Before you move
- Check whether your team uses Meltwater’s PR distribution or broadcast monitoring. discatch does not replace those.
- Note which sources you actually read. If print and broadcast matter, discatch does not cover them.
- Try the free tier. Catches that fire nothing cost nothing.
Meltwater pricing, estimated
| Meltwater | discatch | |
|---|---|---|
| Entry price | demo-gated, from about $6,000/yr per third parties | free, then units |
| API | enterprise, 7 named APIs | every plan |
| MCP | yes, enterprise package | planned |
| Self-serve signup | no | yes |
| Developer sources | no | Discourse, GitHub, HN, Stack Exchange |
The enterprise shape
Meltwater is built for PR and communications teams. Its media intelligence covers print, broadcast, and social in one platform. If you are a developer, a founder, or an agent, the enterprise shape is the wrong fit. discatch is built for that use case: per-unit pricing, developer sources, and catches that push to an agent.
What Meltwater does well
Meltwater has the broadest source coverage in the category: social, news, print (400,000+ newspapers), broadcast, podcasts (20,000+), reviews, and APAC platforms (WeChat, Weibo, RED, Douyin). It ingests 1.3 billion documents daily and has operated since 2001. The AI Visibility API tracks brand mentions inside ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Claude, and Grok. Discord, Threads, and Bluesky coverage is rare in the enterprise tier and Meltwater has all three. The official MCP server at api.meltwater.com/v2/mcp had a major expansion in July 2026. Seven named REST APIs at developer.meltwater.com cover listening, AI summaries, social analytics, AI visibility, and integrations.
What a switch costs
- Data export. Meltwater supports data export. Scope depends on the subscription package.
- Alert rebuild. Each Meltwater saved search becomes a discatch catch.
- Contract term. Meltwater contracts are typically 12 months with annual auto-renewal and 3 to 7 percent yearly price increases. Check the notice period.
- Print and broadcast. discatch does not cover print or broadcast media. If those matter, the switch is partial.
- AI visibility. discatch does not track brand mentions in AI assistants. If that matters, keep the Meltwater AI Visibility API or use a separate tool.
How to move in an afternoon
- Get a trial key. No email, no card: `curl -X POST https://api.discatch.com/v1/keys/trial`
- Price a search: `curl -X POST https://api.discatch.com/v1/search -H "Authorization: Bearer $DISCATCH_KEY" -d '{"query": ""your brand"", "sources": ["web", "news", "hackernews", "discourse", "github"], "dry_run": true}'`
- Review the quote. If the price works, run the search without `dry_run`.
- Create a catch for each saved search: `curl -X POST https://api.discatch.com/v1/catches -H "Authorization: Bearer $DISCATCH_KEY" -d '{"name": "brand mentions", "query": ""your brand" OR "your product"", "sources": ["web", "news", "hackernews", "discourse", "github", "stackexchange"], "interval": "1h", "destination": {"type": "webhook", "url": "https://your-server.com/hook", "secret": "whsec_..."}}'`
- Test the destination: `curl -X POST https://api.discatch.com/v1/catches/{id}/test -H "Authorization: Bearer $DISCATCH_KEY"`
- Verify delivery, then let the Meltwater contract lapse at renewal.
Who should stay
A PR or communications team that uses Meltwater for print, broadcast, and social monitoring in one platform should stay. The AI Visibility API, APAC platform coverage, and 1.3 billion daily documents serve that buyer. A developer tool company or an agent that wants an API, per-unit pricing, and developer sources is a different buyer.