LinkedIn Sales Navigator API: Access, Pricing & Best Alternatives

That includes me, you, and every prospecting nerd chasing faster access to the right people at the right companies.

But what if I want to automate lead collection, enrich contacts, and plug Sales Nav into my own workflows?

Is there any official API for that?

That’s what I’m gonna cover today.

In this guide, I’ll answer three questions... Does LinkedIn offer an official Sales Navigator API, how much does it cost, and what are the best alternatives if you can't get in.

Let’s start with the first question.

Is there an official LinkedIn Sales Navigator API?

Short answer? Yes — but not for everyone.

LinkedIn does offer an official Sales Navigator API, but the sad news is… it’s not public or self-serve.

You don’t get in just by paying for Sales Nav.

It’s the only official way to access Sales Navigator API.

What is the Sales Navigator Application Platform (SNAP)?

It’s LinkedIn’s partner-only program that exposes 3 integration families for Sales Navigator: Display Services, Analytics Services, and Sync Services.

How to access it?

There are two ways to work with SNAP; one for partners, and one for customers.

Apply as a partner

If you’re building a sales-tech product, this is the route that gives you direct access to the Sales Navigator API.

From there, LinkedIn evaluates your use case, your customer overlap, and your ability to comply with their data-use terms.

Approval depends on a few things:

1. Your platform must serve Sales Navigator customers
2. You need a strong, product-driven use case
3. You must agree to the SNAP terms and go through compliance onboarding

Once accepted, you get access to the API families that match your approved use case.

As of August 20, 2025, LinkedIn isn’t accepting new SNAP partners. The application process is paused, and there’s no public timeline for when it’ll reopen.

If you’re not already in, you’re stuck waiting.

Use the built-in CRM integrations

This is the route most customers take.

If you use Salesforce, Microsoft Dynamics, or HubSpot, you can turn on LinkedIn’s official CRM Sync features inside your Sales Nav account.

You won’t touch the API directly, but you’ll still benefit from:

1. Embedded Sales Nav profile panes inside your CRM
2. Profile matching and record enhancement
3. Data validation signals like “no longer at company”

These features require CRM Sync to be enabled and only show up if you’re on the Advanced Plus plan.

How much does it cost?

LinkedIn doesn’t publish any pricing for SNAP itself.

If you’re a customer, all SNAP features require the Advanced Plus plan and that plan isn’t publicly priced.

If you’re a partner, the cost depends on your agreement with LinkedIn. There’s no public info on API access fees or usage terms.

Either way, you’ll need to talk to a LinkedIn rep to get actual numbers.

What use cases does this Sales Navigator API address?

SNAP isn’t a general-purpose API. It’s built for very specific use cases that fit inside LinkedIn’s compliance model.

Let me break it down for you.

✅ What it does

SNAP supports three types of integrations:

1. Display services
2. Analytics services
3. Sync services

Display Services let you embed Sales Nav UI components inside your own product.

You basically use secure iframes powered by short-lived access tokens. This lets you interact with Sales Nav without ever leaving your app.

Which means, you can:

1. View LinkedIn profiles and company insights
2. Check lead activity
3. Send InMails straight from your app

This is the same embed system LinkedIn uses in their Salesforce and Dynamics integrations.

Analytics service gives you usage and engagement data you can actually work with.

It’s built for BI teams that want to track adoption, coach reps, or measure how Sales Nav drives pipeline.

You can export:

1. SSI scores for each user, day by day
2. Team-level activity metrics
3. Lead saves, profile views, InMail usage, and more

The data comes through export jobs, not instant responses. It’s made for dashboards, not triggers or automation.

Sync services keep your CRM clean. You can match contact records to LinkedIn profiles, enrich them with verified data, and flag stale entries.

Key features include:

1. Profile Associations — link CRM contacts to LinkedIn profiles
2. Profile Enhancements — show profile photos, job titles, and profile links
3. Data Validation — flag people who’ve left their company

All of this depends on CRM Sync being turned on in your Sales Navigator contract.

If it's not enabled, none of these endpoints will respond.

❌ What it doesn’t do

This is where most of you will get disappointed.

SNAP doesn’t give you raw LinkedIn data. You can’t extract leads, enrich contacts, or plug profile info into your outbound tools.

Here’s what it doesn’t support:

1. Direct access to member profile data
2. Lead list exports
3. Bulk profile downloads
4. Scraping or enrichment workflows
5. API calls for search results, filters, or contact info

Even if you’re a partner, you still don’t get to use it for anything outside licensed Sales Navigator workflows.

If your goal is outbound automation, SNAP isn’t just limited… it’s a dead end.

So it’s basically useless for my use case.

What other options do we have?

Are there any other ways to access Sales Navigator data via API?

Yes! You’ve still got two options. They’re not official. But they work.

1. Use LinkedIn internal API (not recommended)
2. Use a 3rd-party Sales Navigator API (recommended)

1. LinkedIn internal API

You won’t find this one in LinkedIn developer portal.

This is the private API that powers Sales Navigator itself.

Your browser uses it every time you run a search, open a profile, or check saved leads. You can see the requests in the network panel if you inspect traffic.

The data covers almost everything you see in the UI.

That includes lead and account search results, profile data, saved leads, and related activity. In short, if you can click it in Sales Nav, the internal API is behind it.

So why don’t I recommend using it?

Because the downsides outweigh the upsides.

1. Account risk
2. No documentation
3. High technical barrier
4. Scaling costs
5. Legal and compliance risk

LinkedIn watches for unusual activity. If your requests don’t look like a human using Sales Navigator, the system flags them.

At first, you might see temporary restrictions. Push harder and you could face a full account ban.

Plus there are no official docs, no usage guidelines, and no rate limit rules. You’re left guessing how tokens, headers, and payloads should work.

Even if you figure it out, LinkedIn can change everything overnight. One small tweak on their side and your setup breaks without warning.

It’s not something you can vibe code with a few prompts.

It takes serious technical skills to even get started. You’re not just making a simple API call.

You need to handle sessions, cookies, and anti-bot systems that block suspicious behavior.

None of this is explained anywhere, so you’re left to figure it out on your own.

You’ll spend more time fixing errors and patching breakage than actually pulling useful data.

And running this at scale isn’t cheap. You’ll need rotating proxies, account pools, monitoring tools, and constant maintenance.

Plus there’s a legal risk. LinkedIn’s internal APIs are not part of its supported developer ecosystem.

Using them can violate LinkedIn’s terms of service, and it can create legal or compliance issues if you cross certain boundaries.

You also need to think about broader regulations like GDPR.

For a deeper dive into what’s allowed and what’s not, check this article on the legality of LinkedIn scraping:

So between account risk, costs, and compliance issues, the internal API path is fragile and not worth the stress.

That’s why I recommend going with third-party Sales Navigator APIs instead.

2. 3rd-party Sales Navigator APIs

3rd-party APIs are the safer and more practical route.

They have already done the hard work of making a scalable LinkedIn automation and data collection product.

Plus they handle proxies, sessions, rate limits to keep your account safe.

But is it legal?

Yes, that’s why they’re still in business for so many years.

Though these APIs aren’t officially sanctioned by LinkedIn. They sit in a gray area and add guardrails to reduce the risk of bans.

But legality still depends on how you use the data, your local laws, and your compliance rules.

What uses do they address?

3rd-party APIs cover the jobs SNAP doesn’t:

1. Pull leads and accounts from Sales Navigator searches
2. Enrich contacts with LinkedIn profile data
3. Connect Sales Nav to CRMs and sales tools
4. Automate outreach workflows
5. Run large-scale data collection without building your own scrapers

But how do you find the best 3rd-party API for Sales Navigator?

I’ve done the homework and pulled together a list of the top players.

Best Sales Navigator APIs for data collection at scale

There are plenty of tools that promise “Sales Navigator automation.”

Most of them are either clunky, overpriced, or one LinkedIn update away from breaking. I’ve cut through the noise and narrowed it down to the top 2.

1. Lobstr.io
2. Evaboot

Each one brings something different to the table, so you can pick what fits your workflow and budget.

Let’s start with the champion – Lobstr.io 🦀

1. Lobstr.io

Lobstr.io helps you pull complete lead data from Sales Navigator searches. It grabs profile details, company info, and enriches every lead with a verified email.

Key features

1. Full lead data from Sales Navigator searches
2. Built-in email discovery with verified results
3. Proxy and anti-block handled automatically
4. Scheduled scraping for automated data collection
5. Export to CSV, Google Sheets, S3, or SFTP
6. Webhook support and a no-code app
7. Live chat and email support
8. Well-documented API with real examples

What makes Lobstr.io the best?

Lobstr.io collects everything visible in a Sales Navigator search.

It grabs profile details, company info (company name, company page URL, and more data), saved leads, and more.

With our email discovery, you can also enrich every lead with a verified email in real time.

Accuracy

The built-in email discovery hits more than 97% accuracy. This means less than 3% of your emails bounce.

Scale

Lobstr.io processes up to 1.6 million leads per month on tiered plans. If you need more, you can request a custom plan as well.

Account safety

Lobstr.io protects your Sales Navigator account while it runs at scale.

It manages proxies, request pacing, and all the messy anti-bot stuff so you don’t trigger LinkedIn’s defenses.

When you need more volume, you can connect multiple Sales Navigator accounts to spread the load.

Plus Lobstr.io is GDPR compliant. It protects your account and your data while you scale.

Ease of use

The API includes clear docs with examples for every scraper. You can copy them as-is or drop them into an LLM to get a ready script in minutes.

If you don’t want to code, you can run jobs inside the no-code app. It only takes a few clicks.

And if you ever get stuck, support is handled by technical people and is available via live chat and email.

How much does it cost?

1. Starts at $10 per 1,000 leads with verified emails
2. $5 per 1,000 at scale (with emails)
3. Custom plans available for higher volumes

Best for

Lobstr.io is best for individuals and agencies of all sizes and outbound teams that need to run large prospecting campaigns without losing data quality.

How to use Lobstr.io Sales Navigator API?

The process is the same as Lobstr.io’s no-code app. For authentication, you’ll need the API key.

Then, you need to do these 5 simple steps.

1. Create Squid
2. Add Tasks
3. Update Squid
4. Start Run
5. Get Results

Create Squid

To create a Squid, the first thing you need is a crawler hash.

https://api.lobstr.io/v1/crawlers
f

Let me save your time here. Sales Navigator Leads Scraper's hash ID is:

a1d243d3824a1ac773414416eb80362d
f

https://api.lobstr.io/v1/squids
f

You'll have to pass the crawler has ID in the body of your request:

{
    "crawler": "a1d243d3824a1ac773414416eb80362d"
}
f

If the Squid is created successfully, you'll get a Squid ID in the response.

Copy this ID, since you'll need it for everything from now onwards.

Add Tasks

The task in our case is the search URL from Sales Navigator leads search.

https://api.lobstr.io/v1/tasks
f

You'll need to pass the search URLs and Squid ID in the body of your request.

{
    "tasks": [
        {

            "url": "https://www.linkedin.com/sales/search/people?query=(spellCorrectionEnabled%3Atrue%2CrecentSearchParam%3A(id%3A3772932001%2CdoLogHistory%3Atrue)%2Cfilters%3AList((type%3ACOMPANY_HEADCOUNT%2Cvalues%3AList((id%3AD%2Ctext%3A51-200%2CselectionType%3AINCLUDED)))%2C(type%3ASENIORITY_LEVEL%2Cvalues%3AList((id%3A300%2Ctext%3AVice%2520President%2CselectionType%3AINCLUDED))))%2Ckeywords%3AJerry%2520from%2520JSL%2520Foods%252C%2520inc.)&sessionId=DlniK9%2BvQfKBJJMOnlV5%2FQ%3D%3D" 
        }
    ],
    "squid": "<squid_id>"
}
f

Update Squid

Now you need to add the accounts and fill in other required parameters to adjust scraper's behavior.

First thing first, sync your Sales Navigator Account(s) to Lobstr.io.

Read the following articles to learn how to sync a single or multiple Sales Navigator accounts safely via our Chrome Extension.

Once synced, just get the hash ID of your desired Sales Navigator account using the following endpoint.

https://api.lobstr.io/v1/accounts
f

Now, to find what other parameters you need to specify using this endpoint:

https://api.lobstr.io/v1/crawlers/a1d243d3824a1ac773414416eb80362d
f

https://api.lobstr.io/v1/squids/<squid_hash>
f

Start Run

https://api.lobstr.io/v1/runs
f

You only need to pass the Squid ID in the request body.

{
    "squid": "<squid_id>"
}
f

To get real-time progress, you can poll this endpoint:

https://api.lobstr.io/v1/runs/<run_id>/stats
f

Get Results

You can download the results as JSON or CSV.

https://api.lobstr.io/v1/results?run=<run_id>
f

To download them as CSV, you can use this endpoint:

https://api.lobstr.io/v1/runs/<run_id>/download
f

This will give you a temporary S3 link that you can use to download the CSV file containing leads data.

You can also export them directly to Google Sheet, Amazon S3, SFTP, or receive them via email.

And that’s it. Actually that’s NOT it. There’s way more in the documentation, I just shared a very basic overview here.

2. Evaboot

Evaboot is basically Lobstr.io’s more expensive version.

It grabs the same Sales Navigator data, enriches it with emails, then cleans up your exports by scrubbing emojis and fixing typos.

Key features

1. Extracts full lead and company details
2. Enriches records with verified emails
3. Cleans data automatically (emojis, typos, capitalization)
4. No-code app

Evaboot gives you the same Sales Navigator data that Lobstr.io does, including full lead and company details with email enrichment.

Its standout feature is data cleaning.

It automatically removes emojis, fixes typos, and standardizes names so your exports are easier to use right away.

The drawbacks come when you look at scale and usability.

Evaboot tops out at about 200k leads per month (without emails), compared to Lobstr.io’s 1.6M.

And while it does offer an API, the documentation feels vague and harder to follow.

How much does it cost?

1. Starts at $50 per 1000 leads (with emails)
2. At scale, goes down to $17 per 1000 leads

Best for

Evaboot makes sense for small teams or solo users who care about clean data and prefer no-code over APIs.

If you want neat exports without scaling to millions of leads, it fits.

And that’s it.

Conclusion

That’s a wrap on everything you needed to know about Sales Nav API, its cost, access, and the best alternatives.