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Boundstone vs NumVerify
NumVerify is the cheapest way to format-check a phone number, and for some jobs that's genuinely enough. Here's the honest version of where it stops — including the part where our free tier and theirs run on the same class of data.
Facts re-checked 9 August 2026 — spot something stale and we'll fix it in public.Pick NumVerify if…
- You need dead-simple format validation at hobby volume, and the 100-free-checks tier covers you.
- You want the APILayer ecosystem's one-key-many-APIs convenience.
Pick Boundstone if…
- You want the same metadata tier NumVerify sells — free, 250/mo, with the limits disclosed in every response.
- You want live carrier and reachability data (HLR is a paid opt-in today) — not static metadata forever.
- You want email and IP validation in the same credit system.
- You want a public benchmark instead of a reputation you have to guess about.
| NumVerify | Boundstone | |
|---|---|---|
| Free tier | 100 checks/mo | 250 credits/mo (phone + email + IP) |
| Paid price | $14.99 / 5k · $59.99 / 50k · $129.99 / 250k — ≈ $0.006 a check at 10k, since you buy the 50k plan to get there | $0.004 → $0.0028/credit, printed per tier |
| Phone data depth | Database format/metadata; they market it as "real-time carrier & line type detection", which means database freshness, not a network dip | Metadata tier by default, disclosed per-response; live HLR (carrier, ported, reachability) as a paid opt-in at 5 credits |
| Scope | Phone only (parent apilayer sells email separately as mailboxlayer) | Phone + email + IP, one credit system |
| Honesty about limits | Marketed as validation | checks.not_performed names what wasn't checked, every response |
The arithmetic, worked from the table above: at 20,000 checks a month they are cheaper on phone alone — $59.99 on their 50k plan against $79 here. What $79 buys instead is phone, email and IP in one balance, a dashboard, bulk CSV, and live HLR when you opt in. If phone format checking is genuinely all you need, say so and take their plan; pricing re-checked 9 August 2026.
Is Boundstone's free phone check better than NumVerify's?
Today they run on the same class of data — Google's libphonenumber metadata. The differences: ours is 250/mo free instead of 100, covers email and IP too, and every response states that carrier and liveness weren't checked. We think selling metadata as 'validation' without saying that is the category's bad habit.
What does Boundstone add over format checking?
A live HLR dip you opt into with hlr:true (5 credits, paid plans): real carrier, ported status and reachability, with carrier_lookup/ported_status/hlr_liveness moving into checks.performed. When the network can't answer, the dip abstains and the credits are refunded — you never pay for a non-answer.
Decide with data — one email when the benchmark drops
The API is live — start free without waiting. This list gets benchmark № 001 the day it publishes. One email. We validate emails for a living — we're not going to spam yours.