Compare · Otterly.AI
Skald vs Otterly.AI: answers read on the AI engines' websites, or every request your server answered
Skald vs Otterly.AI compares a tool built to read AI answers with one built to read your server log. Otterly.AI runs your prompts every day on the AI engines' own websites, and asks Claude through its API. Skald counts every request your server answered, checks the crawlers of nine owners against their published addresses, and asks four assistants through their APIs.
Otterly.AI is an AI search monitoring tool: it runs the prompts you choose each day on ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Perplexity and Copilot, with Gemini, AI Mode and Claude as add-ons, and its Agent Analytics names the AI agents in the logs you send it. Skald reads your server's access log, sorts every request into five groups that add up to the log, and follows AI visits to your leads. Other tools are on the Skald comparisons page. Every claim about Otterly.AI below links to its own page, read on 26 October 2026.
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heads · Otterly.AI reads
"Which log analytics tool suits a small agency?"
…for crawler data, Northwind reads your server logs…northwind.example/pricing/
ChatGPT · asked daily
named · cited
tails · Skald reads
"GET /pricing/" ChatGPT-Userlive fetch · on OpenAI's list"GET /pricing/" from chatgpt.coma person · click-throughform sent · /contact/a lead, from that visit
access.log · northwind.example
A sample question, two sample log lines and a sample lead. Otterly.AI reads the answer; Skald reads what happened on your site after it.
Otterly.AI help center, How OtterlyAI collects data, read 26 Oct 2026 · help.otterly.ai/how-otterlyai-collects-data
[01] question by question
Skald vs Otterly.AI, question by question
Ten questions, each Otterly.AI answer taken from its own page and linked. A question its help center did not settle is left out. The longer story of sampled answers and measured requests is prompt tracking vs server logs.
| The question | Otterly.AIby its own pages | Skaldyour server log |
|---|---|---|
| What it is built to answer | An "AI search monitoring and optimization platform": how your brand shows up in AI answersOtterly.AI help, 26 Oct 2026 · help.otterly.ai/what-is-otterly.ai | What every request to your site was, and which visits became leads |
| How it gets AI answers | Posts prompts on the engine's own website, "through their public web interfaces"; "we only use API for Claude tracking"Otterly.AI help, 26 Oct 2026 · help.otterly.ai/how-otterlyai-collects-data | Through each assistant's API, on your own keys, 1 to 5 tries per question |
| Which AI engines | ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Perplexity and MS Copilot on every plan; "Claude, Google AI Mode, Gemini as extra Add-ons"Otterly.AI pricing, 26 Oct 2026 · otterly.ai/pricing | ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Claude; no AI Overviews |
| How often it asks | "Daily tracking frequency" on every planOtterly.AI pricing, 26 Oct 2026 · otterly.ai/pricing | Daily, weekly or monthly, per tracking profile |
| How it gets your site's traffic | Agent Analytics "works by analyzing your web server logs": a file upload, a webhook (your own system posts each request to it), Netlify, Cloudflare or a WordPress pluginOtterly.AI help, 26 Oct 2026 · help.otterly.ai/agent-analytics | Reads your web server's access log, or a CDN's |
| Which requests it keeps | AI agents and crawlers; its Cloudflare Worker "forwards only AI-bot traffic"Otterly.AI help, 26 Oct 2026 · help.otterly.ai/agent-analytics | Every request, in five groups that add up to the log |
| Is that crawler real? | The user agent is "used to identify the AI agent"; the address is "never stored". We found no address check on its pagesOtterly.AI help, 26 Oct 2026 · help.otterly.ai/agent-analytics | Checked for nine owners (OpenAI, Anthropic, Perplexity, Google, Bing, Apple, DuckDuckGo, Meta, Yandex) by their published lists, reverse DNS, or Meta's network; a fake is filed under bots. Other crawlers are counted by name, unchecked |
| Why an AI agent came | Three categories: "On-Demand AI Fetcher", "Search Index", "AI Training / Data Scraper"Otterly.AI help, 26 Oct 2026 · help.otterly.ai/agent-analytics | Training crawl, live fetch for someone's question, or a person's click-through |
| People sent by AI answers | "AI referral tracking so you see the humans behind the answers"Otterly.AI, 26 Oct 2026 · otterly.ai/features/agent-analytics | Every person in the log, AI clicks as a floor, followed to the lead |
| What it costs | Lite $29 a month with 15 prompts, Standard $189, Premium $489, Enterprise custom, and a free trial; Agent Analytics from Standard, with "200k Agent Analytics Events per month". As listed on otterly.ai on 26 Oct 2026Otterly.AI pricing, 26 Oct 2026 · otterly.ai/pricing | Nothing on your own server; hosted plans are priced per site, on the Skald pricing page |
Every Otterly.AI answer was read on otterly.ai and help.otterly.ai on 26 October 2026; prices are its monthly ones in US dollars. If we have one wrong, tell us.
[02] one request, field by field
What each one records from a crawler's request
Otterly.AI's docs list the fields its webhook takes for each request (a webhook is a URL your own system posts each request to). Skald reads the whole log line. Flip between them and see which compartments stay full, and what each one lets you answer.
- time
25/Oct/2026:09:14:02timestamp: keptto the second - address
203.0.113.24clientIp: "used only for de-duplication", "never stored"checked against OpenAI's published list - request
GET /pricing/requestUrl: keptthe page, and whether robots.txt forbids it - status
200not among its webhook fieldsthe errors each crawler met - bytes sent
18,422not among its webhook fieldswhat each crawler costs your server - referrer
-referer: keptwhich assistant sent a person - user agent
GPTBot/1.2userAgent: "used to identify the AI agent"the name it claims, before the address check - answer time
0.084 snot among its webhook fieldspages slow for crawlers
4 of 8 fields kept: time, page, referrer, user agent
Otterly.AI help center, What is Agent Analytics?, the webhook's event fields and its file upload columns, read 26 Oct 2026 · help.otterly.ai/agent-analytics
The request is a sample. Bytes and answer time are in Skald only when your log writes them; nginx writes answer time when its log format has $request_time. Its Netlify connector rides on the same webhook; its pages do not list the fields its Cloudflare and WordPress connectors send.
[03] to be fair
Where Otterly.AI does more than Skald
Otterly.AI is built around AI answers. Pick it for answers read where people read them, more engines, scores Skald does not make, and less personal data kept.
Answers as people see them
It posts prompts on the engines' own websites, and says API answers "can be limited, filtered, or structured differently". Skald asks through the APIs, and its own guide says an API can differ from the app.
More engines
Google AI Overviews and Microsoft Copilot come with every plan, and AI Mode, Gemini and Claude as add-ons. Skald asks four assistants and does not track AI Overviews.
Scores and audits
Its plans list sentiment, share of voice, a brand visibility index, citation sources, prompt research, query fan-out, and GEO URL audits, which check a page for AI crawlers and AI answers, with recommendations. Skald counts answers that named you, cited you or named a competitor, and writes no content.
Less personal data
Its Agent Analytics removes IP addresses "before they are stored". Skald keeps each visit's address in full, shortened or not at all, as your admin sets it.
Otterly.AI, read 26 Oct 2026 · help.otterly.ai/how-otterlyai-collects-data · otterly.ai/pricing · help.otterly.ai/agent-analytics
[04] use both
Otterly.AI for the answer, Skald for what happened next
Otterly.AI tells you whether an answer named you. Skald shows what that answer did on your site, from the log you already have, including the days before you set anything up.
Asked
Otterly.AI runs your prompts each day and marks where you were named and cited.
Read
Skald shows which of your pages ChatGPT-User, Claude-User and Perplexity-User fetched for someone's question, each checked against its owner's list. A Claude-User fetch from Claude Code runs on a developer's own machine, so it stays unverified.
Followed
A person who clicks through from an AI answer is followed to the form, booking or payment they send.
[05] choose by the question
Otterly.AI, Skald, or both
Pick by whether you need to know what AI answers say, or what reached your server and what it led to.
- "Are we named in Google AI Overviews and Copilot?" Otterly.AI.
- "How do we score against competitors, with sentiment?" Otterly.AI.
- "Was that GPTBot really OpenAI's?" Skald.
- "Which click from an AI answer turned into a booking?" Skald.
What it does not do
- Skald asks four assistants through their APIs: no Google AI Overviews, AI Mode or Copilot answers.
- No sentiment or share-of-voice score; it counts answers that named you, cited you, or named a competitor.
- Skald writes no content. Its AI readiness check marks six things per page from the log and robots.txt; it does not read what a page says or give it a score.
- Otterly.AI's connectors include Netlify and a WordPress plugin; where no log can be read at all, Skald falls back to its script tag and sees people, not agents.
keep reading
More on Skald vs Otterly.AI
questions
Skald vs Otterly.AI FAQ
Straight answers, including what Skald does not do.
What does Otterly.AI do?
By its own pages, read on 26 October 2026: it runs the search prompts you define every day on AI engines, tells you whether your brand was mentioned and your site cited, audits pages for crawlability and AI readiness, and, on its Standard plan and up, shows the AI agents in logs you connect, in Agent Analytics.
How does Otterly.AI collect AI answers?
Its help center says it "interacts directly with AI platforms through their public web interfaces", posting prompts through the AI engine's own website, and uses an API only for Claude. Skald asks ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Claude through their APIs, on your own keys, 1 to 5 tries per question. Prompt tracking vs server logs.
Does Otterly.AI check that a GPTBot is real?
Not that we could find. Its Agent Analytics docs say the user agent is "used to identify the AI agent", and the client address is used "only for de-duplication" and "never stored". Skald looks the address up for nine crawler owners, OpenAI among them, in the list, reverse DNS or network each owner publishes. A GPTBot from an address OpenAI does not list is filed under bots as "claims to be GPTBot"; a crawler from any other owner keeps the name it sent, unchecked.
Can Skald see Google AI Overviews?
No, and Otterly.AI does: AI Overviews are on every one of its plans. Skald asks ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Claude, never Google. In the log it can still tell a click from AI Mode when the referrer or landing address carries udm=50, but a click from an AI Overview arrives like any other Google click.
Can I run Skald on my own server?
Yes. Skald's Docker image is free to run under the Elastic License 2.0 (source-available). It reads the log of the server it runs on, or the logs sent to it, so the raw lines stay with you.
Can I use both?
Yes. Otterly.AI reads AI answers and the agent requests you send it; Skald reads your whole log. Neither needs the other, and the same log file can feed both.
$ tail -f access.log | skald
See what AI does with your site. Free for 30 days.
No card. We set up hosted Skald for you within one working day, or you self-host it free. Every line of your log, sorted and added up.