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Research & analysis · Capital IQ vs FactSet

Capital IQ vs FactSet: Capital IQ Pro and FactSet Workstation pricing, cost per user and coverage compared

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Thesis, bull and bear case, key metrics, comparables and risk flags, synthesized into one structured tear-sheet.

Sample output is illustrative. Not financial advice.

Illustrative only

Thesis

Bull case

Bear case

Key metrics

illustrative

illustrative price trend, not live data

Comparables

Risk flags

Informational only · sample output, not live market data · not financial advice.

Neither S&P Global nor FactSet publishes a US price list, so almost every Capital IQ vs FactSet comparison you can find compares features and then guesses at cost. The guessing is unnecessary. Both vendors sell to the US federal government, every one of those purchases is a public record with a dollar amount and a period of performance, and a useful share of the records name the number of licenses bought. Divide one by the other and you get real negotiated seat prices for both platforms.

That is what this page does. Capital IQ comes out at roughly $14,451 per license per year on the largest federal award that names a seat count, FactSet at roughly $23,646 per premium workstation, and Bloomberg between $27,791 and $35,442 per terminal. We also found the renewal escalators, which matter more than the first-year discount and which nobody publishes: S&P renewed one Capital IQ Pro subscription at exactly 5.00%, while FactSet held another flat at 0.00% and Bloomberg ran 8.03% at one Treasury renewal.

Investables.ai is not a competitor to either platform and does not pretend to be. It is $29 to $249 per month, and it turns a ticker into a structured research card: what the business does, the metrics that matter with peer context, the bull case, the bear case, comparables and labeled risk flags. No real-time feed, no redistribution rights, no screening universe of sixty million private companies. Informational research only, not investment advice.

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Both sides bull and bear

Risk flags on every card

The short answer

What is the difference between Capital IQ and FactSet?

Capital IQ Pro is stronger on private companies, transaction comparables and credit, with more than 60 million private company records. FactSet is stronger on public company analytics, broker estimates, portfolio analytics and Excel and API workflows, and reports 237,324 users across 8,996 clients. On price, US federal awards that name a seat count put Capital IQ at about $14,451 per license per year against about $23,646 per FactSet premium workstation, so Capital IQ is usually the cheaper seat and FactSet the deeper public markets toolkit.

Last updated August 2026

Why it works

What the contract record shows that a feature checklist cannot

Capital IQ is the cheaper seat, and it is not close

Across every federal award that names a license count, Capital IQ lands well below FactSet. The FBI paid about $187,861 a year for roughly 13 Capital IQ licenses, which is about $14,451 each. Treasury paid about $165,523 a year for up to 7 FactSet premium workstations, about $23,646 each. That is a 64% premium for the FactSet seat. The widely repeated US list figures point the same way, roughly $33,375 for Capital IQ against reported FactSet workstations in the $25,000 to $30,000 range, but those are reseller estimates and these are audited payments.

The renewal is where the two vendors genuinely differ

First-year discounts get all the attention and the escalator gets none, which is backwards on a multi-year contract. In contiguous federal renewals with unchanged scope wording, S&P raised a Capital IQ Pro subscription by exactly 5.00%, from $138,250 to $145,163. FactSet renewed an Executive Office of the President subscription at exactly $24,000 two years running, a 0.00% increase. Bloomberg ran +8.03% at one Treasury renewal and then -2.01% at a later one. If you are signing a three-year deal, ask for the escalator in writing before you argue about year one.

Only one of these vendors has ever published a real price list

S&P Global Market Intelligence has filed thirteen services on the UK G-Cloud 14 framework, and every one carries an actual banded rate card, because supplying UK public bodies obliges a supplier to publish. FactSet and Bloomberg have filed nothing there. So for Capital IQ you can read the band structure directly, five users at GBP 45,000 rising to a hundred at GBP 250,000, while for FactSet the contract record is the only hard evidence that exists. That asymmetry is worth knowing before you accept either vendor's claim that its pricing is standard.

What you get

A structured first pass on every name

Enter any ticker or asset and the research card synthesizes the thesis, lays out the bull and bear case, surfaces the key metrics and comparables, and flags the risks, so your own diligence starts further along.

  • Turns any US ticker into a structured research card in seconds
  • Costs $29 to $249 per month against roughly $14,000 to $24,000 per seat
  • Puts the bull case and the bear case side by side with explicit risk flags
  • Covers small and mid caps that get little or no sell-side coverage
  • Needs no procurement cycle, no seat minimum and no annual commitment
  • Complements a Capital IQ or FactSet contract rather than replacing it
NVDA NVIDIA Corp. Illustrative

Thesis

Dominant AI accelerator supplier. The debate is the durability of data-center demand versus a cyclical capex peak.

Bull

CUDA moat, near-monopoly share

Bear

Customer concentration, cycle risk

P/E 46.2 Rev +94% 3 risk flags

Side by side

Capital IQ vs FactSet vs Bloomberg: what each one actually costs, from public contract records

Per-seat figures are our own arithmetic on US federal contract awards published at USAspending.gov, retrieved August 2026: award amount divided by the stated period of performance, then divided by the license count named in the award description. These are negotiated government prices under federal procurement rules, not list prices, and a commercial buyer should expect to pay more.

What you are comparing S&P Capital IQ Pro FactSet Workstation Bloomberg Terminal
Published US price list None, quote only None, quote only Published: $31,980 for one terminal, $28,320 each for two or more
Federal price per seat, per year About $14,451 (FBI, roughly 13 licenses, 2014 to 2021) About $23,646 (Treasury, up to 7 premium workstations, 2023 to 2026) About $27,791 (GAO, 10 users) to $35,442 (CFTC, 6 shared terminals plus data)
Cheapest federal seat on record Not separately itemized in the awards we read About $10,603 for a web portal user (DOJ, 2 licenses) About $10,008 for a Bloomberg NEF web seat at 66 seats (DOE)
Renewal escalator in contiguous federal renewals Exactly +5.00% (SBA, FY2026 to FY2027, identical scope wording) 0.00%, held flat two years running (Executive Office of the President) +8.03% (Treasury FY2022 to FY2023), then -2.01% (FY2024 to FY2025)
Filed rate card anywhere in the world Yes: 13 services filed on UK G-Cloud 14, all with pricing documents None filed on G-Cloud None filed on G-Cloud
Private company coverage More than 60 million private companies, plus 110,000+ PE and VC funds Public company focused, no registry-verified private financials Strongest in fixed income, FX and market data rather than private company financials
Scale the vendor discloses Not broken out below the Market Intelligence division $2,405.6m ASV, 8,996 clients, 237,324 users at 31 Aug 2025 Terminal count not disclosed
Typical buyer M&A, private equity, credit, corporate development, valuation Asset management, equity research, portfolio analytics, quant teams Trading desks, fixed income, anyone who needs the messaging network
Investables.ai, for scale $29 to $249 per month, published, no seat minimum Same Same

Bloomberg list prices are the vendor's own published rates. Federal per-seat figures are derived, not quoted, and award descriptions occasionally understate scope, so treat them as evidence of order of magnitude rather than as a quote you can hold a salesperson to. Investables.ai pricing is our own published rate and the product is informational research only, not investment advice.

Why Investables.ai

One research card that compresses the reading

Not a wall of raw data, not a one-sided opinion, and not a six-figure terminal. The thesis, both sides of the argument and the risks, in one structured tear-sheet you can act on. You stay in control of every decision.

Both sides, every time

The bull case and the bear case sit side by side, so you weigh the argument instead of reading a single take. Informational only, never a recommendation.

Risks on the page

Valuation, concentration and regulatory risks are flagged explicitly, so the downside is visible up front rather than buried in a footnote.

Faster diligence

A structured first pass in seconds means you spend your time on judgement, not on gathering, across stocks, ETFs, crypto and startups.

Good questions

Questions about capital iq vs factset

It depends entirely on the work. FactSet is better for public company analytics, broker estimates, portfolio attribution and Excel and API workflows, and its client base skews to asset managers. Capital IQ Pro is better for private companies, transaction comparables, credit and the SNL banking and insurance content, and it skews to M&A, private equity and corporate development. Neither is a superset of the other, which is why large banks license both.
Capital IQ, on the evidence available. The largest US federal award that names a Capital IQ seat count works out to about $14,451 per license per year, against about $23,646 per FactSet premium workstation on a comparable federal award. Reported US list prices point the same direction. The gap narrows if you need Capital IQ add-ons such as SNL, Panjiva or Credit Analytics, which are separate subscriptions rather than parts of a seat.
S&P does not publish a US price. The commonly cited US list figure is about $33,375 per user per year, and buyers report negotiated seats between $10,000 and $50,000 depending on volume and modules. The filed UK rate card prices bands rather than seats: GBP 45,000 for up to five users, about GBP 9,000 each, down to GBP 250,000 for up to a hundred, about GBP 2,500 each. Federal awards that name a seat count come in around $14,451.
FactSet is quote only, and the answer depends heavily on which product you buy. A Treasury award for up to seven premium workstations works out to about $23,646 per seat per year. A Justice Department award for two web portal users works out to about $10,603 each, so the entry-level web seat is less than half the price of a full workstation. Commonly reported commercial figures run from about $12,000 to $30,000 or more per user.
Buy Bloomberg if you need real-time markets, fixed income or the messaging network, and accept that it is the most expensive seat at roughly $28,000 to $32,000 published. Buy FactSet if the work is public equity research, estimates and portfolio analytics. Buy Capital IQ Pro if the work is deals, private companies, comps and credit. Most teams that can only afford one pick on the dominant workflow rather than on total feature count.
Capital IQ, decisively. S&P states coverage of more than 60 million private companies plus 110,000 or more private equity and venture funds on Capital IQ Pro. FactSet does not offer registry-verified private company financials at that scale and is built primarily around public companies and the estimates ecosystem. If private targets are central to your work, that single difference usually settles the choice before price enters the discussion.
Yes, and the leverage is in structure rather than percentage. Both vendors price on seats and modules, so the cheapest real saving is usually removing modules nobody logs into and moving occasional users to a lighter product. On the FactSet side the federal record shows a web portal seat at roughly 45% of a premium workstation. On the S&P side the filed card shows add-ons priced as a percentage of base, so trimming the base cuts the add-ons too.
If you run a regulated process, need audited private company financials, redistribute data inside a product, or trade on real-time prices, then yes, and there is no cheap substitute. If your job is understanding a listed company and forming a defensible view you can explain to somebody else, the answer is often no. That work needs filings, fundamentals with peer context and an honest statement of what could go wrong, none of which requires a six figure contract.
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