Claude
ChatGPT
Every Shopify spy tool, honestly compared
Pick the right competitor-research tool for the job you are actually doing. 13 tools on price, features and fit — written by the people who build one of them, which is why each page says where the others win.
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Looking for an alternative to a specific tool?
Each page compares that tool against everything else here — including the cases where you should stay where you are.
Koala Inspector alternatives
Shopify spy extension
Dropshippers who want to trace a product back to its AliExpress supplier and be alerted when a competitor changes a price. That supplier match is a real capability Store Detector does not have.
Free · $22/mo
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TrendTrack alternatives
Store database + ad & email spy
Agencies and funded DTC teams that need ad creatives and email campaigns archived alongside store data, and have a research budget to match. The email library in particular is something Store Detector does not offer.
$42–$105/mo
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BrandSearch alternatives
Store database + ad spy
Media buyers who need to see and save competitors’ actual ad creatives and landing pages every day. Store Detector reports ad activity but does not archive the creatives.
Free trial, then paid
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Dropship.io alternatives
Product research + store & ad spy
Dropshippers whose next product is coming from TikTok Shop rather than Shopify, and who want creator sourcing in the same tool.
$26–$49/mo
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PPSPY alternatives
Shopify spy + product research
Dropshippers who want to watch a competitor’s order volume move over a fortnight before committing ad budget to the same product.
$39–$299/mo
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SellerCenter alternatives
Multi-platform spy + sourcing
Sellers researching across Amazon, Wish, Shopee or Lazada as well as Shopify, and sourcing from 1688 or Taobao rather than AliExpress alone.
Free · $4.99/mo
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StoreLeads alternatives
Ecommerce store database (B2B)
Agencies and Shopify app developers who need lead lists, firmographics and CRM enrichment. If your job is selling to merchants rather than competing with them, this is the right tool and Store Detector is not.
$75–$950/mo
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StoreInspect alternatives
Store database + free detector extension
Agencies, app developers and B2B teams who need to reach merchants, not just study them. The 1.04M-contact layer is the thing Store Detector has no equivalent of and no plan to build — if outreach is the job, this is the better tool.
Free · $39–$279/mo
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Foreplay alternatives
Ad creative workflow
Creative teams and media buyers whose job is producing ads. It solves a different problem from Store Detector and the two sit together comfortably rather than replacing each other.
$49–$389/mo
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Charm.io alternatives
DTC brand + TikTok Shop intelligence
Retailers deciding which brands to stock, investors sourcing and diligencing DTC or TikTok Shop brands, and brands benchmarking market share. If you need brand contacts and CRM enrichment at that scale, this is a different category of tool from a spy extension and we do not replace it.
Demo only
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Particl alternatives
Retail & marketplace intelligence
Brands and merchandising teams who need to see what is selling across the wider retail market — marketplaces and big-box retailers included — rather than what one Shopify store is running. Store Detector has no visibility outside Shopify, so this is a genuinely different dataset.
$250–$1,000/mo
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Kalodata alternatives
TikTok Shop analytics
TikTok Shop sellers, creators and affiliates who need product, creator, video and livestream data in one place. Store Detector indexes Shopify and holds nothing on TikTok Shop, so it is not a substitute.
7-day free trial
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FastMoss alternatives
TikTok Shop analytics
TikTok Shop sellers and creators who want the widest dataset and creator coverage available. Store Detector is Shopify-only and holds no TikTok Shop data, so it does not replace this — Kalodata is the closer like-for-like swap.
7-day trial, then paid
Compare
All 14 tools, one table
The 12 capabilities that decide which tool you need. 4 rows go against us — we would rather you found that out here than after installing.
| Capability |
Store Detector
This is us
|
Koala Inspector
|
TrendTrack
|
BrandSearch
|
Dropship.io
|
PPSPY
|
SellerCenter
|
StoreLeads
|
StoreInspect
|
Foreplay
|
Charm.io
|
Particl
|
Kalodata
|
FastMoss
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free plan A free tier that does not expire (~ = trial only) | Yes | Yes | Partial | Partial | Partial | Partial | Yes | Partial | Yes | Partial | Not advertised | Partial | Partial | Partial |
| Chrome extension Analyse a store from the page you are on | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Not advertised | Not advertised | Not advertised | Yes |
| Traffic & revenue estimate Monthly visits and a modelled revenue figure | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Not advertised | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Installed app detection Which Shopify apps the store runs | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Not advertised | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Not advertised | Yes | Not advertised | Not advertised | Not advertised |
| Theme detection Theme name and version | Yes | Yes | Yes | Not advertised | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Not advertised | Not advertised | Not advertised | Not advertised | Not advertised |
| Live ad detection Whether the store is advertising right now | Partial | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Not advertised | Partial | Yes | Yes | Not advertised | Yes | Yes |
| Ad creative library A searchable swipe file of the actual ads | No | Not advertised | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Not advertised | Not advertised | Yes | Partial | Partial | Yes | Yes |
| Product research Bestsellers and product discovery | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Not advertised | Not advertised | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Change alerts Notified when a tracked store changes | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Not advertised | Partial | Partial | Not advertised | Not advertised | Yes | Not advertised | Yes | Not advertised | Not advertised |
| Searchable store database Filter a whole index, not one store at a time | Partial | Not advertised | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Not advertised | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Public API Query the data from your own code | Yes | Not advertised | Yes | Yes | Not advertised | Yes | Not advertised | Yes | Yes | Yes | Not advertised | Partial | Not advertised | Partial |
| AI assistant access MCP or an AI API for Claude / ChatGPT | Yes | Not advertised | Yes | Yes | Not advertised | Yes | Not advertised | Not advertised | Yes | Yes | Not advertised | Yes | Not advertised | Not advertised |
| Entry price Cheapest way in, checked 2026-08-02 | Free · $4.99/mo | Free · $22/mo | $42–$105/mo | Free trial, then paid | $26–$49/mo | $39–$299/mo | Free · $4.99/mo | $75–$950/mo | Free · $39–$279/mo | $49–$389/mo | Demo only | $250–$1,000/mo | 7-day free trial | 7-day trial, then paid |
- Yes
- Partial
- No
- Not advertised by the vendor
Built from each vendor’s own public marketing, checked 2026-08-02. “Not advertised” means the capability is not claimed on their site — not that it is missing. Prices drift; check the vendor before you buy.
Tools we are not an alternative to
Two tools come up in the same searches and are regularly listed as competitors. They are not ours to replace, and saying so is more useful than ranking for the query.
SellerSprite
Amazon-only seller intelligence — reverse-ASIN keyword research, BSR tracking and listing optimisation. Store Detector indexes Shopify, so it is not a substitute.
Frequently asked questions
What is the best free Shopify spy tool?
Three here run a permanently free tier rather than a trial. Store Detector is free with no card and no credit meter — the Chrome extension, traffic and revenue estimates, live ad detection, app and theme detection, every ranking page and the public JSON API. Koala Inspector’s free tier never expires but keeps sales estimates on its $22/month plan. SellerCenter’s free plan is capped at 1,000 credits a month. Everything else here is a trial.
Which Shopify research tool has an ad creative library?
TrendTrack, BrandSearch, Dropship.io, PPSPY, SellerCenter and Foreplay all advertise one. Store Detector does not — it reports that a store is advertising and how many ads are live, not the creatives themselves. If a swipe file is what you need, this is not the tool.
Do these tools show real sales figures?
No, and be careful of any that imply otherwise. Every tool here models revenue from traffic and category benchmarks; none can see a merchant’s Shopify dashboard. Use the figures to compare stores against each other rather than as accounting data — our methodology page shows exactly how ours is built.
How are these comparisons put together?
Every cell is read off the vendor’s own live site, last checked 2026-08-02. Where a vendor does not claim a capability we mark it “not advertised” rather than “no”, because the two are not the same thing — a ✗ is a factual claim about someone else’s product and we only make it about our own. We build a competing tool, which is why 4 of the 12 rows in the table go against us.
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