Alchemer

What it is

Alchemer is a feedback platform that sits between self-serve survey tools and the enterprise experience-management suites. It started in Boulder in 2006 as SurveyGizmo, renamed itself Alchemer in October 2020, and has been majority-owned by KKR since May 2022, as the first deal of KKR’s middle-market Ascendant strategy. Two acquisitions turned the survey tool into a voice-of-customer (VoC) platform: Apptentive in January 2023, for in-app and mobile feedback (now sold as Digital Experience), and Chatmeter from PSG on 24 September 2025, for review, listings and social reputation management across physical locations.

Gartner placed Alchemer as a Challenger in the 2026 Magic Quadrant for Voice of the Customer Platforms (announced 12 March 2026), its fifth consecutive inclusion. The company reports more than 11,000 customers in over 100 countries, a vendor figure.

The buyer question it answers in 2026 is specific: Qualtrics shut Delighted down on 30 June 2026, and many of those customers need something heavier than an NPS widget but lighter than a Qualtrics or Medallia program.

Why it shows up in CX stacks

• Surveys, in-app prompts and reviews in one contract. The product menu now covers surveys, digital experience (web, mobile and in-product), reputation management, social media management, voice, and location listings. A multi-location retailer or franchise can run post-visit surveys and answer Google reviews from the same vendor instead of adding a separate reputation tool such as Birdeye or Yext.
• A survey engine researchers actually use. Full Access adds conjoint, card sort, heatmap questions and statistical analysis, so market-research and CX teams can share one tool instead of buying a research suite on the side.
• The AI layer is being rebuilt as Iris. Pulse, the text and sentiment analytics layer, gained conversational AI in December 2025 and reached all customers in early Q1 2026; an AI Auto-Responder for reviews followed in March 2026. On 2 September 2026 Alchemer announced Iris, which folds those features into one AI-native layer with human review controls that decide where AI responds on its own, and set general availability for Q4 2026.
• Integrations are a platform feature. Business Platform accounts get API access and connectors to Salesforce, HubSpot, Zendesk, Slack and Tableau among the 400+ systems Alchemer lists, plus workflow automation to route a detractor into a ticket or CRM task.

Pricing reality

Alchemer is one of the few VoC vendors with public prices, but only for teams of up to three users. The published plans (checked 8 November 2026) are per user:

• Collaborator: $55/month, or $315/year billed annually (about $26/month), 75,000 responses a year.
• Professional: $165/month or $1,075/year, maximum 3 users, 100,000 responses, adds branding, advanced logic and phone support.
• Full Access: $275/month or $1,895/year, maximum 3 users, 125,000 responses, adds research question types and statistical analysis.

There is no free plan; the trial is 7 days on Professional with no card required. Anything with more than three users, SSO, API access, a HIPAA BAA, Digital Experience, reputation management or Pulse is a custom Business Platform quote. Vendr reports an average contract of $29,808 across 28 Alchemer deals, so budget $20K to $40K a year for a platform deal with one or two modules, about the size of the $30,000 median Qualtrics contract, but one that can also cover reviews and in-app feedback. Gartner’s 2026 report flagged Alchemer’s professional-services pricing as high for the market, so price implementation separately.

Best for

CX and customer-success operations leads at mid-market companies, 200 to 5,000 employees, who need relationship and transactional surveys, in-app feedback and review management in one place, and who will not staff a Qualtrics-sized program. Multi-location brands that want survey responses and Google reviews in one dashboard get the most from the Chatmeter side.

Skip it if NPS is the whole requirement, or if thousands of frontline employees each need their own location’s feedback view.

Versus the alternatives

Qualtrics and Medallia hold the largest share of the VoC market. Pick Qualtrics when research, employee experience and CX need to live on one enterprise platform with a dedicated program team; pick Medallia when tens of thousands of frontline staff each need their location’s feedback and unlimited users matter more than price. Pick Alchemer when you need most of that scope with a two- or three-person program team and can live without their analytics depth.

Enterpret is the fastest-growing AI-native entrant, at a $36,302/yr median contract; pick it when your feedback already exists in tickets, calls and reviews and the job is reading it, not collecting it. SurveyMonkey and Typeform are the cheaper picks when you only need survey collection. Former Delighted customers who only ran NPS should look at AskNicely, Simplesat or Retently first.

If none fit, run one journey on a three-seat Professional plan for a quarter, export the responses to your BI tool, and decide on a platform contract once you know the response volume and who owns closing the loop.

Watch-outs

• The three-user ceiling is a hard upgrade trigger. The fourth seat moves you from about $3,200 a year (three Professional seats) to a custom platform quote, and G2 reviewers cite renewal jumps after added seats or features moved between tiers. Guard: before signing, get the platform quote for your 12-month seat plan, and cap the renewal increase in the order form.
• Iris is announced, not proven. Its GA was scheduled for Q4 2026, and the auto-responder posts replies under your brand on public review sites. Guard: keep human approval on for every public response until you have reviewed a month of drafts, and do not pay for Iris before you have used it on your own data.
• One platform, three codebases. Survey, Digital Experience (Apptentive) and reputation (Chatmeter) came from separate codebases, and reviews of support are mixed. Guard: in the pilot, test the hand-off you actually need, for example a one-star review creating a CRM task, rather than each module in isolation.
• HIPAA needs a platform plan. The BAA is offered to Business Platform customers, not the small-team plans. Guard: if surveys touch patient data, get the BAA signed before the first send.