Hootsuite vs Buffer

HubSpot Marketing Hub

Zoho Social

Agorapulse

Sprout Social

Loomly

Later

Compare Hootsuite and Buffer based on features, pricing, verified reviews, integrations & more on GetApp. Find out which software is best for your business in 2026.

Sprout Social is a social media management tool created to help businesses find new customers & grow their social media presence.

Later is a web-based marketing platform, designed to help businesses plan and schedule posts across social media platforms including Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest. The drag and drop calendar tool allows users to plan social posts for the week ahead and monitor engagement in real time.

With Agorapulse, businesses can manage their social media messages, schedule & publish content, identify key influencers, monitor social channels, & create insightful reports. The platform integrates with Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, and LinkedIn, posting across multiple platforms.

Hootsuite helps brands manage social media better, from the smallest businesses to the largest enterprises across CPG, finance, healthcare, tech, higher-ed, and government services.

@mentions

A/B Testing

Access Controls/Permissions

Activity Dashboard

Activity Tracking

Activity/News Feed

Advertising Management

Alerts/Escalation

Alerts/Notifications

Approval Process Control

Assignment Management

Audience Targeting

Automated Publishing

Automated Scheduling

Behavior Tracking

Benchmarking

Blogs

Brand Tracking

Calendar Management

Calendar/Reminder System

Campaign Analytics

Campaign Management

Campaign Planning

Campaign Scheduling

Campaign Tracking

Categorization/Grouping

Chat/Messaging

Collaboration Tools

Commenting/Notes

Communication Management

Competitive Analysis

Competitor Monitoring

Compliance Management

Contact Database

Contact Management

Content Creation

Content Discovery

Content Library

Content Management

Conversion Tracking

Customer Database

Customer Engagement

Customer Experience Management

Customer History

Customer Segmentation

Customer Social Profiles

Customer Support

Customizable Branding

Customizable Fields

Customizable Forms

Customizable Reports

Customizable Templates

Dashboard

Dashboard Creation

Data Import/Export

Data Security

Data Visualization

Drag & Drop

Editorial Calendar

Email Alerts

Employee Advocacy

Employee Database

Employee Engagement

Engagement Tracking

Event Triggered Actions

Feedback Management

File Sharing

Filtering

Group Management

Image Library

Impact Measurement

Influencer Tracking

Keyword Filtering

Keyword Tracking

KPI Monitoring

Lead Engagement

Live Chat

Marketing Automation

Media Library

Mobile Access

Mobile Alerts

Monitoring

Multi-Account Management

Multi-Campaign

Multi-Channel Campaigns

Multi-Channel Communication

Multi-Channel Data Collection

Multi-Channel Management

Multi-Channel Marketing

Multi-Channel Social Integration

Multi-Language

Performance Metrics

Post Scheduling

Pre-Approved Content Library

Predictive Analytics

Progress Tracking

Project Management

Publish Scheduling

Real Time Comparisons

Hootsuite

Android

Web-based

iPad

iPhone

Business Development

Overall its been pretty good. Im not a big social media fan so I like it to be as simple as possible to get my message across.

Manager

There are times that the software has been a little buggy for us. Sometimes images fail to upload or content fails to post due to errors.

marketing manager

I love that I can save drafts and schedule easily. This makes my social media strategy clear and streamlined with the ability to plan ahead.

Owner

I was excited to start using Hootsuite for the simple reason that I needed help managing my accounts. Like the very easy dashboard and functionality.

Team Manager

It is recommended for its great ability to integrate to instagram, linkedin, pinterest and Facebook.

Executive Director

Hootsuite is easy to use and helps us save a lot of time getting our messages to our supporters and constituents. The way it integrates all social media platforms really helps our entire team.

Hootsuite is a great software to use and have in your scheduling arsenal. However, I recommend using it as a supporting scheduling tool in combination with other systems.

REALTOR

I had an issue with integrating it with all my platforms. I forget which one, but I was missing one that I had to do separately.

Accountant 

Hoot suite is a great product for batch posting and saves time when you have multiple social media platforms. I appreciate the ability to set times and have the software send posts out for you.

Great tool that we used to help up our employee engagement and reach more customers through their Amplify platform.

ReachKCK Director

It may be user error, but it has proved an inconvenience at times.

Social Media Manager

The price is affordable compared to other tools - I would recommend this if you want to do basic post scheduling on a budget.

Marketing and communications 

I hate that you have to have a public page in order to schedule content for Instagram. M sure it’s something to do with Instagram settings itself but it still pisses me off.

Development Director

I would recommend it to others looking for an easy to use scheduling platform and those who would benefit from concise analytics.

owner

I am a youtuber so i use this software to post out to all my social  media it is so easy to use and love that i can post to different social medias at the same time.

Senior Account Manager

Easy to use and set up, great for community management of low-volume channels. A simple solution to aggregate social content.

Admin/Marketing

Hootsuite is great for small businesses, I used it when doing marketing for a non profit with no marketing budget.

Tier 2 Lead

I can manage all social media platforms using this tool. Its customer service is wonderful; it is quick to respond to doubt.

Hootsuite screenshot: Social Media Monitoring: Monitor all of your social media profiles in one place and track the topics that matter to your brand.

Hootsuite screenshot: Scheduling: Plan social content as a team with an intuitive, shared calendar that features collaborative post drafts and built-in approval workflows.

Hootsuite screenshot: Publishing: Create, publish and schedule engaging posts across your social channels.

Hootsuite screenshot: Customer Engagement: Never miss a message and respond to customer inquiries faster with a consolidated stream of messages across networks that can be triaged and assigned. Provides optional chatbot handover for automated responses.

Hootsuite screenshot: Analytics & Reporting: Measure the effectiveness of your social media strategy and turn strategy into execution with meaningful and actionable insights. Customize and share reports according to your unique business goals and objectives.

Freelancers

Large Enterprises

Mid Size Business

Non Profit

Public Administrations

Small Business

Realtor

Good centralized tool for managing social media 

Sean:                                                  Hey, I'm Sean. I'm a real estate agent, and I used to use Buffer and now I've switched to Hootsuite. For more reviews like this, click the link below. So as a real estate agent one of the things I like to be able to do is post social media in advance, and both Buffer and Hootsuite do those perfectly for me, and it just streamlines the day so that I'm not having to spend time figuring out when, what, where to post. I set it and forget it with both those products and I really like them. 
			                                                       So using Hootsuite really is the most dynamic product I've had. All my streams come on one dashboard, which is really neat to see and so it gives you a lot better layout of knowing what goes to which social media outlet, and I like that interface. It also has a lot more training and education that Buffer doesn't have. So it really makes it kind of a fun product to use as well. 
			                                                       So Buffer uses a mobile app more, for me what I like is it's very mobile-friendly. Shortening website addresses is very convenient and fast and easy. So if you're on the go, Buffer might be a thing you like. I liked it for that aspect. But it does have other things I don't like but it is very mobile-friendly and I think in this world mobile is good. 
			                                                       Buffer was a quick setup because it's very mobile-friendly; the mobile app is very easy to use and user friendly. So it's very easy to setup and start running from then on. Pick my topics, add my content, and tap a few buttons and go. Hootsuite takes a little more time to get used to the setup process, but it is all in one dashboard. You log in with your social media profiles and other RSS feeds you might want to add. It really makes it one encompassing dashboard and I think that's a thing that makes it stand out more than the other, is your really able to see what's going on versus just a checklist. That's what I liked about Hootsuite and still do over Buffer. 
			                                                       So as considering which platform I wanted to use, I looked at ease of use, mobile capability, and overall robust features. Those things along with price, I think compared with price wasn't really that much of an issue because they both provide a fair value for what they're offering. Hootsuite seems to have a little bit more of a dynamic platform and that was something I liked. I liked having a dashboard that has all my feeds easy to see and use, and also training and support that went on with Hootsuite. Buffer has a great mobile app so it's very mobile-friendly, and you're able to see it. But when you need to sit down and take a look at all your social media feeds one day, just set it and forget it,  Hootsuite had kind of the best dynamic platform. 

HubSpot Marketing Hub is a scalable, all-in-one platform for inbound marketing, combining content marketing, marketing automation, social media, analytics, and more, for marketing teams of all sizes to grow traffic, convert leads and track customers, all in one place

Zoho Social helps marketers in small to large organizations to grow the social media presence of their brand with actionable insights focused on content and engagement by scheduling unlimited posts, managing social networks, tracking conversations, and measuring performance from a single dashboard

Loomly is an easy-to-use social media management platform that helps you craft, optimize, schedule and analyze content for all social platforms including Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, TikTok, Snapchat, Pinterest, Google, and custom channels.

Buffer helps users manage multiple social media accounts at once as well as quickly schedule content from anywhere on the web, collaborate with team members, and analyze rich statistics on how posts perform

Reporting & Statistics

Reporting/Analytics

Social Media Integration

Social Media Monitoring

Social Promotion

Tagging

Third-Party Integrations

Buffer

Marketing Manager

The scheduling was great and the reports are probably the best out there. It also has a great mobile app which never crashed on me.

Video Editor and Social Media Content Creator

Just choose the option that fits your needs. Another Buffer feature I love is the ability to share the same post to multiple platforms with the appropriate variations.

Company Director

It's great to help clients who have never used a scheduling platform before, it's quite easy to use and reliable.

author

I love social media schedulers, and this is a good one. I like that it's relatively inexpensive, and easy to connect with social media accounts.

Buffer has been one of the only platforms I've had trouble with when it comes to failed posts. It didn't happen that frequently, but it happened often enough that it was a pain point.

Good platform for scheduling you SOME posts, very easy to use and a big help for people with multiple SOME channels.

Its free  as well so you can try it out until you want to take its premium membership. Easy to set up, easy to connect and their customer support is also great.

Designer

If you're an avid social media user/manager with multiple accounts, it seems like a great resource for scheduling posts. They also have an extensive blog/education section, which is quite informative.

freelance VA

Since my client uses Pinterest, this a good alternative for Tail. The link shortener feature is my lifesaver.

Founder

Integration with BulkBuffer. All of this has made Buffer a win win for me.

Manager, People & Possibilities 

I do like the ease of use and functionality. It has a clean interface and you can select from a couple of different plan options, including one for posting and analyzing your social media accounts.

Creative Director 

Buffer is a great tool to use if you would like to schedule social media posts all in one go. It can help you post to multiple networks and also get handy reports on how your social media is doing.

So all in all I think Buffer does a great job for the price of the software. I do like how all analytics are in one place and how you can have multiple users and editors working on your social copy.

Blogger

I love how simple Buffer is to use, and I use it often for my Instagram. The UI/UX is very intuitive, and I like it that is not crammed with many unnecessary integrations.

It can be a little confusing to learn the interface and features of customizing for each platform.

Hootsuite vs Buffer Comparison (2026)

Hootsuite

Buffer

Overview

Video & Screenshots

Pricing

User reviews

Key features

Integrations

Alternatives