Metricool vs Later: Ads Reporting or an Instagram Storefront

The short answer: if your monthly report has to put Google Ads or TikTok Ads spend beside organic posts, Metricool reads both from its free plan up and charges $25 a month on monthly billing for up to 5 brands on Starter, while Later reads only Meta ad accounts, and only on its Scale plan at $110 a month (checked on 26 October 2026 on the Metricool and Later pricing pages). If the job is an Instagram and TikTok feed that sells through the bio link, Later is the stronger shop window: its Link in Bio page, with email capture, is on every plan, the free one included.

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Later changes what the tool is organised around. Metricool is built around a brand: one folder holding a profile per network plus a Meta, a Google and a TikTok ad account, priced by how many folders you keep. Later is built around the Instagram grid and the link beneath it, sold in social sets of eight profiles with a monthly allowance of posts per profile.

What decides it:

1. Count what you schedule per profile, not per brand. For example, a Reel every weekday plus a Story every day, in a month with 22 weekdays, is 22 + 30 = 52 items on one Instagram profile: over Later Starter's 30, inside Growth's 180, and drafts count too, per Later's plan reference. Metricool's paid plans set no monthly cap until a brand passes 600 posts, when a manual review starts (fair use policy).
2. List the ad accounts that feed today's report. If a Google Ads or TikTok Ads line is in it, Later has nowhere to put it. Metricool takes one account per ad platform inside each brand (brand guide).
3. Log the bio link's results before you move anything. Tag the bio links with UTM values and write down a month of sessions and sign-ups from them in your own analytics. That is the baseline either tool has to beat.

Job by job

Where they part

Paid results in the same report

Metricool's brand holds a Meta Ads, a Google Ads and a TikTok Ads account next to the organic profiles, and its pricing page lists PDF and PPT reports from Starter. Later's Scale plan connects Meta ad accounts so paid and organic performance sit together in its Custom Analytics view, per its pricing page. For a brand that buys only Meta ads and already needs six social sets, that is enough. With search or TikTok spend, it is half a report.

Selling from Instagram

Here Later leads. Its bio page links Instagram posts and Reels to products, collects email addresses into Mailchimp or a CSV, and on Growth adds Instagram Shop product tagging and page views by location, per the plan reference. Metricool's SmartLinks track clicks too, but its free plan article leaves them out. For a shop whose sales start in the grid, that is the deciding row.

One AI step, on Later's side

Later's documented AI lives in the app. Its Ideas tool takes a brand description of 3 to 200 characters, builds content pillars at no credit cost, then spends 1 credit for every 3 ideas; Starter includes 5 credits a month. A workable routine: generate a pillar's ideas on the first of the month, keep the ones that fit the month's offers, and only then click Create Draft Post, where the idea becomes the caption. A person rewrites each caption, checks every price and date in it against the offer, and schedules it.

Later counts a draft against the same monthly allowance as a published post, so each idea its AI turns into a draft spends part of the cap that moves a Starter account to Growth at twice the price. Keep ideas on the board until you will publish them.

On Metricool's side the AI work runs through its MCP server, free on every plan; Metricool vs Hootsuite walks through asking it for a month of ad figures and checking them against the ad platforms.

The prices next to each other

Checked on 26 October 2026, USD before tax.

• Free. Metricool: 1 brand, 20 posts a month, 30 days of analytics, no LinkedIn or X (Metricool pricing). Later: 1 social set, 1 user, 12 posts per profile, no analytics, listed in its plan reference rather than on the pricing page.
• First paid step. Metricool Starter is $25 a month on monthly billing, or $20 billed annually, for 5 brands. Later Starter is $25 a month, or $18.75 billed yearly, for 1 set and 1 user (Later pricing).
• A team with approvals. Metricool Advanced is $67 a month, or $53 billed annually, for 15 brands and unlimited team members. Later Growth is $50, or $37.50 billed yearly, for 2 sets and 2 users, with extra sets at $15 and extra users at $5 (Later pricing).
• Larger accounts. Metricool's 50-brand tier is $210 a month, or $159 billed annually. Later Scale is $110, or $82.50 billed yearly, for 6 sets and 4 users (Metricool pricing).

Choose Metricool if

• Your job is one monthly report per brand with Google, Meta and TikTok ads beside the organic numbers.
• You run several small brands and want the bill to follow brands, not posts.

Choose Later if

• Your job is selling from an Instagram or TikTok feed, with the bio page as the till.
• Snapchat is in your plan, X is not, and creator campaigns are coming this year.

The Hootsuite angle on Later's planner is in Later vs Hootsuite.

Run both free plans for one month

Both free tiers do the deciding job at small scale. Put the brand with the ad accounts on Metricool's free plan and rebuild last month's report there. Put the Instagram profile on Later's free plan, rebuild the bio page with UTM tags, and compare sessions with your baseline. One month answers which job you were paying for.

Then check the ads total itself. A report that adds up each ad platform's conversions often shows more orders than the shop recorded, because every platform credits itself for the same sale. Compare the month's summed platform conversions with the orders in your shop or CRM for the same dates, and treat the gap as the size of the double count. Later, if you want that comparison run continuously, a causal attribution tool like Causality Engine does it; disclosure: I founded it.

FAQ

Does Later report on Google Ads or TikTok ads?

No. Its pricing page lists Meta Ads Analytics on Scale, for paid and organic performance together, and names no other ad platform.

Do drafts count toward Later's monthly post limit?

Yes. The plan reference says drafts count toward your monthly post count, and the pricing FAQ says posts count when they are scheduled, not when they publish.

Is Metricool's link in bio page on the free plan?

No. Metricool's free plan article lists SmartLinks among the paid features, while Later's Link in Bio page is on its free plan.