HearBuyers vs F5Bot: keyword alerts or scored buyers?
updated 18 October 2026 · facts about other products checked 17 October 2026 from their own pages
F5Bot suits you if you want a free alert every time a keyword shows up on Reddit, Hacker News or Lobsters. HearBuyers suits you if you only want posts from people asking for what you sell, each scored 0 to 100 with a drafted reply. F5Bot tells you someone used a word. HearBuyers tells you who might buy.
F5Bot facts come from its home page, checked on 17 October 2026.
Side by side
| F5Bot | HearBuyers | |
|---|---|---|
| Sources | Reddit (posts and comments in every subreddit), Hacker News, Lobsters | X (posts and replies) and Reddit (posts and comments) |
| Setup | Sign up with an email and add keywords | Paste your website. Buyers, problems, search phrases, competitors and subreddits are filled in for you to edit |
| How it judges a post | Keyword match, with flags for subreddit, excluded terms and co-occurring keywords. Gold adds AI filtering by description | A 0 to 100 buying-intent score, the sentence that shows the need, and a one-line reason |
| Replies | Not listed | A drafted public reply per strong match, plus a DM draft on X. A person approves and posts |
| Alerts | Email (instant, batched or daily), Slack and Discord via webhooks, RSS and JSON | Slack, a daily email digest and a team inbox with stages |
| Price | Free $0. Silver $9.99 a month (20 keywords). Gold $49.99 (200 keywords, AI filtering, feeds, Slack and Discord). Enterprise on request | From $19 a month, free for 14 days. Any price agreed with you first |
Where F5Bot is stronger
- Price. The free plan really is free, and Silver costs $9.99 a month.
- Hacker News and Lobsters. HearBuyers doesn't read them yet.
- Coverage of a word. When you need every mention of a brand name or a release, a plain keyword alert does the job.
- Feeds. Gold includes RSS and JSON feeds you can plug into your own tools.
- Longevity. It has been running since 2017.
Where HearBuyers is stronger
- Fewer, better alerts. A keyword alert fires on every post that contains the word, while HearBuyers keeps only the posts above your threshold. F5Bot's Gold AI filter narrows things down too, and HearBuyers builds on that idea.
- Buyers' own words. It searches for the problems people describe as well as your category's name.
- X. F5Bot doesn't read it.
- The next step. You get a drafted reply for a person to approve, plus a shared inbox for the team.
How to choose
If you have no budget or only need brand mentions, start with F5Bot. Switch to HearBuyers once your inbox fills up with mentions and you need to know which ones come from buyers. Plenty of teams run both, F5Bot for the brand name and HearBuyers for leads.
How to switch
- List the F5Bot keywords that describe a problem or ask for a recommendation.
- Sign up for HearBuyers and paste your website.
- Add any of your keywords that are missing from the suggested search phrases.
- Add competitors and subreddits, then set your threshold.
For the longer write-up, see the F5Bot alternative page. If alerts are what you're after, see Reddit keyword alerts. Paste your website into HearBuyers and compare its first scan with your F5Bot inbox.
Sources, checked 17 October 2026: F5Bot home. Product names are trademarks of their owners. HearBuyers is not affiliated with them. Spot something out of date? Write to us and we will fix it.
See who is asking for what you sell
Paste your website. Your first scored matches from X and Reddit arrive within minutes, each with a drafted reply. Free for 14 days, no card.