Social media management is just clicking the "Post Now" button and chilling the rest of the day because it's just a task.

Only those who think this way don't understand "Quality Work".

Social media management is a Job, not one of the tasks.

Whether you are a one-person team that changes hats (Content Ideas, copywriting, Design, or data analysis) every day, a growing team with 3-5 members, or a big agency, you need social media management tools to streamline your processes.

Because the present era is fast, and everyone (boss or client) wants things done quickly, new modern tools help you stay ahead and get great results.

Teams have different needs. Some want only scheduling and reporting, but some brands want to manage their brand mentions and unfiltered opinions.

There is also one need that has been growing rapidly for some time.

That is the centralization of all the social media efforts.

This means planning, scheduling, collaboration, inbox management, reporting, or even listening, all controlled from one place.

Because no one likes to pay for multiple tools for interconnected operations.

After sleeping on it, I created a list of social media management tools that understood nearly all their audience's pain points. These tools have been helping the social media team run operations smoothly, using, if not with one tool, at least a minimum of tools.

  1. Statusbrew

  2. Sprout Social

  3. Hootsuite

  4. Buffer

  5. Agorapulse

I know you are busy, and switching tools is also difficult. So, here is the comparison table of the top 5 tools out of 13 i shortlisted to save you some time.

Best 5 Social media management tools comparison table 2025

Tool

Best For

Pricing Starts at

Best Features

Statusbrew

Agencies, brands with multiple profiles

$69/mo per user (5 profiles included)

Advanced scheduling & bulk publishing, Content Labeling/tagging, Custom approval workflows, Role-based permissions, Unified inbox for organic + paid, 60+ Automation rules & sentiment filters, 250+ KPIs Tracked

Sprout Social

Enterprises & large teams needing depth

$249/mo per user

Smart Inbox, CRM integrations , Social listening (enterprise tier), Competitor benchmarking, Employee advocacy , Robust reporting, Asset library for media

Hootsuite

Mid-to-large orgs, general use

$99/mo per user

Streams-based engagement, Bulk scheduling, Visual content calendar - Team workflows, 150+ third-party integrations, Basic analytics, Link shortener

Agorapulse

Agencies & SMBs focused on engagement

~$79/mo per user

Unified social inbox, Ad comment management, Publishing queues, Bulk scheduling, Competitor analysis, Strong engagement reports, Shared calendars, Approval flows

Buffer

Solopreneurs & small businesses

Free + paid (per channel)

Simple scheduling, AI caption assistant, Engagement suggestions, Basic post-level reports, Landing page builder, Easy-to-use interface, Team collaboration

You can look at this database if you wish to compare these tools feature-wise.

The DB contains information such as:

  • Trial Period

  • Pricing

  • Networks Supported

  • Features

  • USP

Statusbrew

If you hear about Statusbrew for the first time, it's a modern social media management tool offering 1:1 feature parity with a top leader without a considerable price tag.

why-statusbrew

Statusbrew helps you centralize all of your social media efforts, such as planning, team collaboration, scheduling, inbox management, and reporting, to manage them from one place.

Its team-based features, such as approval workflows, planning collaboration, and flexible pricing structure, make it best suited for agencies and growing teams.

Best Features:

  • Bulk content scheduling for upto 400 posts & 365 days

  • Content tagging to understand campaign performance

  • Publishing rules to maintain brand voice

  • Brew AI helps you enhance Captions as per your Brand Voice

  • Custom shareable calendars get client feedback

  • Approval workflows so that only that content goes live that aligns with your brand

  • A unified inbox that helps you manage all types of engagements, including brand mentions

  • 60+ inbox automations, including hiding/deleting negative or spam comments

  • Team Inboxes help divert relevant conversations to relevant teams

  • Auto-tag conversations based on keywords, campaigns, sentiments, language, etc.

  • Bulk delete/hide 4000 comments in one go

  • HubSpot, Salesforce CRM integration

  • 20+ reporting templates to create 1-click dashboards

  • 250+ KPIs tracked to create custom shareable reports

  • Statusbrew is GDPR & SOC 2 compliant

  • 22/6 support through email, live chat, help center & 1:1 Zoom call

Pricing

  • Lite: $69 per month (1 user, 5 profiles)

  • Standard: $129 per month (3 users, 10 profiles)

  • Premium: $229 per month (6 users, 15 profiles)

  • Custom pricing for Enterprises or multiple-profile businesses

Sprout Social

Sprout Social is a leader in the world of social media tools. Its design philosophy revolves around creating tasks around social media actions to facilitate a workflow among teams.

sprout-social

Sprout may be the best choice for a premium social media management tool, yet there are “better value for money options” available.

Best Features

  • Sprout Social lets you respond promptly to customer queries and comments across multiple social platforms

  • Schedule and publish content to different social media platforms in advance

  • Advanced analytics provide deep insights into audience engagement

  • Monitor brand mentions, industry trends, and customer sentiment

  • Collaborate on content creation, review, and approval processes seamlessly

  • Generate customizable reports

  • Sprout Social's CRM integration provides a holistic view of customer interactions

  • Manage their social media activities from anywhere using Sprout's mobile app

  • Sprout Social's smart inbox consolidates messages from different social media profiles

  • Sprout Social's competitor analysis tools allow businesses to benchmark their performance against competitors and identify strengths and areas for improvement

Pricing

  • Standard: $199 per month per user

  • Professional: $299 per month per user

  • Advanced: $399 per month per user

  • Custom pricing for Enterprises

If you find Sprout Social to be your best tool, I suggest you understand its pricing structure before making a call.

Hootsuite

Next, we have Hootsuite. It's the most widely used social media management tool and a market leader for online education about social media management.

Users enjoy curating and publishing content on social media via Hootsuite. It also offers integration with more than 100+ apps, yet there are other better tools than Hootsuite.

Best Features

  • Offers a centralized dashboard to manage multiple social media accounts across various platforms

  • Allows users to create custom streams for each social network to monitor specific keywords, hashtags, and user interactions in real time

  • Users can assign tasks, respond to comments, and collaborate on content creation within the platform

  • Provides a content calendar view that gives users an overview of scheduled posts, campaigns, and content plans to maintain a consistent posting strategy

  • Offers comprehensive analytics and reporting tools that provide data on engagement, follower growth, and performance metrics for each social network

  • Enables users to automatically share content from their favorite websites or blogs through RSS feed integration

  • Hootsuite's social listening feature tracks brand mentions, keywords, and industry trends

  • Helps manage and monitor social media ad campaigns across platforms to track ad performance and adjust campaigns in real time

  • Integrates with various third-party apps, such as Canva, Google Drive, and Mailchimp

  • Hootsuite's security features include role-based access management, two-factor authentication, and secure password management to protect your social media accounts

Pricing

  • Standard: $99 per month per user

  • Advanced: $249 per month per user

  • Custom pricing for Enterprises

Check this blog to understand Hootsuite pricing in detail.

Agorapulse

Agorapulse is a social media management tool that does it all. It will keep you covered for social media publishing, engaging, and reporting. It also offers collaboration workflows and automation for engagement.

Agorapulse-Community-Management-Software

Although one might feel that Agorapulse isn’t very flexible, it is a good value for money. There are better tools than Agorapulse if you have already tried it in the past.

Best Features

  • A unified inbox that consolidates all social media comments, mentions, and messages from multiple platforms

  • A visual content calendar for scheduling and organizing content across different social media channels

  • Monitors brand mentions, keywords, and industry trends across social media

  • Track and analyze sentiment around your brand or specific topics

  • Categorize and prioritize content based on different themes

  • Automatically schedules posts based on predefined time slots

  • Moderate comments on Facebook ads through Agorapulse

  • Agorapulse's CRM feature categorizes and tracks interactions with followers

  • Create customized reports

  • Monitor competitors' social media activity

  • Upload and schedule multiple posts at once through CSV files

  • Collaborate on content creation and approval

  • Label content for categorization and analysis

Pricing

  • Standard: $79 per month per user

  • Professional: $119 per month per user

  • Advanced: $149 per month per user

  • Custom pricing for Enterprises

Buffer

Buffer is the next tool on our list of the best social media management tools. Instead of offering an all-in-one tool, Buffer follows the a-la-carte ideology.

Buffer is usually an excellent choice for any beginner or brand trying social media for the first time. Once a brand grows, it looks for Buffer alternatives to get a mature platform and advanced reporting.

Key Features

  • Buffer's Optimal Timing Tool analyzes audience engagement patterns and suggests the best times to post content for maximum reach and interaction.

  • Social media calendar provides a clear overview of scheduled posts

  • Buffer's link-shortening feature not only saves character space but also tracks click-through rates

  • Buffer allows users to include Facebook Pixel in their posts to allow retargeting of website visitors for more personalized ad campaigns.

  • Buffer suggests relevant hashtags for posts

  • Buffer's collaborative features allow team members to brainstorm, plan, and collaborate on content ideas

  • Upload custom thumbnails for videos shared on social media

  • Integrate RSS feeds

  • Add custom UTM parameters to track link clicks

  • Buffer's browser extensions allow users to add content to their Buffer queue while browsing the web

Pricing

  • Free Forever plan (3 channels and 10 posts scheduled per channel)

  • Essentials: $6 per month per channel

  • Team: $12 per month per channel

Later

If you are serious about your brand presence on Instagram, you should check out Later.

Instagram offers a feed planner, scheduling, and automatic posting. It also provides link tools that help eCommerce companies showcase their products.

Best Features

  • Content calendar to help users plan and schedule social media posts

  • Schedule and post Instagram Stories

  • Later's Link In Bio feature lets users create a clickable landing page that mirrors their Instagram feed

  • Allows users to curate user-generated content

  • Suggests relevant hashtags

  • Analytics on post performance, engagement metrics, and follower growth

  • Tag products in their posts and link them directly to their online shop

  • Later's drag-and-drop interface allows users to visually plan their feed layout by rearranging scheduled posts

  • Calendar preview of scheduled posts

  • Create post variations for different social media platforms and automatically publish posts based on predefined time slots

  • Add the first comment to their Instagram posts automatically

  • Provides customizable Instagram Stories templates

  • Allows team members to collaborate on content planning and scheduling

  • Plan and schedule multi-image carousel posts on Instagram

Pricing (X is not supported)

  • Starter: $25 per month per user for 8 profiles

  • Growth: $50 per month for 2 users & 16 profiles

  • Scale: $110 per month for 6 users for 48 profiles

Sendible

Sendible is a social media management tool designed for agencies with multiple clients. It offers customized dashboards for various clients.

sendible

If you need pricing flexibility, decent features, and collaboration team features, Sendible can be considered.

Best Features

  • Automatically recycle and repost evergreen content

  • Enable content approval workflows

  • Monitor social media mentions, keywords, and hashtags in real-time

  • Aggregate messages and notifications from multiple social media platforms into a single inbox

  • In-depth analytics and customizable reports

  • Set up automated workflows for tasks such as posting, responding to messages, and following specific accounts

  • Suggest relevant and trending content ideas based on user interests and industry trends

  • Track conversations and sentiment about a brand, industry, or specific keywords

  • Bulk scheduling, repeat posting, and customized posting times for different time zones

  • Support team collaboration through user roles, permissions, and content approval workflows

  • Client-friendly reporting with custom branding and data visualization

Pricing

  • Creator: $29 per month per user per calendar for 6 profiles

  • Traction: $89 per month for 4 users per calendar for 24 profiles

  • Scale: $199 per month for 7 users per calendar for 49 profiles

  • Advanced: $299 per month for 20 users 100 profiles

  • Enterprise: $750 per month for 80 users 400 profiles

ContentStudio

ContentStudio is an all-in-one Social Media Management tool to create, schedule, publish, & analyze your content across all social networks in one place.

content-studio-front

It offers a suite of tools tailored for agencies, brands, and marketers to enhance their online presence and engagement.

Networks Supported: Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn, Pinterest, TikTok, and more.

Key Features

  • Unified social media dashboard: Manage all your social media accounts from a single interface, allowing for efficient planning, scheduling, and publishing of content across various platforms.

  • AI-powered content creation: Use the AI assistant to generate engaging captions, suggest relevant hashtags, and create compelling images.

  • Collaborative tools: Facilitate teamwork with features like content approval workflows, shared calendars, and real-time collaboration.

  • Advanced analytics and reporting: Monitor and analyze social media performance with in-depth insights, competitor benchmarking, and customizable reports to inform strategic decisions.

  • Manage all your social interactions in one place. No more multiple logins, respond to comments, messages, and mentions across all platforms from a single, unified inbox.

Users Love It For:

  • Very low pricing to get started

  • Ready-to-use white label reports

  • Intuitive interface simplifies social media management

Capterra Rating

4.7/5

eClincher

eClincher, just like the other tools in our list of best social media management tools, has features for social media publishing, engagement and reporting.

eclincher-front

It does everything you can expect from a good social media management tool with content queues, RSS feeds, conversation management, and more.

Networks Supported: Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Google My Business.

Key Features

  • Schedule and publish social media posts

  • Upload and schedule multiple posts in bulk

  • A visual calendar view of scheduled posts

  • Offers detailed analytics and performance insights data

  • Collaborate with team members, assign roles, and manage permissions

  • Supports managing multiple clients with separate accounts for agencies

  • Customizable White Label Reports: Users can create branded reports with custom logos and data visualization

  • The social inbox feature centralizes messages, comments, and mentions from different platforms

  • Recycle evergreen content

  • Monitor keywords, hashtags, and mentions across social media platforms

  • Offers a client approval workflow for clients to review and approve posts

  • Organize and categorize content for easier management and tracking.

  • Allows users to manage and track Facebook ad campaigns directly from the dashboard.

  • Suggests content ideas and topics based on user interests and industry trends.

  • Allows team members to review, edit, and contribute to posts before publishing.

Users Love It For:

  • Brand tracking

  • Great analytics

  • Media library

Capterra Rating

4.7/5

Social Champ

Social Champ is a social media management tool that has proved to be an incredible solution as an effortless scheduler. It provides a single dashboard integrating all your social media platforms and allows you to create, schedule and analyze content on each platform together.

social-champ-front

The tool is power-packed with multiple features which includes content curation, recycle, monitoring analytics, team collaboration, bulk upload, and more. The content composer comes with a hashtag manager that helps you create, save, and organize hashtag groups diligently. With its vibrant UI and easy to use dashboard, it's easily one of the most user-friendly social media management tools.

Networks supported: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, TikTok, YouTube, and Google Business Profile.

Key Features

  • Schedule social media posts directly from the calendar

  • End-to-end campaign management

  • Set up automated social publishing queues

  • Offers in-depth social media analytics

  • Organize content assets

  • Supports workflow automation by allowing users to create task templates, assign responsibilities, and streamline collaboration.

  • Offers pre-built social campaign templates, saving time in setting up consistent and effective social media campaigns.

  • Store and manage marketing assets

  • Collaborate on content creation, editing, and approvals

  • Design customized workflows

  • Supports social media automation by allowing users to queue up posts for automatic publishing.

  • Includes a headline analyzer tool

  • Supports audience segmentation

  • Integrates with email marketing platforms to sync email campaigns

  • Create and save social media message templates

  • Integrates with WordPress to manage and schedule blog posts

Users Love It For:

  • Social media calendar

  • Sentiment analysis

  • In-app editors

  • Auto RSS

  • Round the Clock customer support

Capterra Rating

4.4/5

Brandwatch

Brandwatch, formerly known as Falcon.io, is a social media management cum customer intelligence tool. It is dedicated to helping brands discover, attract, and engage customers across social networks.

Content calendar, approval flows, cross-channel customizable inbox, and social listening are some of the key highlights of Brandwatch.

Networks Supported: Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, WhatsApp, YouTube, TikTok.

Key Features

  • Social listening features to monitor and analyze conversations, mentions, and trends from different social media platforms and online channels.

  • Uses advanced image recognition technology to analyze and categorize images shared on social media

  • Create customized dashboards with widgets to track specific metrics

  • Allows audience segmentation based on demographics, interests, behaviors, and other criteria

  • Sentiment analysis to determine the sentiment (positive, negative, neutral) of social media mentions and conversations

  • Monitor and analyze competitors' social media activities

  • Identify and analyze influencers for your industry

  • Geo-location analysis of social media conversations

  • Identify emerging trends and topics in real time

  • Generates topic clouds

  • Access historical data and analyze long-term trends

  • Export data and generate customizable reports

  • Offers real-time alerts to notify users

  • Benchmark your brand's social media performance against industry competitors

  • Prioritizes data security with features like access controls, encryption, and compliance with industry standards

Users Love It For:

  • Cross-collaboration

  • Flexibility to adapt to all organization types

  • Reporting

  • Ease-of-use

Capterra Rating

4.2/5

Khoros

Khoros offers enterprise solutions for social media management, marketing and intelligence. The suit is really appreciated for easy and effective brand communication on social media.

Networks Supported: Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest.

Key Features

  • Offers a unified platform for multiple social media accounts

  • Provides advanced social listening features

  • Allows automation of social media engagement chatbots, automated responses, and workflows

  • Supports the creation and management of online communities

  • Real-time analytics to track social media performance

  • Helps users identify influencers relevant to their industry and collaborate with them for influencer marketing campaigns

  • Offers features for managing social media accounts across different regions and languages

  • AI-driven insights to identify trends, anomalies, and opportunities within social media data

  • Content publishing calendar with scheduling and planning features

  • Social media advertising management

  • Integrates with customer service tools

  • Create customized workflows for social media management, collaboration, and approval

Users Love It For:

  • Brand messaging

  • Customer targeting

  • Social customer care

Capterra Rating

4.2/5

Which Is The Best Social Media Management Tool?

There is no one-size-fits-all answer to this question. The best social media management tool for you will depend on your specific needs.

Some factors to evaluate include the integrations offered, the pricing, and the availability of free trials.

When choosing a social media management tool, it is also essential to review the size of your team and your budget.

Some tools are designed for large teams and agencies, while others are more suited for small businesses and startups. Ultimately, you should select a tool that offers the features you need at a price you can afford.

Look at the value you are getting for your money. Some tools may offer many features, but they may not be the right features for your business.

We are confident that choosing one of the above tools will help you and your business tremendously.

FAQs

Which are the best social media management tools for small businesses?

Statusbrew, Zoho Social, and HubSpot are the best social media management tools for small businesses that come at an affordable price.

Which are social media management tools for agencies?

Statusbrew, Sprout Social, and Hootsuite are social media management tools for agencies that offer features to handle multiple clients with ease.

Can I manage multiple social media accounts from one tool?

Yes, that’s the main point. Most tools support multiple accounts across different platforms.

Is it safe to connect my social media accounts to third-party tools?

Yes, if the tool is approved by the networks (via official APIs). Always check compliance and security certifications.

Do these tools help me find the best times to post?

Most offer analytics or “best time” recommendations based on past engagement data.

Can I collaborate with my team inside the tool?

Yes, modern tools like Statusbrew, Sprout Social, & Hootsuite allow roles, approvals, and shared calendars.

Are there cheaper tools with the same features as Sprout Social or Hootsuite?

Yes, some tools like Statusbrew or Agorapulse provide 1:1 feature parity at lower costs by charging per brand/workspace rather than per user.

Which tools provide onboarding support when switching?

Enterprise platforms like Sprout, Hootsuite, and Statusbrew provide onboarding calls and training.

Do tools support both organic and paid (ads) management?

Yes, some do. Hootsuite, Sprout, and Statusbrew cover both; Buffer and Later focus more on organic content.

Can I customize captions and media per platform while scheduling together?

Yes, most tools allow per-platform editing to meet character count or format rules.

Do these tools allow bulk scheduling or CSV uploads?

Yes, enterprise and agency-focused tools usually support bulk uploads. Statusbrew even allows upto 400 posts to be scheduled in one go.

Do they provide a content calendar or board view for planning?

Yes, almost all tools provide a visual calendar, and some add Kanban/board views.

Do these tools have a unified inbox for comments, DMs, and reviews?

Yes, top-tier tools bring all conversations into one inbox.

Do they support sentiment analysis of comments and reviews?

Many tools provide built-in sentiment detection.

Can I track competitor performance or benchmark my brand against others?

Yes, competitor benchmarking is offered by Sprout, Statusbrew, and similar tools.

Can I backfill historical data if I switch tools?

Some tools offer backfill (usually up to 12–18 months). Others only track data after setup.

How many KPIs/metrics are available?

Varies — from 30–50 in simpler tools to 200+ in advanced tools like Sprout Social, Statusbrew etc.

Do these tools have approval workflows for clients/agencies?

Yes, workflows let clients approve or reject posts.

Do they allow external approvers without full user seats?

Yes, some tools like Statusbrew allows free “guest approvers.”

Are there discounts for non-profits?

Yes, Many tools provide such discounts. Sprout Social & Hootsuite provide upto 50% discounts but you have opt for higher plans. However, Statusbrew provide flat 50% discount on all plans.

What kind of customer support do they offer (chat, email, 1:1 calls)?

Varies — from email-only to 22/6 live chat with dedicated account managers.

Are these tools SOC 2, GDPR, or HIPAA compliant?

Enterprise-ready tools (Sprout, Hootsuite, Statusbrew) usually meet these standards.