$29/mo
All 11 SBIR/STTR agencies + Grants.gov. Capability-statement ranking. Weekly digest. Built for solo founders and small R&D firms.
$199–$799/mo
SBIR + 7,000+ SLED procurement sources. BD-team features (API, CRM hooks, contract intel). Built for 50+ headcount primes.
$179+/mo
Foundation grants only — no SBIR coverage. Built for nonprofits and development teams chasing private philanthropic funding.
| Dimension | TopicScout | HigherGov | Instrumentl |
|---|---|---|---|
| Price | $29/mo | $199–$799/mo | $179+/mo |
| SBIR coverage | All 11 agencies | All 11 agencies | None |
| SLED procurement | No | Yes (7k+ sources) | No |
| Foundation grants | No | No | Yes (100k+ funders) |
| Capability-statement ranking | Yes (Claude-powered) | Keyword + saved searches | Yes (foundation-specific) |
| Weekly digest | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| API access | No (planned) | Yes | Limited |
| White-label | Yes ($200–500/mo) | Reseller (enterprise) | No |
| Institutional plan | Yes ($500–2k/mo flat) | Enterprise quote | Yes (different segment) |
| Free trial | Yes (homepage single-lookup, unlimited) | Demo only | 14-day trial |
| Best for | Solo founders, R&D firms, SBDC clients | 50+ headcount BD teams | Nonprofits, development offices |
TopicScout alone. $29/mo. The single-lookup tool is free if you want to validate fit before subscribing.
TopicScout for SBIR matching + HigherGov Basic for SLED procurement. ~$228/mo combined. Don't add Instrumentl unless you have a foundation- grants strategy.
Instrumentl for the nonprofit foundation side + TopicScout for the SBIR spinout side. ~$208/mo combined. The two cover non-overlapping grant universes.
TopicScout Institutional ($500–2k/mo flat) for SBIR portfolio matching across your cohort. HigherGov is enterprise-priced for multi-counselor seats and usually wrong-fit.
No. Instrumentl covers foundation and private grants only — it does not index any federal SBIR/STTR topics. If you need SBIR coverage, TopicScout or HigherGov are the relevant tools.
Usually no. HigherGov's value is its 7,000+ SLED procurement sources and BD-team features like API, CRM hooks, and contract intel. A solo founder focused on SBIR rarely uses those features. TopicScout at $29/mo covers the same SBIR data with a capability-statement-aware weekly digest.
Yes, and many firms do. The pattern is TopicScout for the cap-statement-ranked weekly SBIR digest, plus HigherGov for SLED procurement and contract intelligence. They cost ~$228/mo combined and don't duplicate work.
GovWin (Deltek) is enterprise-priced (typically $5k+/year) and aimed at large primes. GovTribe overlaps heavily with HigherGov at a similar price point. Neither shows up in the SBIR-focused buyer decision often enough to belong in this comparison; we focus on the three tools small businesses actually evaluate side-by-side.
Yes, with a caveat: we publish it, so we recommend TopicScout for SBIR-focused small firms because that's who we built it for. We don't recommend TopicScout for foundation-grant nonprofits or 50+ headcount BD teams — that's where HigherGov and Instrumentl genuinely win. If a price or feature here is wrong, email james@topicscout.io and we'll correct it.