsoAsked | Topicfinder |
|---|---|---|
| Primary research method | Live Google People Also Asked boxes | Competitor-page crawling |
| Search volume data | No | No (works from real competitor traffic, not volume estimates) |
| Competitor traffic / topic discovery | No | Yes, crawls thousands of similar domains automatically |
| Question / PAA data | Yes (branching question graph) | No |
| AI-generated title suggestions | No | Yes, scored by SEO potential and character length |
| City / region-level targeting | Yes, city-level in all Google-supported languages | No (domain-level crawling, not geographic) |
| Team workspace (multi-seat) | Yes, unlimited seats on every plan | Business plan and up (3 seats) |
| CSV export | Lite and Pro plans | Yes, all plans |
| API access | Pro plan only | No, not on any plan |
| Free trial | No (3 free searches/day, unregistered visitors only) | Yes, no credit card required |
| Search / report history retention | 24 hours to 1 year depending on plan | Reports stored indefinitely in the cloud dashboard |
| Starting price | $12/mo | $39/mo |
Which should you choose?
AlsoAskedTopicfinderTopicfinderAlsoAskedAlsoAskedTopicfinderAlsoAskedAlsoAsked and Topicfinder rarely compete for the same research question. AlsoAsked tells you what Google expects a page to answer; Topicfinder tells you what is already working for a specific competitor. Neither gives you a volume number, which is unusual for the category, but for different reasons: AlsoAsked is deliberately narrow, while Topicfinder replaces volume with real crawled traffic data. Teams doing broad content strategy across many topics will lean on AlsoAsked's PAA trees; teams building a content calendar around a handful of known competitors will get more direct value from Topicfinder.
Bottom line
Choose AlsoAsked's $12 Basic plan if the job is mapping search intent quickly and cheaply across a wide range of seed terms, and upgrade to Pro only once bulk search or API access becomes necessary. Choose Topicfinder's free trial, then the $39 Starter plan, if you already have a competitor in mind and want proven topics with ready-scored titles rather than a question tree. Agencies running both content-brief research and competitor content audits will likely end up paying for both, since neither replaces the other's core data source.
Frequently asked questions
Is AlsoAsked or Topicfinder better for building a content brief from real search questions?
AlsoAsked is the better choice for this because it queries live Google PAA boxes and renders the exact question tree Google clusters around a topic. Topicfinder does not surface questions at all; it crawls competitor pages to find proven topics, which is a related but different kind of research.
Does Topicfinder use search volume data the way most keyword tools do?
No, Topicfinder does not use search-volume estimates; it identifies content opportunities by crawling thousands of competitor domains and surfacing pages that are already earning real traffic. AlsoAsked also has no volume data, since it is a pure PAA question tool, so neither platform is a substitute for a dedicated volume-based keyword tool.
Which tool is easier to try without committing to a paid plan?
Topicfinder offers a genuine free trial with no credit card required, giving you 100 competitor searches and 3,000 topics a day to evaluate the tool. AlsoAsked has no registered free plan; unregistered visitors get 3 free searches a day, which is enough to see the format but not to run real research.
Can either tool generate content titles automatically?
Topicfinder generates multiple AI-optimized title variations for every topic it surfaces and scores each one by SEO potential and character length, flagging the ones ready to use. AlsoAsked has no title generation feature; its output is the question tree itself, exported as a PNG graph or CSV file.
Is there an API for automating research with AlsoAsked or Topicfinder?
AlsoAsked offers an API on its $47-a-month Pro plan for scheduled searches and bulk queries. Topicfinder has no public API on any plan, including the $149-a-month Business tier, so its data can only leave the platform through CSV exports.
Do AlsoAsked or Topicfinder track brand visibility in AI answers like ChatGPT or Google AI Overviews?
No, neither tool monitors AI-generated answers. AlsoAsked's question trees can inform the kind of conversational follow-ups an AI assistant might address after an initial prompt, and Topicfinder's AI features are limited to scoring blog titles, not tracking citations. A dedicated AI visibility tool is needed to monitor whether a brand is actually mentioned or recommended inside ChatGPT, Gemini, or AI Overviews.