# The best 401(k) prospecting software in 2026: a sourced buyer's guide. Source: https://www.401khunter.com/best-401k-prospecting-software · Updated September 17, 2026 · By Jake, Founder, 401kHunter 401(k) prospecting software helps a financial advisor, TPA or recordkeeper find retirement plans worth calling, work out who to call, and start the conversation. Eight products do some or all of that today. They differ less in the underlying filings — everyone starts from the Department of Labor's Form 5500 — than in how much other data they join to it, whether they find you a decision maker, and whether you can start this afternoon or after a demo and a contract. ## Key takeaways - 401kHunter is the best 401(k) prospecting software for most independent advisors: it joins Form 5500 filings with 15+ other public sources across 1M+ plans, finds a confidence-scored decision maker on demand, drafts the outreach, and publishes its price (free search, packs from $25, Pro $100/month). - Judy Diamond Prospector+ has the deepest filter set and report tooling, and publishes per-state pricing: $795–$995 a year for one state, $3,900 for national. - RiXtrema Larkspur Executive publishes the largest executive contact file (over 1.2 million) and runs email campaigns in-product from its $3,495 Pro tier. - AdvizorPro PlanPro and ISS MarketPro are built for distribution teams and sold by quote; O3 Edge is strongest on defined-benefit plans; FreeERISA is a free single-filing lookup. - Of the 833,851 U.S. retirement plans with enough fee data to grade, 10.2% earn a D (reported administrative expenses above 1.5% of plan assets) and 60.9% earn an A (0.5% or less), per 401kHunter's analysis of Form 5500 filings as of August 2026. ## Comparison table | Tool | Best for | Data coverage | Contacts | Published pricing | |---|---|---|---|---| | 401kHunter | Advisors and small teams who want the whole prospecting workflow — find the plan, find the person, send the first email — in one tool, without an annual contract. | 1M+ plans, 2.1M+ filings, 15+ public sources; refreshed monthly | Decision-maker email and direct phone on demand, confidence-scored, auto-refunded if none is found | Free search and 50 free credits; credit packs from $25; Pro $100/month incl. 1,500 credits. No contract. (401khunter.com/pricing, retrieved Sep 2026) | | Judy Diamond Associates — Retirement Plan Prospector+ | Advisors who work one state and want a mature, report-heavy Form 5500 tool with the deepest filter set. | "800,000+ retirement plans using 500+ advanced search fields" (vendor) | Export includes "plan data and contact information"; no contact count published | National $3,900/yr; regional editions $2,500/yr; single states $795–$995/yr (single user) (store.judydiamond.com, retrieved Sep 2026) | | RiXtrema — Larkspur Executive | Teams that want a pre-built executive contact file and bulk email campaigns inside the same product. | "850,000+ retirement plans"; "menu breakdown for 80,000+ plans" (vendor) | "Over 1.2 million plan executives with contact info" (vendor) | Per user per year: Standard $1,595; CTML $2,295; Pro $3,495; Pro+ $4,995 (rixtrema.net, retrieved Sep 2026) | | AdvizorPro — PlanPro | Asset managers, wholesalers and larger RIAs that need plan data connected to an advisor and firm database. | "780,000+ retirement plans" (vendor); investment lineups; service-provider mapping | Plan contact data; no count published | Not published — demo and quote only (advizorpro.com, retrieved Sep 2026) | | O3 Edge | Advisors prospecting pension, cash-balance and other defined-benefit plans. | "Over 700,000 U.S. retirement plans updated monthly"; 10-year plan analytics (vendor) | Not published | Annual subscription per licence; amount not published (o3edge.com, retrieved Sep 2026) | | John Hancock Prospect Finder | Advisors who already place business with John Hancock and want prospecting inside that portal. | Not published | Not published | No price published; access is through the John Hancock financial-professional login (John Hancock press release, retrieved Sep 2026) | | ISS MarketPro (BrightScope) | Asset managers, insurers and recordkeepers mapping advisor-to-plan relationships for distribution. | U.S. defined-contribution market; plan count not published | Advisor-to-plan relationship data; not an advisor prospecting contact tool | Not published — enterprise quote only (issmarketintelligence.com, retrieved Sep 2026) | | FreeERISA | A quick, free look at one filing when you already know the company. | "2.6 million Form 5500s, covering 1.3 million plans" incl. health and welfare (vendor) | None | Free with registration; Deluxe Search listed at $14.95 on one vendor page and $59.95 on another (freeerisa.benefitspro.com, retrieved Sep 2026) | ## How we compared them We build one of the products on this page, so treat our ranking as a vendor's view and check it against the sources. To make that easy, every competitor number below is that vendor's own published claim, linked to the page we read it on and dated to the month we read it. Where a vendor does not publish something — a price, a contact count — we say "not published" rather than estimate it. We compared on five things an advisor actually feels: how much data is joined to each plan, whether the tool finds a person to call, whether it helps you write to them, what it costs to start, and how fast you can start. We did not score on features no vendor documents publicly. - Data breadth: Form 5500 alone, or filings joined with other public sources? - Contacts: a pre-built file, on-demand lookup, or none — and is confidence disclosed? - Outreach: does the tool help produce the first message, or stop at the list? - Price and terms: published or quote-only; monthly or annual; per seat or usage. - Time to first list: self-serve signup, or a demo and a contract first? ## What 401(k) prospecting software has to do Prospecting a retirement plan is four jobs, and most software does only the first. First, find the plan: filter a million filings down to the few hundred that fit your territory, plan size and a reason to call — high fees, a red flag on the filing, a provider you compete well against. Second, find the person: the filing names a signer, who is often a TPA employee or a long-gone CFO, so you need the current decision maker and a way to reach them. Third, say something specific: an email that cites the plan's own numbers is answered; a generic one is not. Fourth, keep track: who you called, what they said, when to follow up. A tool that stops after the first job leaves you to buy a contact database, a writing tool and a CRM separately. That is a legitimate way to work, and the "platform versus stack" trade-off is covered on our platforms page. But it changes what the software really costs. ## Why "how much data" is the real difference Every tool here starts from the same public record: the Form 5500 that retirement plans file each year with the Department of Labor. The filing tells you plan assets, participants, contributions and, for larger plans, what each service provider was paid on Schedule C. If two tools only reformat that filing, they differ mainly in filters and price. The gap opens when a tool joins other records to the filing. A small plan files the short Form 5500-SF, which has no Schedule C, so a filing-only tool cannot tell you who the recordkeeper or TPA is for most of the roughly 800,000 small plans in the country. 401kHunter closes that gap by matching each small plan's IRS opinion-letter serial number against the IRS list of pre-approved plan documents, which identifies the firm behind the plan document for about 85% of small plans, and by inferring the recordkeeper from plans on the same document that later disclosed one. Audited financial statements and SEC 11-K filings supply Roth and plan-design facts the 5500 has no box for. OSHA, IRS 990 and FMCSA records supply current headcounts. 1.08M businesses with payroll but no ERISA-filed plan come from SBA and SEC records. Of the 833,851 U.S. retirement plans with enough fee data to grade, 10.2% earn a D (reported administrative expenses above 1.5% of plan assets) and 60.9% earn an A (0.5% or less), per 401kHunter's analysis of Form 5500 filings as of August 2026. ## 1. 401kHunter Self-serve 401(k) prospecting software that joins Form 5500 filings with 15+ other public sources, grades every plan's fees A–D, finds the decision maker, and drafts the outreach — with published pay-as-you-go pricing. **Best for:** Advisors and small teams who want the whole prospecting workflow — find the plan, find the person, send the first email — in one tool, without an annual contract. **Pricing:** Free search and 50 free credits; credit packs from $25; Pro $100/month incl. 1,500 credits. No contract. (source: https://www.401khunter.com/pricing, retrieved Sep 2026) **Where it wins:** Breadth of joined data, decision-maker contacts and AI outreach in one self-serve product, at a published price a solo advisor can start on for $25. **Pros** - 15+ public sources joined to each plan, not Form 5500 alone: Schedule C provider pay, Schedule H/I financials, audit reports, SEC 11-K filings, IRS pre-approved plan lists, OSHA, IRS 990 and FMCSA headcounts, and more - A–D fee grade and basis-point fee estimate on every gradable plan, with peer benchmarks by plan size and industry - Identifies the provider even for small plans that file no Schedule C: named administrator, inferred recordkeeper, and the firm behind the IRS plan document (on file for about 85% of small plans) - Decision-maker contacts on demand, each with a confidence score; credits are refunded automatically when no usable contact is found - AI outreach in the advisor's own voice: a plan-specific brief and a four-email follow-up sequence - 1.08M businesses with no ERISA-filed plan on record, for startup-plan prospecting - Searchable red flags and change signals (late deposits, sponsor changes, high separated-participant share, excessive distributions) - Client-ready and white-label benchmarking reports; built-in pipeline, notes and follow-up reminders; CSV export - Search is free and open without an account; pricing is published **Cons** - Newer product with less brand recognition in enterprise procurement than the 40-year incumbents - Contacts are found on demand per plan rather than shipped as a pre-built national contact file - No public API yet - Sends no email itself: outreach is drafted for you to send from your own mailbox or sequencer ## 2. Judy Diamond Associates — Retirement Plan Prospector+ The long-standing Form 5500 prospecting database, sold as single-state, regional or national annual subscriptions, with plan scorecards, red flags and benchmarking reports. **Best for:** Advisors who work one state and want a mature, report-heavy Form 5500 tool with the deepest filter set. **Pricing:** National $3,900/yr; regional editions $2,500/yr; single states $795–$995/yr (single user) (source: https://store.judydiamond.com/prospector-plus/prospector.html, retrieved Sep 2026) **Where it wins:** Filter depth and printable plan reports. 500+ search fields, plan scorecards against national, state and industry peers, and pre-written marketing letters are more report tooling than any newer product offers. Per-state pricing is also the cheapest published way to cover a single state for a full year. **Pros** - 500+ search fields and over a dozen red-flag indicators - Plan scorecards benchmarked against the country, the state and the same industry - Pre-generated talking points and a dozen marketing letters - Published, self-serve per-state pricing - Decades of brand recognition with broker-dealers **Cons** - Annual subscription; national coverage is $3,900/yr per user - No published decision-maker contact count, and no built-in contact enrichment by email and direct phone - Form 5500-centred: no joined workforce, SEC or IRS plan-document data - Now owned by Touchpoint Markets (spun out of ALM in 2025) ## 3. RiXtrema — Larkspur Executive A 401(k) plan database with a large executive contact file, fund-menu breakdowns and, on higher tiers, built-in trackable letters and automated email campaigns. **Best for:** Teams that want a pre-built executive contact file and bulk email campaigns inside the same product. **Pricing:** Per user per year: Standard $1,595; CTML $2,295; Pro $3,495; Pro+ $4,995 (source: https://rixtrema.net/larkspurexecutive/landingpage, retrieved Sep 2026) **Where it wins:** Outreach at volume. The Pro tier runs automated email campaigns to plan executives from inside the product (up to 300 simultaneous campaigns, per the vendor), and its published contact file is the largest of any tool here. **Pros** - Largest published executive contact count - Fund-menu (investment lineup) breakdown for 80,000+ plans - Built-in trackable marketing letters and automated email campaigns on higher tiers - Published tier pricing **Cons** - Annual per-user licence from $1,595; campaign automation starts at $3,495 - A pre-built contact file ages between refreshes; no per-contact confidence score is published - Mass email to plan executives carries deliverability and compliance risk that the sender owns ## 4. AdvizorPro — PlanPro A retirement-plan data module inside AdvizorPro's wider advisor, RIA and firm intelligence platform. **Best for:** Asset managers, wholesalers and larger RIAs that need plan data connected to an advisor and firm database. **Pricing:** Not published — demo and quote only (source: https://www.advizorpro.com/data/planpro, retrieved Sep 2026) **Where it wins:** Context beyond the plan. If the question is "which advisors and firms are attached to these plans, and who else do they work with", PlanPro sits inside a database built to answer it. **Pros** - Plan data linked to an advisor, RIA and family-office database - Service-provider mapping and plan filing alerts - Investment lineup data **Cons** - No published pricing; sales-led purchase - Built for distribution and enterprise teams more than for a solo advisor ## 5. O3 Edge A cloud prospecting platform from actuarial consultancy October Three, covering defined-benefit as well as defined-contribution plans. **Best for:** Advisors prospecting pension, cash-balance and other defined-benefit plans. **Pricing:** Annual subscription per licence; amount not published (source: https://www.o3edge.com/features/, retrieved Sep 2026) **Where it wins:** Defined-benefit expertise. It comes from an actuarial firm and matches each subscriber with a plan expert, which matters when the prospect is a pension rather than a 401(k). **Pros** - Defined-benefit and cash-balance insight - Ten-year plan analytics - Plan-expert matching **Cons** - No published price - No published contact data ## 6. John Hancock Prospect Finder A plan-prospecting dashboard John Hancock Retirement provides to financial professionals inside its own portal, launched in July 2022. **Best for:** Advisors who already place business with John Hancock and want prospecting inside that portal. **Pricing:** No price published; access is through the John Hancock financial-professional login (source: https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/john-hancock-retirement-launches-prospect-finder-tool-for-financial-professionals-to-help-build-scale-and-efficiency-301593780.html, retrieved Sep 2026) **Where it wins:** Cost and convenience for John Hancock producers: smart filters, co-branded scouting-report PDFs and peer comparisons with no separate subscription named. **Pros** - Co-branded scouting reports - State, industry and national plan-score comparisons - No separate price named **Cons** - Tied to one recordkeeper's portal - Data source, plan count and contact data are not published ## 7. ISS MarketPro (BrightScope) BrightScope is now the data engine inside ISS Market Intelligence's MarketPro suite, sold to institutions for defined-contribution market intelligence. **Best for:** Asset managers, insurers and recordkeepers mapping advisor-to-plan relationships for distribution. **Pricing:** Not published — enterprise quote only (source: https://www.issmarketintelligence.com/solutions/marketpro/, retrieved Sep 2026) **Where it wins:** Institutional distribution intelligence: seeing which advisors serve which plans across the market. It is a different job from advisor prospecting, and brightscope.com no longer serves a public plan lookup. **Pros** - Advisor-to-plan relationship mapping - Institutional-grade market and distribution analytics **Cons** - Not sold to individual advisors - No published pricing - The public BrightScope plan lookup now redirects to ISS ## 8. FreeERISA A free, registration-based Form 5500 lookup run by Judy Diamond Associates. **Best for:** A quick, free look at one filing when you already know the company. **Pricing:** Free with registration; Deluxe Search listed at $14.95 on one vendor page and $59.95 on another (source: https://freeerisa.benefitspro.com/, retrieved Sep 2026) **Where it wins:** Price. For a one-off lookup of a known company's filing it costs nothing, and its paid tier reaches Form 5310 and Top Hat filings that prospecting tools generally skip. **Pros** - Free filing lookup - Paid tier adds 5310 and Top Hat filings **Cons** - A lookup tool, not a prospecting workflow: no fee grades, contacts, lists or outreach - Its purpose is to funnel users to Prospector+ ## Which software fits which advisor There is no single best tool for every practice. These are the honest matches. - Solo advisor or small team, want to start today and pay for what you use: 401kHunter. - You work one state and want the most filters and printable scorecards for a fixed annual fee: Judy Diamond Prospector+. - You want to email thousands of plan executives from inside the tool: Larkspur Executive Pro. - You are an asset manager or wholesaler mapping advisors to plans: AdvizorPro PlanPro or ISS MarketPro. - Your prospects are pensions and cash-balance plans: O3 Edge. - You already place business with John Hancock: Prospect Finder is in your portal, and no separate price is named for it. - You need to look up one company's filing once: FreeERISA, or 401kHunter's free Form 5500 search. ## What it actually costs to get started Published entry prices, from each vendor's own site (Sep 2026): 401kHunter is free to search, with 50 free credits and packs from $25; its Pro plan is $100 a month. Judy Diamond Prospector+ is $795 a year for a small state, $995 for a large one, $2,500 for a region and $3,900 for the country. Larkspur Executive is $1,595 a year for Standard and $3,495 for the Pro tier with campaign automation. ERISApedia's Plan Data Intelligence starts at $2,087 a year. AdvizorPro, ISS MarketPro, O3 Edge and Fi360 do not publish a price. On 401kHunter a decision-maker lookup costs 30 credits and a plan's full financials 10; at 10 cents a credit that is $3 per contact found, refunded automatically when none is found. An advisor working 30 plans a month spends well under the cost of any annual licence here; an advisor who wants unlimited browsing of a single state for a flat fee may find Judy Diamond's state edition the better buy. ## Conclusion For an independent advisor the question is rarely "which database has the most plans" — they all have roughly the same 800,000 to a million, because they all read the same filings. The question is how much the software does after the search. 401kHunter is our answer and we rank it first because it joins 15+ public sources to each plan (each one is listed on our methodology page), finds the decision maker, and drafts the outreach, at a published price you can start on for $25. Where a competitor is the better fit, we have said so above. ## Frequently asked questions ### What is the best 401(k) prospecting software? For most independent financial advisors, 401kHunter: it covers 1M+ plans from Form 5500 filings joined with 15+ other public sources, grades plan fees A–D, finds confidence-scored decision-maker contacts, drafts AI outreach, and has published pay-as-you-go pricing from $25. Judy Diamond Prospector+ is the best fit for single-state advisors who want the deepest filters and printable reports, and RiXtrema Larkspur Executive for teams that want bulk email campaigns built in. ### What is 401(k) prospecting software? Software that turns public Department of Labor Form 5500 filings into a searchable database of retirement plans, so advisors, TPAs and recordkeepers can find plans by location, size, fees, providers and warning signs, identify who runs the plan, and reach out. ### How much does 401(k) prospecting software cost? Published prices as of Sep 2026: 401kHunter is free to search with packs from $25 and Pro at $100/month; Judy Diamond Prospector+ is $795–$995/year per state or $3,900/year national; RiXtrema Larkspur Executive is $1,595–$4,995 per user per year; ERISApedia Plan Data Intelligence starts at $2,087/year. AdvizorPro PlanPro, ISS MarketPro, O3 Edge and Fi360 are quote-only. ### Does 401(k) prospecting software include decision-maker contact information? Some does. RiXtrema Larkspur Executive publishes a file of over 1.2 million plan executives. 401kHunter looks up the decision maker on demand for the specific plan, returns a confidence score with each contact, and refunds the credits automatically if no usable contact is found. Judy Diamond exports include contact information but no count is published. FreeERISA and Fi360 include none. ### Where does 401(k) prospecting software get its data? All of it starts with Form 5500 and 5500-SF filings from the Department of Labor's EFAST2 system. Tools differ in what they add. 401kHunter joins 15+ other public sources, including Schedule C provider compensation, audited financial statements, SEC 11-K and Form D filings, the IRS list of pre-approved plan documents, SBA PPP records, and OSHA, IRS 990 and FMCSA headcounts. Its methodology page lists each one. ### Can prospecting software tell me who a small plan's recordkeeper or TPA is? Usually not from the filing alone, because small plans file Form 5500-SF, which has no Schedule C. 401kHunter identifies the provider for small plans three ways: the third-party administrator named on the filing, a recordkeeper inferred from plans on the same IRS pre-approved document that later disclosed one, and the firm holding the IRS opinion letter for that document, which is on file for about 85% of small plans. Inferred values are always labelled as inferred. ### Is there free 401(k) prospecting software? Partly. FreeERISA offers free lookups of individual filings with registration. 401kHunter's plan search is free and open without an account, and signup includes 50 free credits; unlocking contacts and full financials uses credits. John Hancock Prospect Finder names no separate price for advisors who use its portal. ### How often is the data updated? The Department of Labor publishes Form 5500 bulk files monthly, and filings for a plan year arrive over roughly the following 7 to 10 months. 401kHunter refreshes monthly and shows the data freshness date in the product. RiXtrema advertises real-time filing updates and O3 Edge monthly updates. ### Do I need a contract or a demo to start? 401kHunter and Judy Diamond's store are self-serve. RiXtrema publishes prices and sells annual licences. AdvizorPro, ISS MarketPro, O3 Edge and Fi360 require a demo or quote.