How CharitySense compares
A capability-by-capability comparison of CharitySense against Candid, Cause IQ and Charity Navigator, including the three questions we do not answer.
| Capability | Candid | Cause IQ | Charity Navigator | CharitySense |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Donors: Is this organization real, and where does my money actually go? | ||||
| Rating. A single trust signal, and whether you can take it apart. | Offers part of this: Seals of Transparency. | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Offers this: Four beacons. | Offers this: 31 scored inputs, every one cited. |
| Semantic search. Finding organizations by what they do, not by the words they chose. | Offers part of this: Fundraising assistant. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Premium, from $1,199/yr | Offers part of this: 460+ filters, boolean keyword. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Core, from $1,999/yr | Offers part of this: Keyword search and cause filters. | Offers this: Embeddings over 3.57M organizations. |
| Organization profile. Financials, programs, leadership and board, read out of the filing. | Offers this: Basic profile free, full detail paid. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Full detail: Premium, from $1,199/yr | Offers this: Profile on the free tier. | Offers this: Financials, programs, named staff pay. | Offers this: Up to 21 evidence sections. |
| Money flow diagram. Every dollar traced from where it came in to what it paid for. | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Offers this: Sankey built from the filed blocks. |
| Outcomes and impact. What the programs did, and whether anyone scores whether it worked. | Offers part of this: Impact metrics on the profile. | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Offers this: Impact and Measurement beacon. | Offers part of this: Filed program accomplishments, unscored. |
| Constituent feedback. What the people served say about being served. | Offers part of this: How We Listen on the profile. | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Offers part of this: Whether feedback is collected, not what was said. | Does not offer this: Not offered. |
| Grantmakers and foundations: Can I defend this grant, before the board meeting and after it? | ||||
| Federal grants and contracts. What the government has actually paid this organization, and for what. | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Offers this: USAspending prime and subawards. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Core, from $1,999/yr | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Offers this: 5.4M awards, 1.2M subawards. |
| Single Audit findings. What auditors found when federal money was examined, every year on file. | Offers part of this: A-133 audit performed flag. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Premium, from $1,199/yr | Offers part of this: Audit firm, agency and program, not findings. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Core, from $1,999/yr | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Offers this: 407,766 reports for 67,825 organizations. |
| Search by who is served. Veterans, children, people with disabilities, read from filings and websites. | Offers this: Population served filter. | Offers part of this: Organization categories, not a served field. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Core, from $1,999/yr | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Offers this: 390,390 organizations, as a filter. |
| Pre-award compliance screening. Deductibility, revocation, exclusion and sanctions, before money moves. | Offers this: Charity Check API. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Charity Check API, $2,750/yr | Offers part of this: Publication 78 and BMF codes, no SAM or OFAC. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Core, from $1,999/yr | Offers part of this: IRS status and their own alerts. | Offers this: Six readiness factors, including SAM and OFAC. |
| Filing consistency checks. Whether an organization's own filed numbers add up, and where they contradict each other. | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Offers this: 24 arithmetic checks across four forms. |
| Peer benchmarking. This applicant against a cohort you define, not one we chose. | Offers this: Peer benchmarking. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Premium, from $1,199/yr | Offers this: Benchmark tool, up to 500 organizations. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Core, from $1,999/yr | Offers part of this: Size-class thresholds, cohorts are theirs. | Offers this: Eight metrics, quartiles, up to 250. |
| Bulk export. Getting a shortlist out of the tool and into your grants system. | Offers this: Profile and grants downloads. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Premium, from $1,199/yr | Offers this: Export tool, $0.50 per record on Core. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Core $1,999/yr plus $0.50 per record | Offers part of this: GraphQL API, free tier. | Offers this: CSV, up to 250 organizations. |
| Saved lists and change alerts. Coming back to a shortlist, and being told when something moves. | Offers this: Saved searches and collections. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Premium, from $1,199/yr | Offers this: Saved searches with weekly monitoring. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Core, from $1,999/yr | Offers part of this: Favourites and lists, no rating alerts. | Offers part of this: Saved in your browser only. |
| Demographics. The composition of staff, board and the people served. | Offers part of this: Board and staff, not people served. | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Offers part of this: Beneficiary demographics, not staff or board. | Coming Soon! Coming Soon!. |
| Nonprofits raising money: Who already funds work like mine? | ||||
| Who funded whom. Grant transactions, readable from the funder side and the recipient side. | Offers this: Grants API. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Grants API, $6,000/yr | Offers this: Grantmaking and Funding sections. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Core, from $1,999/yr | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Offers this: 1.54M grant edges, both directions. |
| Funder discovery. Which funders already support organizations like the ones on your list. | Offers this: Funder recommendations. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Premium, from $1,199/yr | Offers this: Funding tab. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Core, from $1,999/yr | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Offers this: Funders ranked by shortlist reach. |
| Journalists and researchers: Who controls this organization, and who gets paid by it? | ||||
| Vendors and contractors. Who gets paid, including professional fundraisers. | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Offers this: Vendors section. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Core, from $1,999/yr | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Offers this: Part VII Section B for 51,860 organizations. |
| Related entities. Parents, subsidiaries and the money moving between them. | Offers part of this: Affiliation type filter. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Ultimate, from $1,699/yr | Offers this: Related entities tab. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Core, from $1,999/yr | Offers part of this: Consolidated affiliates and related-org pay. | Offers this: Schedule R and a resolved money network. |
| Board interlocks. Where else the people on this board sit. | Offers part of this: Board leadership dataset. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Ultimate, from $1,699/yr | Offers this: Personnel profiles and people search. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Core, from $1,999/yr | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Offers part of this: People named, not yet joined across organizations. |
| Developers and AI agents: Can I pull this into my own tool, or let an agent answer from it? | ||||
| API access. Reading the same data from your own code rather than from a page. | Offers this: Six paid APIs, Demographics free. Requires a paid subscription or API key: $2,750 to $9,900/yr | Offers this: Six endpoints, Pro and Enterprise only. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Pro, $5,988/yr | Offers this: GraphQL API, free tier. | Offers this: 1,000 free calls a day, paid beyond. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Paid key, priced on request |
| AI agent access. A surface an agent can read, query and cite without scraping a page. | Offers this: MCP connector for Claude, over paid data. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Free connector, Premium data from $1,199/yr | Does not offer this: Not offered. | Offers part of this: A free API, but no agent surface. | Offers this: Published agent instructions and llms.txt. |
| Custom workflows. Wiring the data into your own screening, scoring or reporting process. | Offers this: Salesforce connectors and partners. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Paid APIs, from $2,750/yr | Offers this: Salesforce integration and CSV upload. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Pro, $5,988/yr | Offers part of this: GraphQL API only. | Offers this: Every field addressable, every answer cited. Requires a paid subscription or API key: Paid key, priced on request |