Linked Helper vs Closely in 2026: Price, Safety and Features Compared

The two are built in opposite ways. Linked Helper is a desktop app that runs on your own computer or VPS. Closely is a cloud platform that runs from the vendor's servers. That one difference decides who holds your LinkedIn session, what you pay per account and how much control you keep.

Which Is Better, Linked Helper or Closely?

Linked Helper leads on price and control. Closely leads on cloud convenience, built-in email and a ready contact database.

Which Tool Has More Features?

Linked Helper has more automation depth for LinkedIn: 30+ features, 15 native integrations (with Zapier, Make and webhooks on top) and AI messages, comments and ICP scoring. Closely has five native CRM integrations with webhooks in and out, and its edges are email steps inside the same sequence, a branch on connection status and a built-in email and phone finder.

Quick key. Yes means the feature is there and works. Partial means it works, with strings attached. No means we tested the tool and did not find it.

Does Closely's Starter Plan Include an Email Finder?

No. On the $65 Starter plan, live scraping, the email finder, the phone finder, AI personalization, lead scoring and web research are switched off. They start on Growth at $159 together with 3,000 shared credits. Starter also has no bonus credits at all, so it suits people who bring their own verified lists.

Closely pricing page, October 2026. Starter $65, Growth $159 and Essential $259 per month billed monthly.

Linked Helper's email finder and enrichment come with every license. The $15 Standard plan includes 620 data credits a month and 250 AI credits, and data credits never expire.

How Much Do Linked Helper and Closely Cost?

Linked Helper is cheaper at every size, and the gap stays above two to one as you add accounts. It starts at $15 per account per month against $65 for Closely, and at 20 accounts Standard costs $240 against $799 before credits. Linked Helper applies bulk discounts automatically, 10% off at 10 accounts and 20% off at 20, up to 50% off for larger teams. Closely's price per extra account falls with volume too, but it is a calculator on its pricing page and not a published schedule.

Linked Helper sells licenses for 1, 3, 6 or 12 months instead of an auto-renewing subscription. The $8.25 figure is a 12-month license billed once at $99. One license runs one LinkedIn account at a time, so we quote prices per account. Duration and bulk discounts stack, and bulk discounts apply when the licenses are on one invoice (licensing and discounts).

What Does a 20-Account Agency Really Pay?

A 20-account team pays about $420 a month with Linked Helper and $879 plus taxes with Closely, even after counting the hosting we added. List prices are only part of the bill, so we ran the full cost for one scenario. Five managers, 20 LinkedIn accounts, outreach feeding HubSpot, campaigns running 24/7, 400 email lookups per account and 850 follow-ups. Linked Helper lives on your own machines, so we added the hosting it needs. Closely is cloud, so its price already includes the servers and the proxies.

Closely's calculator at 20 accounts and 8,000 credits a month, billed monthly. On annual billing the same setting shows $527.

Annual billing narrows the gap but does not close it. Closely's unused credits do not roll over to the next month, according to its support, and its terms add taxes on top of every fee. We counted one credit per lookup. Closely's pricing page implies four credits per email and its help center says two, so a bill at those rates would run from $959 to $1,119 a month.

Which Plan Is the Cheapest Way In?

At Linked Helper the cheapest plan is also the real minimum. Standard at $15 per account passes every check we set for a minimum viable setup, which we defined as the cheapest plan that still runs a real outreach campaign. At Closely the entry price is Starter at $65, but the finder and AI that its home page leads with begin on Growth at $159. Here is what each entry plan gives you.

Source for the Linked Helper columns is the licensing and discounts article of its help center.

What Do You Get With Linked Helper?

Linked Helper home page, October 2026.

Linked Helper, sometimes written LinkedHelper, has been built around one network, LinkedIn, for ten years. Invitations, messages, profile visits, endorsements and post engagement are all actions you chain into one campaign, and each account can use its own HTTP, HTTPS, SOCKS or SOCKS5 proxy.

What Do You Get With Closely?

Closely home page, October 2026.

Closely positions itself as a cloud platform for LinkedIn and email outreach with built-in AI personalization, a contact database and white-label options. It targets sales teams and agencies that want one place for sequences, enrichment and inbox.

Is Linked Helper or Closely Safer?

We believe Linked Helper is: it keeps your session on your side, while Closely holds it in its cloud. This is where the two differ most, so we checked it in the product and in the code.

Is Closely a Safe Cloud Tool?

Closely needs your LinkedIn session on its servers to run anything. When you add an account you either enter your LinkedIn email and password or sync through the Closely Chrome extension. Its help center explains why it wants access: "Since we imitate your behavior and send requests on your behalf", and the credentials are stored in encrypted form.

In October 2026 we unpacked the current Closely Assistant extension (version 2.0.6, Manifest V3). It requests the cookies permission, reads the li_at cookie and sends it with the browser's user agent to api.closelyhq.com. If the server answers with an error, it sends the whole LinkedIn cookie jar instead.

Closely Assistant 2.0.6, from the package we unpacked in October 2026. Minified names are replaced with readable ones. The destination is api.closelyhq.com.

The window where you add an account tells a different story. It says: "We do not get direct access to your LinkedIn account and can not make any changes in it." Closely does hold the session, and it acts on your behalf from its servers.

The add-account window in our Closely trial. Email and password on the left, extension sync on the right.

We asked support whether Closely slows or stops campaigns when an account shows risk signals. The reply did not mention throttling. It said that Closely uses "the same LinkedIn session as LinkedIn itself, so it's not apparent that a third-party tool is being used", with warm-up mode and your own daily limits on top.

Closely support reply to our question about throttling at risk. The agent's name and address are removed.

Closely's controls are real. Warm-up is on by default, daily limits are randomized in documented ranges and working hours follow your time zone. They sit on top of a session that lives with the vendor, and its own terms say it is not responsible for LinkedIn restricting your account.

How Does Linked Helper Keep You in Control?

Linked Helper's answer is different. The session is created inside the desktop app on your machine and never leaves it, so there is nothing to hand to a vendor. The password is used for auto-login only: if you do not add it you log in manually, and if you do not want it stored on our servers, you can store it locally on your machine.

Pacing is set in the same app. The default daily limit is 150 actions, with a Smart Daily Limit Adjustment that varies the daily count so it never lands on the same round number, and separate limits per action type. Each account can also run behind its own proxy with a built-in checker.

Linked Helper limits settings. The default cap is 150 actions per 24 hours, with per-action limits below it.

Does Linked Helper Stop When the Computer Is Off?

Only if you leave Linked Helper on a laptop you close (the help center says so too). Run it on a VPS you rent and campaigns stay online around the clock, from an environment you control. That is the one thing the cloud gives Closely users for free, and it is a fair reason to pick it if you accept the trade.

Can You Test Closely Before You Pay, and Cancel Afterwards?

You can test most of Closely, but not the part its price is built around. The trial takes 14 days and no credit card, and the first screen says all features are unlocked.

Closely trial offer in our test account.

The Enrichment screen then says that enrichment is not part of the free trial and asks you to chat to switch it on. Enrichment is the finder and AI that start on Growth at $159.

Closely Enrichment screen in our trial account. Our tester's email is removed.

Its help center adds that during the trial the dedicated proxy is not allocated, and advises staying in warm-up mode. Linked Helper gives 14 days with full functionality and no card, including data credits to test the finder.

Leaving is a support ticket. Closely's help center says the Cancel button "is there only to help you get in touch with our team" and "doesn't automatically stop your subscription".

Closely help center, how to cancel the subscription.

Refunds are narrow. Closely's policy is no refund, with a request window of two calendar days after the first purchase. Its disclaimer adds that Closely will not entertain or grant requests for cancellations or refunds in connection with any repercussions experienced by your LinkedIn account.

Closely disclaimer of liability.

Linked Helper's terms also say license fees already paid are not refunded. The difference is the shape of the purchase. You buy a license for 1, 3, 6 or 12 months, so by default nothing renews, and a subscription you switch on can be cancelled from the Launcher.

Which Is Better for Agencies, Linked Helper or Closely?

Linked Helper costs less per account and keeps client sessions on machines you control. Closely sells a branded client portal and runs everything in its own cloud.

What Do Users Say About Each Tool?

On G2, the one site where we could compare both, Closely rates slightly higher. At the start of October the ratings on the major review sites look like this.

We could not confirm current Capterra or Trustpilot scores for Closely, so we do not compare them. The three sites have different audiences and review rules.

Closely reviewers praise its ease of use and the contact database. The complaints that repeat on its Trustpilot page are about billing and cancellation. One G2 reviewer wrote: "If you don't want to be charged for NEXT MONTH you must provide 15-25 days of notice." Linked Helper reviewers most often mention time saved, campaign control and a learning curve at the start.

Which One Should You Choose?

Pick Linked Helper for price and control. Pick Closely only if you want LinkedIn and email in one cloud sequence with a built-in contact database, and you are fine with the vendor holding your session.

How Do You Switch From Closely to Linked Helper?

In six steps, using the 14-day Linked Helper trial that needs no card.

Where Can You Read More About Closely?

Two pages go deeper on Closely: our Closely review and the list of Closely alternatives.

To see other tools side by side, browse all comparisons, reviews and alternatives.