Hootsuite is one of the oldest and largest social media management platforms, founded in 2008 in Vancouver, Canada. The company pioneered the multi-account social media dashboard and has evolved into a comprehensive marketing suite serving over 18 million users globally. Following its 2023 merger with Talkwalker, Hootsuite added social listening and AI analytics capabilities to its core scheduling and management platform.
Hootsuite’s pricing has undergone dramatic increases in recent years — by some analyses, 50 to 250% depending on the tier compared to pricing from two years prior. The increases were attributed to rising API costs from social platforms, with Meta, LinkedIn, and X all raising developer fees in 2025. In 2026, the platform is positioned firmly at the premium end of the market.
The Standard plan starts at $99/user/month on annual billing and covers one user with 10 social accounts, unlimited scheduling, and core analytics. The Advanced plan at $249/user/month adds team collaboration, approval workflows, more social profiles, and deeper analytics. Both plans are per-user, meaning a 3-person team on Standard costs $297/month. Enterprise pricing is custom, requires a minimum of 5 users, and typically starts around $15,000–$16,000 per year.
Hootsuite no longer offers a free plan. A 30-day free trial is available, with a 10% discount offered to users who skip the trial and start a paid plan immediately on annual billing.
Hootsuite’s core strengths are its depth of social listening (via Talkwalker), enterprise-grade team collaboration and approval workflows, and the most comprehensive integrations ecosystem in the social media management category. Its main weakness is price — at $99/user/month entry and per-seat pricing that scales linearly, it is significantly more expensive than alternatives like Buffer ($10/channel/month) or Later ($25/user/month).