Instant Expert vs User Interviews and Respondent
User Interviews and Respondent recruit research participants from their own opted-in panels and charge a per-session fee on top of the incentive you pay. Instant Expert invites people who aren't in any panel, such as senior or niche professionals you name or describe, and the offer you set is the whole price, charged only if they book or answer.
Facts about research panels last checked October 3, 2026, on their own public pages.
The main difference
Research panels are built for studies: screeners, scheduling, incentives, and a large pool of people who have opted in to be interviewed. For common roles and consumers they fill sessions quickly.
Panels are thinner for senior people and narrow roles, because those people rarely sign up to be research participants. Instant Expert goes to them directly: you describe the role or name the people, and we invite them at work. There's no separate recruiting fee; the offer is the incentive, and our fee comes out of it.
Side by side
| Question | Instant Expert | Research panels |
|---|---|---|
| Who you can reach | Anyone you name or describe whose work email we can find, including executives and niche specialists. | Members of their panels. User Interviews says 7.5 million participants; Respondent says 4.3M+, including 3.1M verified professionals. |
| How pricing works | You set the offer per person (minimum $5) and a cap on total spend. The price includes our 20% fee; the person gets 80%. No subscription. The offer is the incentive; there's no separate recruiting fee. | User Interviews: $49 per session pay-as-you-go, plus $45 per session for advanced B2B targeting. Respondent: $40 per consumer session, $80 per B2B session. Incentives are paid on top for both. |
| When you pay | Only when someone books a call or sends a written answer. Declines and invitations nobody accepts within 7 days cost $0. | Per completed session. Respondent says screener fails, dropouts and no-shows aren't charged. |
| Speed | The invitation goes out when you approve the send. People have 7 days to book or answer, with up to two reminders. There's no guarantee a given person says yes. | User Interviews says 1 hour to first match. Respondent says under a day to the first booked session. |
| Best for | Interviews with senior or hard-to-find professionals, or specific named people. | Studies that need many participants fast, consumer research, and roles that are common in panels. |
Last checked October 3, 2026. Sources: User Interviews pricing, User Interviews, Respondent pricing, Respondent. Prices change; check their sites before you decide.
When to pick research panels instead
User Interviews or Respondent is the better choice in these cases:
- You need consumers or common professional roles. Their panels are large and they say they fill sessions within hours to a day.
- You're running a structured study: screener surveys, unmoderated tests, NDAs, or 20+ sessions at once. Their tooling is built for that.
- You don't care who exactly you talk to, as long as they match the criteria.
- Your team already runs research operations on one of them and needs consolidated billing and participant management.
Questions
How much does a B2B research session cost on Respondent or User Interviews?
Respondent lists $80 per B2B session and User Interviews lists $49 plus $45 for advanced B2B targeting, both pay-as-you-go. The participant incentive is paid on top. On Instant Expert the offer you set is the whole price, including our fee and the person's payment.
Can I reach executives through a research panel?
Sometimes. Respondent says its panel includes 3.1M verified professionals. But senior and narrow roles are scarcer in any opted-in panel. Instant Expert invites the specific people you want directly at work, so they don't need to be in a panel.
What if an interviewee doesn't show up?
On Instant Expert you get a full refund if the person doesn't join the call, and you can take the refund right away or pick a new time with them. Respondent says it doesn't charge for no-shows either.
Related
- Customer discovery interviews with busy professionalsTen to twenty interviews with the people who have the problem, before you build.
- Getting a first meeting with a specific buyerFifteen minutes with a buyer at an account you care about, when sequences haven't worked.
- Research participant recruitment for B2B studies: channels, tracking and incentivesHow to recruit business professionals for research: pick channels by the role you need, track every candidate from invitation to session, and set incentives people can accept.
- Research interview budgets: what you pay and whenUnderstand participant payments, recruiting fees, card holds and charge timing before budgeting for paid research interviews.
- How Instant Expert works and what it costsThe full pricing rules, refunds and who you can reach.
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