Journal · Outbound · 15 min · Oct 14, 2026
The best Instantly agencies of 2026: partner agencies that run cold email for you
Eight agencies that run Instantly for you, what each one does once a buyer replies, and what each one costs, with the source for every price.
By Vesselin Malev, Managing Director, The Demand Department.
The short answer
Instantly is the easy part to buy. Hypergrowth, the entry plan for Instantly’s agency partners, costs $97 a month for 125,000 emails, with unlimited sending accounts and warm-up (Instantly, October 2026).
The hard part is everything around it. Domains and mailboxes that stay out of spam. A list worth sending to. Copy a buyer actually answers. And a person who picks up the reply within hours, every day of the week.
That’s what an Instantly agency sells. So this list looks past the badge and asks every agency the same two questions. Whose name is the workspace in? And who answers the reply?
If you’re short on time, start here:
The best pick for most B2B companies: The Demand Department. An official Instantly partner running cold email and LinkedIn as one sequence, with people answering every reply and the meeting landing on your calendar. For what’s included, it usually costs less than the other agencies on this list.
Cold email at very high volume: ProfitPath Growth Partners.
Paying only for leads that ask for a call: cold.email.
Selling into Sweden and the rest of Europe: Newlead.
The full ranking and the prices are below.
We wrote this list, and we’re number one on it. Every agency below, ours included, went through the same five tests, written down before the names, and the reasons for each place are in its entry.
The list at a glance
| **#** | **Agency** | **On Instantly** | **Who handles the reply** | **Price (source, month)** | **Best for** |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Demand Department | Official partner, hundreds of sending accounts, with LinkedIn on HeyReach in the same sequence | People, with a rule for every kind of reply | Monthly retainer, 3-month minimum, quoted by touchpoint tier | Most B2B companies whose growth lever is volume |
| 2 | ProfitPath Growth Partners | Listed expert, done-for-you cold email at 100,000 to 10M+ emails a month | Not published | Projects from $10,000 (The Manifest, Oct 2026) | Cold email at very high volume |
| 3 | Growth Engine X | Runs outbound for Instantly itself, a partnership of 3+ years | Positive replies go to your sales team | Not published | US B2B with a market of 100,000+ contacts |
| 4 | Newlead | Listed expert, runs its own and its clients’ outbound on it | Newlead’s team, with interested leads posted to your Slack | Custom retainer, 3-month minimum (Newlead, Oct 2026) | B2B selling into Sweden and the rest of Europe |
| 5 | ColdIQ | Listed expert, done-for-you outbound plus a coaching program | Not published | $3,000 to $10,000/mo reported (Salesforge, Aug 2026) | Series A and later B2B that wants a Clay-built data layer |
| 6 | cold.email | Listed expert, campaigns run in a workspace where you’re an admin | AI flags interest and your team answers | About $150 to $175 per meeting-ready lead, no retainer (cold.email, Oct 2026) | Paying only for leads that ask for a call |
| 7 | frontBrick | Listed expert, building on Instantly, Clay and Twain | AI scores them and alerts your team | $100 to $149/hr reported, most projects $10,000 to $49,999 (Prospeo, 2026) | SaaS, agencies and consultancies that want a packaged engine |
| 8 | Workflows.io | Listed expert, outbound run next to LinkedIn content and ABM ads | Not published | Not published | Venture-backed B2B tech that wants outbound and founder content together |
Every price and claim in this article was checked against the agency’s own site or the source named next to it in October 2026. Prices change often, so confirm the number on the call.
How we ranked them
Five tests, all about what happens around the software.
1. Real volume on Instantly. A partner or expert listing, live client accounts and a sending volume the agency will state.
2. Whose workspace it is. Your Instantly workspace, domains and mailboxes in your name, or theirs with a written transfer.
3. Who answers the reply. A person on their side, an AI flag, or your own team.
4. Where the meeting lands. On your calendar, in your CRM, or in a channel as a lead to chase.
5. What it costs, with a source. A published or reported price, with the month.
We built our own system around these five tests, and that’s why we’re first. The details are in our entry below.
What an Instantly partner badge tells you
Instantly runs two programs agencies point to.
The first is its experts directory, which lists 51 agencies and consultants, "vetted by Instantly, but operating independently" (Instantly, October 2026).
The second is the Solutions Partner program, for agencies that run outbound for clients. To join, an agency needs an active Hypergrowth or Light Speed plan, at least one live client on Instantly, a registered business, a signed partner agreement and a signed deliverability code of conduct. Partners are then tiered by the revenue they’ve generated through Instantly over the trailing 12 months, reviewed monthly, and earn a lifetime commission of 20% to 35% on the client accounts they refer and manage (Instantly, October 2026).
So a badge tells you two useful things. The agency has real client accounts running on Instantly, and it has signed a code of conduct on deliverability.
It doesn’t tell you who answers a reply that lands at 9:40 on a Tuesday, or whose name the workspace is in when you leave. Those two questions decide most of what you get, and the rest of this list is built on them.
There’s nothing wrong with the commission. It’s still worth one question on the first call: who pays Instantly for your workspace, you or the agency? Either works, as long as the contract says so.
1. The Demand Department
The short version: The Demand Department (TDD) is an official Instantly partner. We map your entire total addressable market (TAM) and run every buyer in it through one multi-touch sequence across cold email and LinkedIn, with Instantly on the email side and HeyReach, also an official partnership, on LinkedIn. People answer every reply, and the meeting lands on your calendar.
On Instantly. Hundreds of sending accounts across separate sending domains in your name, every address verified through ZeroBounce before anything is sent, and volume set by tier, from roughly 1,000 to 5,000 emails a day. There’s more on the sending side on our cold email service page.
The build. In week one, your market gets mapped and scored and the full lead list is delivered while the domains warm. In week two, LinkedIn outreach and content go live. In week three, cold email starts sending.
After the reply. Every reply is read and answered by a person. A yes gets booked. "Send me more info" gets the one thing that answers it, then the ask. "Not now" becomes a dated follow-up in your CRM. A reply on either channel stops the other the same day, so nobody gets a LinkedIn request after they’ve already answered the email.
The volume. Engagements are built around how many buyer touchpoints you want each month: 10,000, 50,000 or 100,000. More touchpoints means more email volume and more LinkedIn profiles running outreach and content.
What you keep. Domains, inboxes, lists, sequences and content transfer to you on request, and the LinkedIn profiles were always yours.
The proof. Across all clients in the last 12 months: $28M in pipeline added, 2,200+ calls booked and $4.5M in client revenue closed, for 100+ B2B companies. Named clients include Hotjar, Blockworks, Milk Road, beehiiv, NP Digital and SingularityNET. Beyond Instantly and HeyReach, we’re an official partner of lemlist, Apollo, ZeroBounce and FullEnrich.
Pricing. A monthly retainer with a three-month minimum, set by touchpoint tier and quoted on the strategy session. For what’s included, it usually comes in below the other agencies on this list. After the first three months, the next phase is scoped from real numbers: meetings held and deals closed.
Who it’s for. B2B companies, agencies, SaaS, fintech and service businesses with a proven offer and a market big enough that volume is the lever. The system runs on cold email and LinkedIn, and we don’t run cold calling.
Why it’s first. It passes all five tests in writing: real volume on an official partnership, sending domains in your name, a person on every reply, the meeting on your calendar, and a price quoted from your own volumes.
How to start. The 30-minute strategy session ends with a number: how many meetings the system can book for you, channel by channel, from your volumes. Or get 100 leads scored against your ICP in 24 hours, free.
2. ProfitPath Growth Partners
ProfitPath sells done-for-you cold email at serious volume. Its listing in Instantly’s experts directory, under founder Jack Bricknell, says it can send "from 100k to over 10M monthly emails" and claims it consistently books 1,000+ meetings a month across clients (Instantly, October 2026).
The review count backs up the scale. The Manifest shows 4.9 from 90 reviews, a minimum project of $10,000+ and most projects between $10,000 and $49,999 (The Manifest, October 2026). GoodFirms lists $50 to $99 an hour and 4.9 from 13 reviews, and one reviewer, the CEO of AutomateItLabs, reports 50 to 100 qualified meetings a month (GoodFirms, August 2026).
Where it falls short: the listing covers cold email only, it doesn’t say who answers replies, and the directories disagree on the basics. The Manifest says it launched in 2022 with 50 to 249 people. GoodFirms says 2023, with 10 to 49.
Best for: Cold email at very high volume. Pricing: Projects from $10,000, reported. Watch out: Ask how the 1,000+ meetings a month are counted, and who answers the replies.
3. Growth Engine X
Growth Engine X has an unusual Instantly credential: Instantly is one of its clients. Salesforge’s September 2026 review reports 10 to 20 positive responses a day for Instantly, over a partnership of more than three years (Salesforge).
The founder, Eric Nowoslawski, used to work at Clay, and Salesforge lists the agency at Clay’s Elite Studio tier. Its site, now coldoutbound.com, puts its volume above 8 million emails a month. An engagement sends up to 5,000 emails a day from lists built in Clay, starting with your existing customers, keeps backup domains warming in reserve and plugs into your CRM. When you leave, the domains, inboxes, Clay tables and lists come with you.
It’s picky about fit. It wants US B2B companies with 100,000+ contacts in their market and more than $5,000 of lifetime gross profit per customer, and buyers who qualify get a free test campaign.
Where it falls short: positive replies are handed to your sales team, there’s no public price, and Salesforge found no independent reviews on Clutch, G2 or Trustpilot.
Best for: US B2B companies with a big market and customers worth $5,000+ in gross profit. Pricing: Not published. Watch out: Ask how a "positive response" is defined before you compare numbers.
4. Newlead
Newlead is a Swedish cold email agency, founded in Eskilstuna in January 2025 by Max Erikstedt and Vishal Vyas. It’s in Instantly’s experts directory and runs both its own outbound and its clients’ on Instantly (Newlead, October 2026).
The service covers the ICP, a verified list, dedicated sending domains with warmed inboxes at about four emails per inbox per day, copy with A/B tests, and every reply. Interested leads land in your Slack with name, company, email and phone. Booking them into your calendar is an optional add-on.
It also publishes its numbers, which few agencies do. From January to September 2026: a 5.33% reply rate across 421,456 contacts for 33 clients, and a 0.50% bounce rate across 1,139,931 emails. One client, Luca, got 249 leads in 12 months and about $685,000 in revenue from them.
Where it falls short: it’s a young company with a small named team, and its own numbers show the gap by market: a 9.39% reply rate in Sweden against 1.66% in the US.
Best for: B2B companies selling into Sweden and the rest of Europe. Pricing: Custom monthly retainer, three-month minimum, then month to month. Watch out: Booking is an add-on, so price it in.
5. ColdIQ
ColdIQ is one of the best-known names in Clay-era outbound, and founder Michel Lieben is in Instantly’s experts directory. The listing describes two offers: done-for-you lead generation, which comes with SOPs your team can later use to run it in-house, and a coaching program where campaigns are built with you (Instantly, October 2026). It counts 70+ B2B SaaS and agency clients.
The homepage now leads with software, with plans from $99 a month, next to the managed agency (coldiq.com, October 2026). Salesforge’s August 2026 review puts agency pricing at $3,000 to $10,000 a month, with three-to-six-month minimums standard, and reports its self-described status as one of four Clay Elite Studio partners (Salesforge).
Where it falls short: the reply process isn’t published, and with software now at the front, ask who runs your sequences week to week and how many clients each person carries.
Best for: Series A and later B2B that wants a Clay-built data layer and SOPs to take in-house later. Pricing: $3,000 to $10,000/mo, reported. Watch out: Three-to-six-month minimums, per Salesforge.
6. cold.email
cold.email is the pay-per-result option. There’s no setup fee, no retainer and no software cost. You pay for "meeting ready leads", which it defines as a decision-maker in your target vertical and geography who asks for a call or a meeting. A reply like "send me more info" doesn’t count, and you get the final say on borderline leads. Its offer page puts the price "usually right around $150-$175" a lead, higher in competitive niches (cold.email, October 2026).
The first 20 leads are a trial: if you don’t like their quality, you don’t pay. After that, cancelling takes 30 days’ notice, and the agency wants clients at $1 to $2 million in ARR or more (cold.email, October 2026).
The Instantly setup is the other draw. Campaigns run in an Instantly workspace where you’re an admin, and if you cancel, the mailboxes, domains and workspace transfer to you. Founder John Tanner Worthington is in Instantly’s experts directory.
Where it falls short: AI flags the interested replies and pushes them to your CRM, and from there your team answers them and books the call. Many of the headline claims are self-described, including "#1 Freelancer on all of Upwork.com".
Best for: Companies that want to pay only for leads that ask for a call. Pricing: About $150 to $175 per meeting-ready lead. Watch out: Have someone ready to answer those leads the same day.
7. frontBrick
frontBrick sells packaged engines, sized by the opportunities they target each month: Cold Email Engine at 10 to 30, Multi-Channel Engine at 30 to 50 with LinkedIn added, and ABM Engine at 50+ with LinkedIn Ads, website de-anonymization and lead magnets (Salesforge, September 2026). Clay implementation packages and ongoing support sit alongside.
Founder Stan Stojanovic started it in 2020 and is in Instantly’s experts directory, where his profile describes cold email infrastructure built on Instantly, with Clay and Twain, and claims 30+ discovery calls a month for clients (Instantly, October 2026). Among the case studies Salesforge lists: $700,000 in pipeline from 4,636 prospects over two and a half months for Hire with Jarvis, and 21 enterprise opportunities in 60 days for SimplerQMS.
Prices aren’t on the site. Prospeo’s 2026 roundup reports $100 to $149 an hour, with most projects at $10,000 to $49,999 (Prospeo).
Where it falls short: it’s a small team, about six named people by Salesforge’s count, and AI scores the replies and alerts your team rather than someone on its side answering them. Contract terms aren’t published.
Best for: SaaS companies, agencies and consultancies above $1M in revenue that want a packaged engine. Pricing: $100 to $149/hr, reported. Watch out: Ask about capacity and the start date.
8. Workflows.io
Workflows.io builds outbound for B2B tech companies as a subscription, next to LinkedIn content, AI RevOps and LinkedIn ABM ads. Co-founder Dan Rosenthal is in Instantly’s experts directory, where he says he has overseen outbound strategy for 200+ companies and calls the model "Service-as-a-software" (Instantly, October 2026).
The case study to read on its site is Freckle: 42% month-over-month growth over six months and 640+ tier-one sign-ups from outbound (workflows.io, October 2026).
Where it falls short: there’s no price anywhere, and the offer is built for tech companies, so professional services and traditional industries sit outside it.
Best for: Venture-backed B2B tech that wants outbound and founder content run together. Pricing: Not published. Watch out: Get the channel list and the reply process in writing.
Honorable mentions
Hack’celeration sets Instantly up inside your own account (infrastructure, sequences, deliverability monitoring and CRM sync) and trains your team to run it, with projects from $2,000 and a free 60-minute audit. It says outright that it doesn’t sell a partner tier (Hack’celeration, October 2026). Inbox Accelerator sets up cold email infrastructure for free, in your name, and sells data and consulting to 100+ active clients, per its Instantly listing. Top of Funnel, whose Brandon Charleson built Instantly’s n8n integration, MCP server and CLI, suits custom builds. Lead Gen Jay mostly teaches: Clutch shows a $5,000 minimum project and four reviews, most of them for training and coaching (Clutch).
If you’re open to agencies that aren’t built around Instantly, our rankings of cold email agencies and done-for-you lead generation services cover them.
What an Instantly agency costs in 2026
Two bills sit under every Instantly agency: the software and the people.
The software is published. Instantly’s Outreach plans run $47 a month for 5,000 emails (Growth), $97 for 125,000 (Hypergrowth) and $358 for 500,000 (Light Speed), all with unlimited sending accounts and warm-up. Lead data runs on separate credits, from $9 a month (Instantly, October 2026). Domains and mailboxes sit on top.
The people are where the price lives. Across this list, it comes in four shapes:
Per lead, about $150 to $175 a meeting-ready lead. cold.email, with no retainer and a 20-lead trial (Oct 2026).
A monthly retainer, $3,000 to $10,000 a month. ColdIQ, reported (Salesforge, Aug 2026). Newlead quotes a custom retainer with a three-month minimum (Oct 2026).
Hours and projects, $50 to $149 an hour, projects from $10,000. ProfitPath at $50 to $99 an hour (GoodFirms, Aug 2026), with projects from $10,000 (The Manifest, Oct 2026). frontBrick at $100 to $149 an hour (Prospeo, 2026).
Setup only, from $2,000 a project. Hack’celeration, with your team running it afterwards (Oct 2026).
Even at the top plan, the software is a small slice of the bill. Light Speed at $358 is about 12% of a $3,000 retainer, and Hypergrowth at $97 is about 3%. What you’re paying an agency for is the list, the writing, the deliverability discipline and the hour after the reply.
So ask the question that decides the real number: which of the Instantly plan, domains, mailboxes and data are inside the fee, and whose name are they in? If you’re still weighing Instantly against other platforms, our Instantly vs Smartlead breakdown and our ranking of the best cold email platforms cover the software side.
Your workspace or theirs?
This decides what you walk away with, and it’s the term least often written down.
Three setups show up on this list:
Your workspace, run by the agency. You own the Instantly account, and the agency works inside it. cold.email makes you an admin, and Hack’celeration builds everything in your account.
Their setup, with a written transfer. The agency runs the infrastructure, and the domains, inboxes and lists move to you when you leave. Growth Engine X transfers domains, inboxes, Clay tables and lists, and at The Demand Department, domains, inboxes, lists, sequences and content transfer on request.
Their setup, with nothing in writing. Then assume it all stays with them.
What you want named in the contract: the sending domains, the mailboxes, the lead lists, the sequences and the reply history. New domains take weeks to warm before they can send at volume, and the reply history is the only record of who already said "not now".
How to choose: a decision map
Find your situation, then look at the first pick, and the second if the first says no.
Cold email and LinkedIn as one sequence, with people on every reply: The Demand Department, then Workflows.io.
Cold email at very high volume: ProfitPath Growth Partners, then Growth Engine X.
US B2B with a big market and high customer value: Growth Engine X, then ProfitPath Growth Partners.
Selling into Sweden or the rest of Europe: Newlead.
A Clay-built data layer you can take in-house later: ColdIQ, then frontBrick.
Paying only for leads that ask for a call: cold.email.
A packaged engine sized by opportunities a month: frontBrick, then ColdIQ.
Instantly set up in your own account for your team to run: Hack’celeration.
Eight questions for the first call
Every agency here will tell you it runs Instantly. These questions show how.
1. Whose name is the Instantly workspace in? Good: mine, or yours with a written transfer at exit. Bad: "we handle all that."
2. Who answers a positive reply, and how fast? Good: a named role, the same day. Bad: "it goes to your CRM."
3. Where does the meeting land? Good: on my calendar, with the thread attached. Bad: a weekly lead export.
4. How many emails a day, from how many domains and mailboxes? Good: a number per mailbox and a total. Bad: "as many as it takes."
5. What counts as a lead, and what counts as a meeting? Good: written definitions with title and company size. Bad: "anyone who replies positively."
6. Which costs sit outside the fee? Good: the Instantly plan, domains, mailboxes and data, each priced. Bad: "it depends."
7. What’s the minimum term and the notice period? Good: two numbers. Bad: "we’re flexible."
8. When does the first email go out? Good: a date, two to three weeks out. Bad: "after onboarding."
Frequently asked questions
- What is an Instantly agency?
- An agency that runs cold email for you on Instantly. It sets up the domains and mailboxes, builds the list, writes the sequences, sends them and handles some or all of what comes back. Many are listed in Instantly’s experts directory or its Solutions Partner program.
- What does an Instantly partner badge mean?
- That the agency runs live client accounts on Instantly and has signed its partner agreement and deliverability code of conduct. Solutions Partners are tiered from Starter to Elite by the revenue they generate through Instantly over 12 months. A badge doesn’t tell you who answers replies or who owns the workspace.
- How much does an Instantly agency cost in 2026?
- Per-lead deals run about $150 to $175 a meeting-ready lead. Managed retainers are reported at $3,000 to $10,000 a month. Project work starts around $10,000, and setup-only projects around $2,000. Instantly itself costs $47 to $358 a month for sending, plus data credits.
- Should I pay for Instantly myself or let the agency pay?
- Either works, if the contract says whose name the workspace, domains and mailboxes are in. Paying for it yourself makes leaving simpler. If the agency pays, get a written transfer of the domains, mailboxes and lists.
- Is it cheaper to run Instantly myself?
- The software is cheap: $97 a month on Hypergrowth for 125,000 emails. The work is the expensive part: the list, the writing, keeping domains out of spam and answering replies within hours, every day. If someone on your team has that time, run it yourself. If not, the agency fee buys that person.
- How long until an Instantly agency books meetings?
- Plan on two to three weeks before the first email goes out, because new domains have to warm first, and a quarter before the numbers settle. At The Demand Department, LinkedIn goes live in week two and cold email starts sending in week three.
Ask whose name is on the workspace
Before you sign with any Instantly agency, ask two things. Whose name is the workspace in? And what happened to the last ten positive replies it got for a client: who answered, how fast, and how many became meetings?
If you want to hear ours, the 30-minute strategy session ends with a number: how many meetings the system can book for you, channel by channel, from your volumes. Or start with 100 leads scored against your ICP, free, in 24 hours.
Three layers, run as one revenue system
This article is one piece of the system we build and operate for our clients. See how the three layers are wired together, read the case studies, or start with how it works.
- Cold Email Outbound — sending infrastructure, verified data, and sequences that book qualified calls.
- LinkedIn Outbound + Content — connection sequences and founder led content run from one profile.
- Paid Advertising — account based campaigns and retargeting on the accounts you already work.
Related articles
- The best cold email agencies of 2026, ranked by what happens after the reply — The best cold email agencies of 2026, ranked on what happens after a prospect replies: who answers, how fast, where the meeting lands, and what each one costs.
- The best cold email and LinkedIn outreach agencies of 2026: who runs both as one sequence — The best cold email and LinkedIn outreach agencies of 2026, ranked on whether both channels run as one sequence, with prices, terms and best fit for each.
- What a Cold Email Agency for Agencies Should Deliver — Learn how to define the operational scope of an outbound partner. Focus on domain setup, list building, and copy rather than bloated agency services.
- Pricing Models for a Cold Email Agency for Agencies — Compare outbound pricing tiers to select the right partner. Learn how execution models vary across standard retainers and performance deals.