Helium 10 is one of the best-known toolkits for Amazon sellers. At the time of writing (2026), its entry plan, Platinum, costs $129 a month billed monthly or $99 a month billed yearly. That is fair if you use most of the suite every week. It is a lot if you are still choosing a first product, or if you only open keyword research and a profit calculator.
This guide covers what sellers use Helium 10 for, why some look elsewhere, and how five Helium 10 alternatives compare with it on price, free access and strengths. It includes an honest look at our own free tools, limits included, and a step list for choosing by the stage your business is in.
Every price below comes from the vendor's own pricing page at the time of writing. Prices change often, so confirm before you pay.
What sellers use Helium 10 for
Helium 10 is a full suite, and most users lean on four parts of it.
- Keyword research. Cerebro finds the search terms competing products rank for (a reverse ASIN lookup), and Magnet grows a seed phrase into a list of related search terms.
- Product research. Black Box is for finding products to sell, and the Chrome extension, with its Xray view, analyzes products on an Amazon search page while you browse.
- Listings. Listing Builder writes listings with AI around your keywords, and Listing Analyzer scores an existing one.
- PPC. Helium 10 Ads runs rules-based ad automation and dayparting. It comes with the Diamond plan ($359 a month, or $279 billed yearly), with a 2% management fee on the ad spend it manages.
Around those sit profit reporting, inventory management, review requests and refund recovery, plus Freedom Ticket training on paid plans. Breadth is the reason to pick it: one login covers research, listings, ads and operations across Amazon, Walmart and TikTok Shop.
Why sellers look for a Helium 10 alternative
Switching is usually about fit, not quality: what you pay for and what you use drift apart.
- Price before revenue. Twelve months of Platinum on monthly billing is $1,548. Before your first sale, that could pay for a sample order or part of your first batch of stock.
- Features you will not touch yet. Profit dashboards, inventory planning and refund recovery need a live catalog, and ad automation needs ad spend. A seller still researching uses a small slice of the plan.
- A second marketplace. If you also run an Etsy shop, you need Etsy research too, which sits outside the marketplaces Helium 10 lists.
Helium 10 alternatives compared
Six options side by side, Helium 10 included, in US dollars as listed at the time of writing.
| Tool | Price from (2026) | Free option | Strengths | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Helium 10 | Platinum: $99/month billed yearly, $129 monthly | Free plan with limited access, plus free tools | Widest suite: research, listings, PPC (Diamond), operations | Sellers with revenue who will use most of it |
| Jungle Scout | Starter: $29/month billed yearly ($348), $49 monthly | No free trial; 7-day money-back guarantee | Product database, browser extension, Keyword Scout, sales estimates | New sellers who want a full research suite for less |
| SellerApp | Pro: from $99/month | Freemium plan, no credit card | Advertising tools, with ad automation on its Smart plan | Sellers whose main lever is PPC |
| AMZScout | Paid extension and bundles; see its pricing page | Free sales estimator; extension trial with no card | Chrome extension with niche score, product history, FBA cost estimate, supplier search | Sellers who research while browsing Amazon |
| Amazon Product Opportunity Explorer | No extra charge inside Seller Central | Included with a selling account | Amazon's own niche, search term, review and return data | Anyone who already has Seller Central |
| eMarketInsight | Free; paid plans from $9/month | 3 lookups a day without an account, 10 with a free one | Amazon keywords by niche, product research report, FBA calculator, Etsy research | Validating ideas before launch; Amazon plus Etsy sellers |
Jungle Scout
Jungle Scout is the closest like-for-like switch. The Catalyst plans start with Starter at $29 a month billed yearly, or $49 month to month, and every plan includes the browser extension for Chrome and Firefox. Starter caps Keyword Scout at 50 searches a month and leaves out sponsored (PPC) keyword data and advertising analytics, which arrive with Growth Accelerator ($49 a month billed yearly, $79 monthly). There is no free trial, but new customers get a 7-day money-back guarantee. Looking for a Jungle Scout alternative instead? The rest of this list applies to you too.
SellerApp
SellerApp leans toward advertising. Its Freemium plan costs nothing, needs no credit card and covers basic product research. Pro starts at $99 a month, and the Smart plan adds ad automation at $149 a month for the first three months and $250 after that.
AMZScout
AMZScout centers on its PRO Extension for Chrome, which shows a niche score, product history, an FBA cost estimate and supplier search while you browse Amazon, with a free trial that needs no card. Its free Amazon sales estimator turns a country, category and Best Sellers Rank into estimated monthly sales. Plan prices are on its pricing page.
Amazon Product Opportunity Explorer
Product Opportunity Explorer is Amazon's own research tool, in Seller Central under Growth. It groups search terms into niches and shows demand, search terms and their volume, competition, review insights and return activity, with niche metrics refreshed at the start of each week. It costs nothing extra, but you need a selling account: the Professional plan is $39.99 a month at the time of writing, or the Individual plan charges $0.99 per item sold.
eMarketInsight: free Amazon research, with clear limits
We build eMarketInsight, so weigh this section accordingly. It is not a full suite: it covers the research you do before you spend money on stock, for Amazon and Etsy.
What it does
- Keywords by niche. Type a product, such as "silicone baking mat", into the free Amazon keyword research tool. It finds the closest niche in Amazon's Product Opportunity Explorer data and lists every search term in it with 30-day search volume, growth, click share, sales and conversion. Terms with 500 or more searches that also show sales and conversions are marked as golden keywords.
- A full product report. The Amazon product research report adds the products already selling in the niche, with price, reviews, rating, age and estimated monthly sales, then competition, a suggested price with its FBA and referral fees, and an AI verdict of go, test or avoid with a short launch plan.
- The money check. The Amazon FBA calculator works out the size tier from your packed size and weight, applies the fulfillment and referral fees, adds product cost, ads and storage, and shows profit per unit, margin, ROI and break-even.
- Etsy in the same account. If you also sell on Etsy, the Etsy keyword research tool reads demand from listing views, favorites and sales, because Etsy publishes no search volume. Our guide to Etsy keyword research shows how to read it.
The keyword tool gives 3 lookups a day without an account and 10 with a free account. The product report shows a preview once a day without an account, and the full report 3 times a day with a free account. The FBA calculator runs in your browser with no account and no daily limit.
What it does not do
- No PPC bid data. You see search volume, sales and conversion, not cost per click or suggested bids, and there is no ad management.
- Weekly data. Amazon numbers refresh once a week, so a term that jumped yesterday shows up next week.
- Product sections fill in over time. Products, competition and fees come from the niche's top 30 products, read live from Amazon the first time a niche is researched (about a minute), then kept. Until it reaches yours, the report says so instead of showing empty numbers.
- No Chrome extension. You research on our site, not on top of Amazon search pages.
- Amazon.com only. The figures cover the US store, and there is no rank tracking, inventory or review tooling.
How to choose a tool for your stage
Match the tool to the jobs you will do in the next three months, not the business you hope to have in two years.
- List your jobs for the next 90 days. Finding a product, picking keywords, writing a listing, running ads and managing stock are separate jobs. Cross out what you will not do yet.
- Validate ideas with free data. Run each idea through our Amazon keyword research tool and, if you have Seller Central, Product Opportunity Explorer. Drop ideas where no search term shows real volume and sales.
- Check the margin before paying for software. Put your expected price, product cost and packed size and weight into our Amazon FBA calculator or Amazon's free Revenue Calculator. If the fees leave nothing, no subscription will fix the product.
- Pay for one suite during launch, billed monthly. Close to ordering stock, a month or two of Jungle Scout or Helium 10 adds product tracking and a browser extension. Monthly billing lets you stop when launch work is done.
- Add PPC tools when ad spend is real. Ad automation pays once small gains on your spend add up. Until then, Amazon Ads' own campaign tools will do.
- Review every quarter. Cancel any tool you did not open last month, and export what you want to keep first.
Example: what a research phase costs
An example for a seller who plans three months of research before ordering stock, at the monthly prices listed at the time of writing:
- Helium 10 Platinum: 3 x $129 = $387.
- Jungle Scout Starter: 3 x $49 = $147.
- Free tools only: $0. Product Opportunity Explorer adds nothing to a selling account, but opening a Professional account early just for it costs 3 x $39.99 = $119.97.
A sensible mix: two months of free tools to narrow ten ideas to two, then one paid month ($49 to $129) to study those two in depth.
Mistakes to avoid when you switch
- Comparing sales estimates across tools. Each tool models sales its own way. Compare products inside one tool, not numbers between tools.
- Paying for a year on day one. Platinum billed yearly is $1,188, about nine months at the monthly price, so it only saves money if you still use it in month ten.
- Chasing search volume alone. A term typed often but rarely bought from brings clicks without orders, so weigh conversion and sales too.
FAQ
Is there a free version of Helium 10?
In a limited form. At the time of writing, Helium 10 has a Free plan with limited Chrome extension access and a set of free tools, including a keyword tool, a sales estimator and an FBA calculator. Full research starts with Platinum, and Helium 10 Ads needs Diamond, as the Helium 10 pricing page shows.
What is the cheapest alternative to Helium 10?
Product Opportunity Explorer (with a selling account), SellerApp's Freemium plan and our free Amazon tools cost nothing. Among paid research suites, Jungle Scout Starter costs $29 a month billed yearly at the time of writing, against $99 for Helium 10 Platinum.
Is there a free Amazon keyword tool with real search volume?
Amazon shows search volume to sellers in Product Opportunity Explorer. Our Amazon keyword research tool shows those Opportunity Explorer figures for any product phrase without a seller account, refreshed weekly. Helium 10 also has a free keyword tool.
How can I estimate Amazon sales for free?
The free sales estimators from Jungle Scout and AMZScout turn a product's Best Sellers Rank and category into estimated monthly sales, and Helium 10 offers one too. Jungle Scout's gives a few free estimates a day. For a whole niche, our product research report lists estimated monthly sales for the products that sell in it.
