Machined automates the work behind topical authority. Instead of writing one article at a time, you start from a topic and the platform builds a full content cluster: it finds and groups the keywords, plans one article per subtopic so pages do not compete with each other, researches each article on the web with citations, links the articles together and sends the cluster to your CMS. The company claims more than 11,000 users and is run by Sibu Ventures Ltd.
The tool suits bloggers, niche and affiliate site owners, SEO freelancers and agencies that publish at volume and want to keep costs predictable. Its pricing stands out: every plan has unlimited projects, and the BYOK plan lets heavy users plug in their own Anthropic, OpenAI, Google or OpenRouter key, with AI costs averaging about $0.20 per article. Machined stays focused on content production: it does not track rankings or visibility in AI answers.
What Machined does
The workflow runs from keyword research to publication in a single flow, with settings for voice, research depth and AI model.
- Automated keyword research: AI discovers hundreds of keywords from a topic and analyzes their intent.
- Content cluster automation with keyword grouping and anti-cannibalization rules.
- Deep research by an agent that reads web pages and adds citations from authoritative sources, as inline links or footnotes.
- Long-form articles of more than 3,000 words in over 100 languages, with brand voice, tone control and custom briefs.
- Automatic internal linking with contextual anchor text, plus external links to authoritative sources.
- AI featured images generated with Flux, Nanobanana or DALL-E 3, and automatic meta titles and descriptions.
- An in-app editor to review and change articles before publishing.
- One-click bulk publishing to WordPress and Webflow, as drafts or live, with categories, tags, author and SEO metadata.
- Unlimited webhooks to send content to Zapier, Make, n8n or a custom CMS.
Machined pricing in 2026
Prices below were read on the Machined pricing page in October 2026, in US dollars. Yearly billing saves 25%. All plans include unlimited projects, clusters, deep research, AI images, unlimited CMS connections and webhooks.
- Launch: $19 per month, or $14 per month billed yearly. 30 articles per month, 2 team members.
- Growth: $49 per month, or $37 per month billed yearly. 100 articles per month, 3 team members.
- Pro: $99 per month, or $74 per month billed yearly. 250 articles per month, 5 team members.
- Scale: $249 per month, or $187 per month billed yearly. 750 articles per month, 10 team members.
- BYOK: $99 per month, or $74 per month billed yearly, plus your own AI provider costs. Up to 2,000 articles per month and 10 team members.
New accounts get a 7-day free trial with full access to the Launch plan, and nothing is charged automatically at the end. Plans can be cancelled or downgraded at any time, but Machined does not refund a subscription once it has been charged. Custom plans are available above 2,000 articles.
Machined pros and cons
Pros
- A very low cost per article, especially with BYOK.
- Real cluster logic: keyword grouping, anti-cannibalization and internal links built in.
- Research with cited sources, which helps fact-checking and editorial review.
- Unlimited websites on every plan and more than 100 languages.
- Webhooks open publishing to almost any platform.
Cons
- No tracking of brand mentions or citations in AI answers.
- No Google rank tracking and no Search Console dashboard.
- No competitor analysis or backlink building.
- Publishing is triggered by you: there is no scheduled autopilot that plans and posts on its own.
- No refunds once a subscription has been charged.
The best Machined alternatives
1. Sorank
Sorank is SEO and GEO software on autopilot. It shares Machined's cluster approach (keyword research, topic clusters, internal linking, anti-cannibalization and fact-checking) but runs it without you triggering each step: it writes, illustrates and publishes the articles on your CMS (more than 10 platforms, including WordPress, Shopify and Webflow) on its own. It draws on data from thousands of sites and hundreds of millions of keywords, adds search intent, query fan-out and a weekly read of what up to 5 chosen competitors publish, and brings Search Console, Analytics and AI traffic into one dashboard.
The main gap with Machined is what happens after publishing. Every week Sorank asks AI your customers' questions (25 prompts on ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini with Essential, 50 prompts with Perplexity and Grok added on Pro, 150 on Business) and shows whether your brand is mentioned, which brands are cited instead and which sources AI uses. Backlinks come from a network of direct, one-way links between the sites of more than 5,000 Sorank users, with credits (100 per month on Pro, 300 on Business). Plans are Essential at $99 per month (20 articles), Pro at $249 (60 articles) and Business at $499 (120 articles), or $49, $129 and $249 per month billed yearly, with a 3-day free trial and a 90-day money-back guarantee (see pricing). Agencies can use the white label, and the MCP connector lets you drive Sorank from Claude or ChatGPT.
2. Byword
Byword writes SEO articles at scale from keyword lists and publishes them to WordPress, Webflow and other CMS. It suits teams that think in batches of articles more than in clusters.
3. Koala AI
Koala AI is an AI SEO platform that writes long articles for Google and AI answers. It fits affiliate and niche publishers who care about article depth.
4. SEO Bot
SEO Bot runs SEO agents that research, write and publish content for busy founders. It suits users who want less manual control than Machined requires.
5. Arvow
Arvow generates brand-tailored articles in many languages and publishes them on a schedule, with AI visibility tracking. It fits teams that want scheduling and AI checks in one tool.
6. Junia AI
Junia AI is an AI SEO writer for long articles with a brand voice, aimed at Google and ChatGPT. It suits writers who edit each article closely.
How to choose between Machined and Sorank
Machined fits a site owner or an agency with a tight budget, a clear list of topics and the time to review and publish clusters by hand. If your priority is the lowest possible cost per researched article across many sites, and you already measure rankings and AI visibility elsewhere, Machined, and its BYOK plan in particular, is hard to beat.
Sorank fits a business that wants the whole chain handled, from keyword discovery to publication on a regular schedule, then measured on Google and in AI, with one-way backlinks from the user network. One subscription covers one site, so compare the number of sites you run as well as the article volume. Results usually show within 2 to 4 months, and you can start with the 3-day free trial, the free SEO tools or the free Chrome extension for on-page audits.
