Linkedin Account Types: Premium VS Sales Navigator VS Free [2023]

Wondering which linkedin account type you should go for?

Here we compare linkedin premium plans so you can clearly see what is the best option for your business. Let’s dive right now into the different types of linkedin accounts.

The Different Linkedin Premium Plans

There are 8 linkedin memberships levels:

  1. Free LinkedIn Account
  2. Linkedin Premium Career: $29/month.
  3. Linkedin Premium Business: $59/month
  4. LinkedIn Sales Navigator Core: $99/month
  5. LinkedIn Sales Navigator Advanced: $149/month
  6. LinkedIn Sales Navigator Advanced Plus: $1600/year
  7. LinkedIn Recruiter Lite: $170/month
  8. LinkedIn Recruiter: $835/month

1. Free Linkedin Account

With a free linkedin accounts you can:

  1. Build your Linkedin Profile
  2. Expand your network by sending connection requests
  3. Search for LinkedIn profiles using search filters
  4. Search for Companies using Search filters

You can also use linkedin boolean search on the free search engine to build a targeted lead list.

However, linkedin basic accounts come with limitations:

  1. The search is limited to 1000 results
  2. The number of searches you can make per month is limited

linkedin free account

The monthly search limit depends on your Linkedin activity. This is what Linkedin calls commercial use limit.

linkedin basic account limitations

These limitations can be lifted by the following linkedin premium plans.

2. Linkedin Premium Career

Linkedin Premium Career help you get a job faster. Linkedin claims candidates with Premium Career get hired an average of 2X as fast.

linkedin premium career

How much does Linkedin Premium Career cost?

A LinkedIn Premium Career account costs $39.99 per month

What are Linkedin Premium Career features?

The features of Linkedin Premium Career are:

  1. 5 inmails per month
  2. See Everyone who’s Viewed Your Profile from the last 90 days
  3. Access to Open Profiles (meaning people can send your message without sending a connection request first)
  4. Job and applicant insights
  5. Top Applicant Job recommendations
  6. Company insights
  7. Salary insights
  8. 16,000+ LinkedIn Learning Courses
  9. Full access to Interview Preparation tools
linkedin premium vs free

3. Linkedin Premium Business

Linkedin Premium Business is made for sales professionals who are willing to generate leads with the platform.

linkedin premium business

How much does Linkedin Premium Business cost?

A LinkedIn Premium Business account costs $59.99 per month

What are Linkedin Premium Business features?

LinkedIn Premium Business claims to help to grow business at a larger scale by offering the all features in Linkedin Premium Career plus:

  1. 15 InMails per month
  2. Unlimited People Browsing
linkedin premium vs sales anvigator

4. Linkedin Sales Navigator Core (Professional)

Linkedin Sales Navigator helps sales reps find, connect and build relationships with potential buyers by using Linkedin’s network data to get all the information they need to better identify and engage with their leads.

linkedin sales navigator plan

How much does Sales Navigator Core cost?

Sales Navigator Core costs $99/month if you pay monthly and $79/month if you pay annually.

Does Sales Navigator include premium ?

Yes. With every of the Sales Navigator linkedin paid options you get every Linkedin Premium features. Sales Navigator Core is the version that is used by 90% of sales and marketing professionals.

What are Sales Navigator Core features?

Here a Linkedin Sales Navigator Core Features

  1. Unlimited People & Company Searches
  2. 50 inmails credits per month.
  3. See up to 2500 results (VS 1000 with Premium)
  4. Advanced search filters
  5. Lead & Account List creation
  6. Alerts on Lead & Account activities
  7. Lead Generation Automation with Saved Searches


The Sales Navigator search engine which is much more powerful than the basic. Here is a video detailing how you can use Sales Navigator features to generate leads.

The only thing that you can’t do with Sales Navigator is export the leads into a CSV or an Excel file.

But no worries, you can use a 3rd party tool like Evaboot to get the data.

5. Linkedin Sales Navigator Advanced (Team)

Sales Navigator Advanced is an upgraded version of Sales Navigator Core built for sales team. It facilitates collaboration between the members of sales team

linkedin sales navigator advanced plan

How much does Sales Navigator Advanced cost?

Sales Navigator Advanced cost $149/month if you pay monthly and $108.33/month if you pay annually.

What are Sales Navigator Advanced features?

With Sales Navigator Team, you get all the features in Sales Navigator professional plus.

  1. Account lists creation with CSV upload
  2. Smartlinks
  3. Teamlink

Here is a video presenting the feature of this linkedin plan:

6. Linkedin Sales Navigator Advanced Plus (Enterprise)

Sales Navigator Plus is designed for enterprises and offers advanced features like CRM integration and real time contact update.

linkedin sales navigator advanced plus plan

How much does Sales Navigator Advanced Plus costs?

Sales Navigator has no public pricing, but we know the subscriptions start at $1600/year.

What are Sales Navigator Advanced Plus features?

With Sales Navigator Advanced Plus, you get all the features in core and Advanced plus:

  1. Teamlink Extend which allow you see if your prospects are connected to anyone in your company (not just your sales teammates)
  2. CRM Synchronization to exclude from your Sales Navigator searches leads already present in your CRM
  3. Real Time Contact Update to be notified when your prospects change jobs or companies.
  4. Advanced Campaigner Manager for Linkedin Ads

7. Linkedin Recruiter Lite

LinkedIn Recruiter Lite is made for recruiters and hiring managers to find talent on LinkedIn who wants to source candidates.

linkedin recruiter linkedin plan

How much does Linkedin Recruiter Lite costs?

Linkedin Recruiter Lite cost $170 per month or $1,680 per year.

What are Linkedin Recruiter Lite features?

The feature of Linkedin Recruiter Lite are:

  1. 30 inmails credits per month
  2. Advances search filters to find candidates
  3. Recruiting CRM to manage candidate pipeline
  4. Candidates recommendation
  5. Sourcing automation with saved searches
  6. Create and manage job post from the platform
  7. Inmails and job posts analytics

linkedin recruiter project crm.png 1

8. Linkedin Recruiter

Linkedin Recruiter is an upgrade version of Recruiter Lite that offers more search filters and advanced integrations with Applicant Tracking System (ATS)

linkedin recruitier plan

How much does Linkedin Recruiter costs?

Linkedin Recruiter Lite cost $835 per month or $8,999 per year

What are Linkedin Recruiter features?

With LinkedIn Recruiter, you get all the features in Recruiter Lite Plus:

  1. 100-150 inmails credits per month
  2. Inmail bulk sending
  3. Additional search filters (like Open To Work)
  4. Collaboration features for teams
  5. Integration to popular ATS’s
linkedin recruiter ats integrations.png 1

Linkedin Premium Plans Comparison

In this part we compare linkedin premium plans:

  1. Linkedin Premium VS Linkedin Sales Navigator
  2. Linkedin Premium Business VS Basic
  3. Linkedin Premium Career VS Basic
  4. Linkedin Sales Navigator Core VS Sales Navigator Advanced
  5. Linkedin Sales Navigator VS Recruiter Lite

1. Linkedin Premium VS Linkedin Sales Navigator

Sales Navigator has much more value for money than Linkedin Premium Business if your goal is to generate lead on linkedin. It has way more search filters to find leads and offer more Inmails.

If you are a sales rep, an SD or a founder, there is absolutely no question: you should get Linkedin Sales Navigator instead of Linkedin Premium Business.

2. Linkedin Sales Navigator Core VS Sales Navigator Advanced

If you use the CSV upload feature, Sales Navigator Advanced can be a game changer. If you don’t, not so much. Here is a demo of the feature so you can if it’s useful for you.

Smartlinks and Teamlinks are cool features they fall in the “nice to have” category

Sales Navigator Smart Links allows creating Sales presentations aggregating files and websites, and then easily share and track your prospect’s interactions with this content.

Teamlink help sales teams get warm introduction to their prospects from their teammates.

Here some information about the features anyway in case you want to dig a little yourself.

3. Linkedin Premium Business VS Basic

Linkedin Premium Business doesn’t worth the cost, especially if you want to use for lead generation. Plus Linkedin Premium Business is included in Sales Navigator. So you can have both tools for $40 more.

linkedin premium business plan

Instead of comparing linkedin premium business and your free account, you should compare sales navigator vs a basic account.

4. Linkedin Premium Career VS Basic

If you are a jobseeker, Linkedin Premium Career does make a difference compared to a basic linkedin account. The resources Premium Career provides can be of a great help to find a job.

Especially:

  1. Top Applicant Job recommendations
  2. Company insights
  3. Salary insights
  4. 16,000+ LinkedIn Learning Courses
  5. Full access to Interview Preparation tools

5. Linkedin Sales Navigator VS Recruiter Lite

Linkedin Sales Navigator can almost do the exact same thing as Linkedin Recruiter for less money. If your only interest is getting access to advanced search filters and linkedin database, better choose Sales Navigator over Recruiter Lite.

Sales Navigator is interesting for a recruiting business because you can find candidates and clients with the same tool.

If you are also interested in the ATS and job posting features, you might prefer having a global recruiting solution like Linkedin Recruiter.

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