InsightFuse runs the campaign. Medialyst shows you who to pitch and why.
InsightFuse runs your outreach as one campaign, with review mode on by default. Medialyst picks each journalist from their recent bylines, shows you why, and leaves every send to you.


Who builds Medialyst, and who grades it.
As far as we know, Medialyst is the only AI PR tool that publishes a public, recurring quality benchmark. Carly Martinetti, our Founding Strategic Advisor, runs Notably, a boutique PR agency serving 25+ clients; she grades our real media lists, and we publish every grade, starting with her first: F, 27.9/100. Elvis Sun, the founder, is an AI engineer who spent 8 years at Google working on AI systems.
The honest comparison.
Pulled from public InsightFuse documentation, customer reviews, and our own product. We update this page when either side ships something new.
| Capability | Medialyst | InsightFuse |
|---|---|---|
| Finding the right journalist | ||
| Find journalists for this story | ✓ Story-specific relevance scoring | ~ Every candidate “scored against your story and angle”; a per-reporter reason is not documented |
| Understand a journalist's beat | ✓ Reads past articles + recent coverage | ~ Agent “scans everyone writing about your space right now”; database beat tags “derived from job title, outlet and industry” |
| Analyze past writing | ✓ Grounded in actual articles | ~ Not documented |
| Per-journalist pitch angles | ✓ Personalized angles + pitch drafts | ~ Writes each reporter “a pitch that reads hand-written” |
| Data freshness | ✓ Live news article search in real time | ~ Database “refreshed on a rolling schedule”; the agent scans current coverage |
| Refine a list with natural language | ✓ “Remove anyone inactive in 6 months” | ~ Not documented |
| Find more like top performers | ✓ “Find 20 more like the top 5” | ~ Not documented |
| Add custom enrichment columns | ✓ “Research if they use affiliate links” | ~ Not documented |
| Pitching & sending | ||
| Email verification | ✓ Multi-step verification waterfall | ~ 289,253 of 799,089 profiles carry a direct email; verification method not documented |
| Send from one place | ✓ Built-in sending | ~ Sends from your own mailbox (Gmail, Outlook and more); “Review mode is the default”, autopilot is opt-in; reads replies, up to 2 follow-ups |
| Pricing & setup | ||
| Time to first pitch | ✓ Minutes | ~ Not documented |
| Free trial | ✓ First list free | ~ Free plan: search all 799,000+ profiles, no credit card |
| Contract | ✓ None — cancel anytime | ~ Monthly (“Cancel anytime”) or annual |
| Price | ✓ from $149/mo | ~ $59/mo, or $49/mo billed annually |
| Agent-native workflows | ||
| API access | ✓ Public REST API | ~ “There is no API today” |
| Remote MCP support | ✓ Hosted remote MCP server | ~ Not documented |
| Agent-native workflows | ✓ Usable directly inside Claude, ChatGPT & Cursor | ~ Not documented |
| CSV import / re-enrichment from competitor exports | ✓ Upload any CSV — the agent re-verifies & re-scores | ~ CSV export on Pro; import not documented |
Find your journalists now. No demo. No contract. No credit card.
Start in seconds and see live journalist matches for your first pitch.
Why people switch from InsightFuse.
Picked from recent bylines, not a job title
InsightFuse's media-list guide says “Job title is the strongest signal available” when you filter a list down to people who write, and its database explains that “Beat tags are derived from job title, outlet and industry.” Its agent goes further: its homepage says it “scans everyone writing about your space right now and pulls the reporters whose beat matches your story.” The same guide advises spending “thirty seconds on the reporter's recent work” before a tier-one send. Medialyst starts from that recent work. Each journalist is picked from their recent bylines for your story, with a 0–100 fit score and a written reason that cites the articles behind it.
insightfuse.com/media-list-building — method guide ↗A quality grade you can check, starting with an F
As far as we know, Medialyst is the only AI PR tool that publishes a public, recurring benchmark of its own list quality. Carly Martinetti, Medialyst's Founding Strategic Advisor and co-founder of the PR agency Notably, builds her own list from the same client brief, grades ours against it, and we publish every grade. The first, on 20 July 2026, was an F: 27.9 out of 100. The latest, on 1 October, is a B (82.0).
medialyst.ai/carly-score — every published grade ↗A person sends every pitch
InsightFuse sells a campaign that runs “without you in the loop … nights, weekends, long after you've closed the tab.” Its default is review mode: “Review mode is the default: the agent researches and drafts, then stops until you have read the pitches. Autopilot — where it sends and follows up on its own, including while you are logged out — is a deliberate switch.” In Medialyst, a person sends every pitch from their own Gmail or Outlook, with open, click and reply tracking.
insightfuse.com/pricing — “Can the agent email journalists without me approving it?” ↗An API and MCP server on every plan
InsightFuse says: “There is no API today — CSV export is the way to move data into another system.” Medialyst ships a public REST API and a hosted MCP server on every plan, including the free credits, so journalist research runs from Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor or your own scripts. The Medialyst team also builds Newsjack.sh, MIT-licensed open-source PR skills for your own agent.
insightfuse.com/media-contact-database ↗Where InsightFuse wins.
One plan, $49–59 a month
InsightFuse Pro is $59 a month, or $49 a month billed annually with three extra months free in the first year. It includes the agent, unlimited campaigns, contact reveals and lists. Its pricing page says “No credit system, no reveal packs, no AI usage metering, no overage billing — your plan price is the whole bill.” Medialyst starts at $149 a month, or $97 billed annually.
Search 799,000+ profiles free, no card
InsightFuse's free plan lets you “Search all 799,000+ journalist profiles,” filter by beat, outlet, job title and country, and save one list, with no credit card. Contact details stay hidden until you upgrade, but you can see who you could reach before you pay anything.
The whole loop, from pitch to follow-up
InsightFuse sends from your own mailbox (Gmail, Outlook, Yahoo and others), after you have read the pitches in review mode, its default, or on its own once you switch on autopilot. It monitors replies over IMAP and sends follow-ups, “never more than two each, and never to anyone who already answered.” A duplicate guard “Never pitches the same reporter twice.” Medialyst tracks replies but does not send follow-ups for you. InsightFuse also says “We don't track opens with hidden pixels.”
A candid security page
InsightFuse's security page states its gaps plainly: “SOC 2: not certified, and no audit currently in progress,” “Single sign-on: not available,” and “OAuth is not available yet,” followed by “We would rather tell you now than during a security review.” It also says “We do not archive message bodies on our servers.”
Where Medialyst pulls ahead.
Built from both sides
Elvis Sun, Medialyst's founder, spent 8 years at Google working on AI systems. Carly Martinetti runs Notably, a boutique PR agency, and is Medialyst's Founding Strategic Advisor. He builds the agents; she judges the lists against real agency work, and her grades are public.
The reason, written down for every journalist
Each journalist is picked from their recent bylines for the story you describe, with a 0–100 fit score and a written reason that cites the articles behind it. On Pro and Scale, deep fit scoring reads each journalist's author page and recent bylines before judging fit.
You send it, and you see what happened
Pitches go out from your own Gmail or Outlook when you send them. Medialyst tracks opens, clicks and replies for each journalist, and one toggle hides opens from scanners and bots.
Pay for delivered emails, not misses
Each email is validated within the last 14 days or re-checked at build time, and you pay only for delivered verified emails. Misses are free. Starter is $149/mo ($97/mo billed annually), Pro $299/mo and Scale $800/mo, with no per-seat fees, 100 free credits to start, and a 14-day money-back guarantee.
API, MCP and open-source skills
A public REST API and a hosted MCP server come with every plan. Newsjack.sh, MIT-licensed and built by the Medialyst team, adds open-source PR skills like newsworthiness checks, angle generation and daily newsjack monitoring.
Three places the difference shows up.
01Database quality
InsightFuse runs on its own database plus an agent.
” Its own guide is frank about the limits of any database: “Any contact database, ours included, is a snapshot,” so “spend thirty seconds on the reporter's recent work” before a tier-one send. Medialyst does that step for every row. Each journalist is picked from their recent bylines for your story, with a 0–100 fit score and a written reason citing the articles behind it.
On Pro and Scale, the scorer reads their author page, recent bylines and the openings of their latest articles first. Each email is validated within the last 14 days or re-checked at build time, and you pay only for delivered verified emails. 9) in July 2026.
02Speed
InsightFuse is designed so you brief it once and step away.
You tell it what you're announcing and where you want to be seen, choose a campaign depth of 10, 20 or 40 agent steps, and the agent researches, shortlists and drafts. ” Its site does not publish a time-to-list figure. Medialyst is built for the moment you want a list in front of you. Paste a press release, a URL or a topic, and the agent proposes story angles you can edit before any credit is spent, then researches the journalists for each one.
In minutes you have a ranked, fit-scored list with drafted pitches, and you decide who gets each email. If you want a campaign that keeps working while you're away, InsightFuse is built for that. If you want to spend your time choosing who to pitch, with the reason in front of you, Medialyst is built for that.
03AI & agent surface
InsightFuse runs in its own web app.
” Medialyst is built to be used from wherever you already work. A public REST API and a hosted MCP server come with every plan, including the free 100 credits, so journalist research and enrichment can run inside Claude, ChatGPT or Cursor, in your own scripts, or in an internal agent. sh, MIT-licensed open-source PR skills that install into your own agent.
Inside the app, custom columns take plain-English research questions and answer them across a whole list, and you can upload any CSV to re-score it against your story. Sending stays with a person, from their own Gmail or Outlook, with open, click and reply tracking.
Two pricing philosophies, side by side.
Ours is public and posted. Here's how it sits next to InsightFuse's own published pricing page and what named third parties report.
- Starterfounders & small teams$97/mo annual
- Proin-house comms & PR teams$194/mo annual
- Scaleagencies & high-volume teams$520/mo annual
- No contract · no per-seat fees · cancel anytime · 14-day money-back guarantee
- Free first list — 100 credits, no credit card
- One unified product — no modules priced separately
- InsightFuse publishes a free plan, which searches all 799,000+ profiles with contact details hidden and no credit card, and one paid plan, Pro, at $59 a month or $49 a month billed annually ($588 a year, plus three months free in the first year). Pro includes the agent, unlimited campaigns, contact reveals, lists and CSV export, with no credit system or overage billing.
- Pricing published online
In the words of Medialyst users.
Real customers, approved for use. Your results depend on your story and your list — these are theirs.
"What came back was a working list with real journalists, current coverage, and contact information I could use the same day. No cross-referencing. No digging through three different tabs. One prompt and I was pitching."

"I love Medialyst. It follows the workflow I already use, which, if I may say so myself, is the right workflow. I don't keep old Excel documents full of old emails and blast things to people. I hate the spray and pray. I like to make sure reporters are writing about the things I'm talking about, and to find new people who are. Muck Rack, Cision, all of those are basically very expensive static databases. I already know the major trade reporters. What Medialyst has helped me uncover are the people at Fast Company and The Wall Street Journal who cover packaging, and the freelancers I can get on the radar of. Muck Rack just doesn't help with that. Now when I tell Claude 'here's the person,' it pulls them through Medialyst, onto my list there, and starts gathering information about them. I haven't gotten a bounced email yet. I'd rather send a smaller list I can defend. And I'm never afraid to share it with clients, because it has everything in there. It proves its worth. My first job, as an intern, was photocopying Bacon's books into an Excel database every year. So I'm acutely aware of how hard it is to keep track of all this. This is how I would approach it myself."

"Medialyst makes it super easy to narrow down and create dedicated PR lists to reach out to the journalists that actually want to hear what you have to say. The timeline from chatting to the agent about what you have to promote to actually launching the campaign goes down to mere 1-2 hours instead of days worth of research and prospecting."

"Then recently I stumbled upon Elvis Sun's agentic PR tool Medialyst — with a few detailed prompts, the agent comes up with a pretty targeted list of journalists. The best thing is it gives a summary of their recent articles before I commit to reading every piece."

"This new company is a terrific idea—and helps PR people in ways they didn't know they needed it. The team really 'gets' this business and so many businesses just don't. Jump in. The agents are ready!"

"Medialyst is the only tool that keeps up with the pace our firm needs to move at across our High Growth B2B Tech clients. The journalist targeting is sharp as well as accurate, and Elvis actually ships when you give him feedback."

"It's 100% customizable to you & your clients. It's affordable. It's built by someone who gets back to you quickly & truly wants to give the people what they want — MORE time."

"The big media database platforms are built for agencies with full teams and retainers to match. For a boutique practice like mine, the economics just do not work. Medialyst fits the model. Beyond contact discovery, it helps me stay on top of what reporters are actually covering: the beats, the patterns, the recent angles. That is the real work of pitching well these days. Spray and pray is over, and Medialyst is built for how modern media relations actually works, at a price point that makes sense for the way I operate."

"Medialyst takes the guesswork out of journalist outreach. It vets your pitch for suitability, matches it to the right journalists, and hands you their most accurate contact details — so instead of firing off cold emails into the void, you're landing in the right inboxes. The result? Fewer emails sent, more stories published."

"This is a must-have if you work in media, it's easy to use and saves you a lot of time! The customer service has been some of the best I have experienced."

Paste a story. Get your journalist list in minutes.
Drop in a press release, your website URL, or a one-line description of your news. Medialyst reads what's relevant, finds reporters who actually cover it, scores them by fit, and checks every email before you get it. Your first list is free, no credit card.
Common questions about switching from InsightFuse.
How much does InsightFuse cost in 2026?
Does InsightFuse send pitches without my approval?
InsightFuse vs Medialyst — what's the difference?
What is the Carly Score?
Does InsightFuse have an API?
Which should I choose?
See why each journalist is on your list. Then send it yourself.
Start free with 100 credits and no credit card. Paste your story and get a verified, story-specific list of journalists in minutes.

