Cognism and Lusha split by criterion and judge; no overall winner emerges. Cognism leads sovereignty (5.5 vs 1.7; 6 judges lean Cognism, 0 Lusha, 0 tie) — its data residency attribute reads EU only, Lusha's US by default — and prospecting compliance (3.7 vs 3.0; 3 lean Cognism, 1 Lusha, 2 ties). Lusha leads CRM sync and export (4.8 vs 4.0; 5 lean Lusha, 1 Cognism) and pricing transparency (4.0 vs 2.0; 5 lean Lusha, 1 Cognism): Lusha publishes prices, Cognism's plans route to a quote. The splits: data coverage ties at 2.8 vs 2.8 (2 lean Cognism, 3 Lusha, 1 tie); data provenance, 1 Cognism, 2 Lusha, 3 ties (4.0 vs 3.7); visitor identification drew 5 ties (2.0 vs 1.7). Weighted totals: Lusha ahead for the SDR lead (4 vs 3.2), RevOps (4.1 vs 3.8), ABM marketer (3.6 vs 3) and skeptic (4 vs 3.5); Cognism for the data protection officer (4 vs 0).
Choose Cognism if
Your compliance mandate requires personal data stored in the EU — Cognism's data residency attribute reads EU only against Lusha's US by default, and sovereignty leans 6 judges to Cognism, 0 to Lusha, 0 ties.
Your procurement policy avoids US legal entities — Cognism's legal entity jurisdiction is GB, Lusha's is US.
A data protection officer signs off on the purchase — that judge's weighted total is 4 for Cognism against 0 for Lusha.
Your outbound calling puts prospecting compliance first — 3 judges lean Cognism on that criterion against 1 for Lusha, 2 ties.
You want a privacy notice that names its source categories with a self-service opt-out — cited in Cognism's provenance verdict, where its mean is 4.0 vs 3.7 though judges split 1 Cognism, 2 Lusha, 3 ties.
Choose Lusha if
Your team runs Salesforce, HubSpot, Monday or Zoho — CRM sync and export leans 5 judges to Lusha against 1 for Cognism, mean 4.8 vs 4.0.
You need published prices before a sales conversation — Lusha publishes prices, Cognism's plans route to an individual quote, and pricing transparency leans 5 judges to Lusha against 1, mean 4.0 vs 2.0.
Your buyer sits in the SDR lead, RevOps, ABM marketer or skeptic seat — Lusha's weighted totals lead each: 4 vs 3.2, 4.1 vs 3.8, 3.6 vs 3, 4 vs 3.5.
You need published volume figures — Lusha's data coverage verdict credits 290M+ contacts, 165M+ emails, 117M+ direct dials and 29M+ companies, with 3 judges leaning Lusha on coverage against 2 for Cognism, 1 tie.
You must keep exported data after ending the contract — Lusha's CRM sync and export verdict notes terms letting customers keep exported data after termination.
Read this comparison as one judge. Each weighs the same scores by what they care about.
The Skeptic
Has read "98% accuracy" and "GDPR-compliant data" on every homepage in the category. Reads instead for the refresh cadence, the credit-back rule for a bounced email, what a mobile number costs in credits, and the source the privacy notice admits to.
Cognism
Lusha
This judge's pick
Criterion by criterion
Coverage, accuracy & freshness
Cognism
The positioning line "Nicht die Datenmenge entscheidet, sondern ihre Qualität und Nutzbarkeit" is the only coverage statement on the captured pages — I found no record counts, no per-country or DACH figures, and no refresh cadence for anything. Firmographic filters, verified-mobile filters and verification-on-demand are described as features, but we found no public information on the verification method, last-verified dates, or credit-back and bounce terms.
Lusha
Headline counts are the whole story: 290M+ contacts, 165M+ emails, 117M+ direct dials, with no country or DACH breakdown anywhere on the captured pages. The weekly refresh attaches to buying signals, not to contact records, and the only accuracy figure published is a decay rate (12.6% a year, from 148,000 records) — a market statistic, not a verification method or a refresh cadence. We found no bounce or credit-back guarantee; the platform is licensed "as is" with no warranties.
Data sources & lawful basis
Cognism
The privacy notice names its source categories — licensed third-party data vendors (list only on request), customers under data sharing agreements, direct correspondence — and honestly discloses that business emails may be generated approximately from the employer's email pattern, with a self-service Privacy Centre opt-out and platform data removed after 5 years from collection. But the GDPR FAQ survives on the homepage as a question with no captured answer, no legal basis is stated for the records, and we found no public information on an Art. 14 notification practice or a published balancing test.
Lusha
The privacy notice is franker than most in this category: it names data brokers and public APIs as sources and discloses the Community Program, in which members contribute CRM data, email headers and calendar meeting details, alongside scanning of customers' connected email and calendars. Opt-out is real and demonstrably exercised — 1,119 delete/opt-out requests in 2024, none denied, completed in under four days, backed by a suppression list and a toll-free opt-out line. But we found no public statement of the legal basis for processing the people in the database — no legitimate-interest position, no balancing test, no notification practice for people when added.
Visitor identification & intent signals
Cognism
Intent signals — buying intent, hires, funding and M&A, job changes — are marketed as account-prioritisation features, but we found no public information on how companies or visitors are identified, whether a tracking script sets cookies, or any statement on consent under §25 TDDDG. The source of the intent data is not named on the captured pages.
Lusha
"Website Visitor Identification" appears as a feature name and buying-intent topics are tiered from five to twenty-five, but the captured pages say nothing about how identification works, whether it is company- or person-level, or how the tracking behaves with and without consent. We found no public information on a consent position under Germany's TDDDG, a consent-mode option, or a cookieless mode. A named feature with no documented mechanics and no consent statement earns little.
Prospecting workflow & outreach rules
Cognism
The filter set is real — firmographic, technographic and signal-based filters, verified-mobile filters, CSV enrichment and export — though "rechtskonforme Daten" is sold as a property of the data rather than a workflow. We found no public information on a suppression or do-not-contact list, on checking numbers against do-not-call registers, or on guidance for cold outreach rules in the main EU markets; the website terms limit liability without allocating compliance duties.
Lusha
Filters, sequences and signals exist, but the terms push the legal risk to the buyer: call-recording consent is the customer's sole responsibility and AI output is reviewed and relied upon at the customer's sole risk. The suppression list is Lusha's own mechanism for people who opted out of Lusha's database, not a do-not-contact tool for the buyer's outreach, and we found no public information on country-aware handling of German contacts, do-not-call register checks, or opt-outs syncing back from outreach. A "Do not call list" badge on the pricing page and an unnamed "Advanced compliance" tier are the entire compliance substance on show.
CRM sync, enrichment & export
Cognism
Direct export to Salesforce, HubSpot and Pipedrive (with further systems named), a CRM enrichment add-on that keeps records current, and Data-as-a-Service access via API and bulk delivery are all evidenced. We found no public information on field mapping, deduplication, API rate limits or credit costs per call, and nothing on whether exported data may be kept after the subscription ends.
Lusha
Native integrations with Salesforce, HubSpot, Monday and Zoho, CSV and bulk enrichment, an API with webhooks and MCP, and automation partners give the data somewhere to land, and the terms state plainly that the customer may continue using the data after termination unless Lusha terminated for cause. We found no public information on field mapping, deduplication, propagation of objections or corrections into synced records, or per-call API credit costs; the rate limits are described only as "strict".
European sovereignty
Cognism
The privacy policy names Cognism Limited (England and Wales) and Cognism d.o.o. (Croatia) as joint controllers, storage inside the EU on Amazon Web Services in Ireland, and SCCs for third-country recipients, with a Macedonian affiliate and UK and French affiliates named as data recipients. The contracting picture stays non-EU — the website terms are governed by England and Wales, the third-party data vendor list is only available on request — and independent sourcing could not confirm jurisdiction, ownership, residency or subprocessor exposure beyond the privacy policy's own statements.
Lusha
A Delaware company and a Tel Aviv affiliate are joint controllers, the data is stored on Amazon Web Services in the United States, and the terms authorise storage in the United States or any country where Lusha or its subprocessors maintain facilities, with sharing to the United States, United Kingdom, Australia and Israel under Standard Contractual Clauses. The subprocessor list is published with purpose, location and transfer method — real disclosure — but every disclosed location sits outside the EU, and we found no public information on any EU hosting or contracting option. Good paperwork, no sovereignty.
Pricing transparency
Cognism
The pricing page ends every tier in "Individuelles Angebot anfordern" — Standard and Pro each show five licenses with no price, and the Data-as-a-Service and CRM-enrichment pricing questions sit collapsed with no figures. Credit them this much: the billing unit is unusually public — "1 Credit = 1 freigeschalteter Kontakt", browsing and reuse free, credits pooled account-wide — but without tier prices, credit allowances, expiry or per-seat costs, the annual invoice cannot be computed from public pages.
Lusha
Four tiers are priced with credit allowances and credit expiry is stated, though the captured pages give different figures for rollover — the pricing page shows monthly credits rolling over to a 2x cap on some plans while the terms say purchased credits expire at term end and do not roll over. The invoice still cannot be computed: no credit cost per data type (email versus direct dial versus mobile), no per-seat price beyond the included free seats, no price for the Scale tier, no per-call API cost, and VAT treatment unstated. There is no refund rule for inaccurate data — the data is licensed "as is".
Sovereignty, side by side
Dimension
Cognism
Lusha
Legal entity
Incorporated in DE
Incorporated in US
Ownership
Not determined
Not determined
Data residency
Not determined
US by default
Subprocessors
US CLOUD Act reach
US CLOUD Act reach
Facts, side by side
Only facts both products carry under the same definition — anything else would not be a fair row.