Is Sales Navigator just LinkedIn with more filters? Not quite. It's a separate app at linkedin.com/sales, built on the same member data, and it's designed around one weekly question: who should I talk to next, and why now? People who get their money's worth treat it as a loop. Search, save, watch, reach out. People who don't open it twice, run one huge search and wonder why nothing happens.
This guide covers what Sales Navigator is, what's in each tier, how it differs from free LinkedIn and Premium, and how to use it step by step. Feature names and tiers come from LinkedIn's compare plans page (updated by LinkedIn on September 27, 2026), checked again on October 14, 2026. Prices get their own article: LinkedIn Sales Navigator pricing in 2026.
What is LinkedIn Sales Navigator?
Short answer: LinkedIn Sales Navigator is LinkedIn's paid prospecting tool for B2B sales. It runs on the same profiles as regular LinkedIn but gives you a separate workspace with 50+ lead and account search filters, saved lead and account lists, alerts when saved people change jobs or post, AI summaries called Account IQ and Lead IQ, and 50 InMail credits a month. It comes in three tiers. Core is $119.99 a month ($89.99 a month billed yearly), Advanced is $159.99 ($149.99 billed yearly), and Advanced Plus is quoted per team and is the only tier with CRM sync. Every tier includes LinkedIn Premium perks, so you don't need both.
What does Sales Navigator do? Features by tier
| Feature | What it does | Tier |
|---|---|---|
| Lead and account search | 50+ filters on role, seniority, years in role, company headcount, industry, geography and recent activity | Core and up |
| Boolean keywords | AND, OR, NOT, quotes and brackets in the keyword box of a lead or account search | Core and up |
| Spotlights | One click filters on top of a search, such as changed jobs in the past 90 days or posted on LinkedIn in the past 30 days | Core and up |
| Lead and account lists | Named lists of saved people and companies, with notes on each lead | Core and up |
| Alerts | Job changes, posts and company news for everyone you've saved, plus new matches on saved searches | Core and up |
| Account IQ and Lead IQ | AI written summaries of a company or a person, built from LinkedIn and public sources | Core and up |
| InMail | 50 credits a month to message people you aren't connected to | All three tiers |
| TeamLink | Shows which colleague is connected to your prospect | Advanced and up |
| Buyer intent, Smart Links, team reporting | Which accounts show interest in your company, trackable content links, usage reports for managers | Advanced and up |
| Seat management and CSV upload | One bill for the team, and upload your book of accounts from a spreadsheet | Advanced and up |
| CRM sync and lead or contact creation | Writes Sales Navigator activity into Salesforce, HubSpot, Microsoft Dynamics or Oracle and creates records from inside Sales Navigator | Advanced Plus only |
Relationship Map, where you sketch the buying committee at an account and spot who's missing, comes with every tier. The Sales Navigator app for Microsoft Teams is Advanced Plus only. LinkedIn's compare page also lists Relationship Explorer and Message Assist (AI drafted outreach), and those can depend on region, so check before you count on them. There's a mobile app for iOS and Android too, handy for reading alerts, not great for building searches.
Sales Navigator vs regular LinkedIn: what's actually different?
Plenty of people ask this right after the trial screen. So what's the real difference? Free LinkedIn's built for networking. Sales Navigator is built for working a list of people you don't know yet.
| Task | Free LinkedIn | Sales Navigator Core |
|---|---|---|
| Searching for people | A handful of people filters, and a monthly commercial use limit on searches | 50+ lead filters, a separate account search, Boolean, spotlights |
| Keeping track of prospects | Connect or follow, nothing else | Lead and account lists with notes, whether or not you're connected |
| Knowing when to reach out | Notifications about your own network | Alerts on everyone you saved: job changes, posts, company news |
| Messaging strangers | A connection request with a short note | 50 InMail credits a month |
| Research before a call | The profile itself | Lead IQ and Account IQ summaries, account pages with headcount trends |
| Premium perks | Not included | Included: unlimited browsing, who viewed your profile, the badge |
What about Premium Business? It's roughly half the price of Core, but its search is the same as the free account's. If you're mostly messaging people you already know, Premium is enough. When finding new accounts is your job, it isn't. We've put the full comparison with InMail counts in the Premium vs Sales Navigator section of the pricing guide.
Sales Navigator Advanced and Advanced Plus: what you get on top of Core
Core is a single user licence. Advanced and Advanced Plus are team licences, and that's really the whole story: search, lead lists, alerts and the 50 InMails are identical on all three. So what are you paying extra for? Collaboration on Advanced, and the CRM on Advanced Plus. The table below follows LinkedIn's own plan comparison in its help centre, checked on October 14, 2026.
| Feature | Core | Advanced | Advanced Plus |
|---|---|---|---|
| Who it's for | One user | A team | A team |
| Advanced search, lists, alerts, Relationship Map | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Saved leads and accounts per user | 10,000 | 10,000 | 10,000 |
| InMail credits a month | 50 | 50 | 50 |
| Share lists and saved searches with teammates | No | Yes | Yes |
| TeamLink and TeamLink Extend | No | Yes | Yes |
| Smart Links | No | Yes | Yes |
| Buyer intent signals | No | Yes | Yes |
| Upload your book of business (CSV) | No | Yes | Yes |
| Detailed usage reporting | No | Yes | Yes |
| SSO and enterprise billing | No | Only if bought through LinkedIn sales | Yes |
| CRM data into Sales Navigator, and activity back into the CRM | No | No | Yes |
| Data validation (flags outdated CRM records) | No | No | Yes |
| Sales Navigator profiles embedded in the CRM | No | No | Yes |
| ROI reporting, CRM sandbox, licences by CRM role | No | No | Yes |
| Sales Navigator for Microsoft Teams | No | No | Yes |
What Sales Navigator Advanced adds
- TeamLink. You see which of your colleagues is connected to a prospect, so you can ask for an intro instead of writing cold. TeamLink Extend widens that to coworkers who don't have a Sales Navigator seat, if they opt in to share their network.
- Smart Links. You bundle a deck, a case study and a video into one link and see who opened it and how they engaged. Handy after a first call, when you want to know whether the deck got forwarded.
- Buyer intent. Alerts and account level signals about companies engaging with yours, so you know which accounts are warming up before anyone's replied.
- Shared lists and saved searches. Your teammates work the same account lists instead of rebuilding them one by one.
- Book of business upload and usage reports. Managers can upload a target account list from a spreadsheet and see who's actually using their seat.
Advanced costs $40 a month more than Core on monthly billing, or $720 a year more on annual (full price table). Is it worth that? For a solo seller, almost never, because nothing in search or InMail changes. For four or five reps working the same accounts, TeamLink alone can pay for it: one warm intro beats a dozen InMails.
What Sales Navigator Advanced Plus adds
Advanced Plus is the CRM tier. LinkedIn's sync works with Salesforce, HubSpot, Microsoft Dynamics 365 and Oracle Sales. Data flows both ways: CRM accounts and contacts show up in Sales Navigator with CRM badges, and Sales Navigator activity, like InMails, messages and notes, is written back into the CRM. On top of that you get data validation, which flags CRM contacts who've changed jobs, Sales Navigator profiles embedded right inside the CRM record (Freshworks supports the embedded profiles too), and ROI reporting that shows admins which opportunities Sales Navigator activity touched. ROI reporting only works once sync is switched on.
There's no list price. You buy it through LinkedIn sales, with a demo and onboarding, and quotes customers have shared with us start around $1,600 per seat a year. Does it make sense? For a larger team on Salesforce or Dynamics whose ops people want ROI numbers and clean CRM data, yes. For Pipedrive or Zoho teams it adds nothing, because neither CRM is supported. And if the only thing you want is LinkedIn people and conversations in your CRM, there's a much cheaper path, covered in the Ln2CRM section below.
Core, Advanced or Advanced Plus: which one should you pick?
- Core if you're prospecting on your own, or each rep works separate accounts.
- Advanced if you're a team sharing target accounts, and warm intros through colleagues are realistic in your market.
- Advanced Plus if you're on Salesforce, HubSpot, Dynamics or Oracle and need LinkedIn's own two way sync, data validation and ROI reporting across a bigger team.
Sales Navigator search filters explained
Where do the 50+ filters actually live? In the lead search panel they're grouped into a handful of sections, and once you know the groups the panel stops feeling like a wall of checkboxes. Group names below are as they appear in lead search at the time of writing. LinkedIn moves things around now and then, so don't panic if one has shifted.
| Filter group | Filters inside | What you'd use it for |
|---|---|---|
| Company | Current company, company headcount, past company, company type, company headquarters location | Keeping leads inside companies that fit your ICP |
| Role | Function, current job title, seniority level, past job title, years in current company, years in current position | Finding the buyer, not just someone at the right company |
| Personal | Geography, industry, first and last name, profile language, years of experience, groups, school | Region, language and the odd shared school or group |
| Buyer intent | Following your company, viewed your profile recently, buyer intent signals (Advanced and up) | People already showing some interest in you |
| Best path in | Connection degree, connections of, TeamLink connections, past colleague, shared experiences | A warm route instead of a cold one |
| Recent updates | Changed jobs, posted on LinkedIn | Timing: who has a reason to talk this month |
| Workflow | Personas, account lists, lead lists, people in your CRM, people you've interacted with, saved leads and accounts | Including or excluding people you already work with |
Account search has its own set: industry, company headcount, headcount growth, department headcount, annual revenue, headquarters location, technologies used and job opportunities among them. Headcount growth and job opportunities are the two we'd look at first. A company that's hiring for the team you sell to usually has budget and a problem.
How to use LinkedIn Sales Navigator, step by step
This is the order we'd set it up in during the free month. It takes about two hours the first time, then a few minutes a day.
1. Set your sales preferences
On first login Sales Navigator asks for the geographies, industries, functions and company sizes you sell to. Tempted to skip it? Don't. Those answers drive lead recommendations and the accounts it suggests on the home page. You can change them later in Settings, and you should once your first searches show you what your market really looks like.
2. Start with an account search, not a lead search
Most people jump straight to searching for job titles. Why's that backwards? Because a great title at the wrong company is still the wrong lead. First decide which companies fit: industry, headcount, headquarters location, headcount growth. Run that as an account search, sanity check the first page of results, and save the companies you want into an account list. Fifty good accounts beat five hundred random ones.
3. Run a lead search inside those accounts
Now search for people, with the Account lists filter pointing at the list you just built. Add Function, Seniority level and Current job title. In the keyword box, Boolean saves a lot of noise, for example ("head of sales" OR "VP sales") NOT intern. Our LinkedIn Boolean search guide has the operators and the quirks LinkedIn doesn't document. Keep each search narrow. Sales Navigator only shows the first 2,500 results of any search, so a search with 40,000 matches hides most of them.
| Who you want | Keyword string to start from |
|---|---|
| Sales leaders | ("head of sales" OR "VP sales" OR "sales director") NOT (intern OR assistant) |
| Founders of small companies | (founder OR CEO OR owner) NOT (former OR advisor), plus company headcount 1 to 50 |
| Revenue operations | ("revenue operations" OR RevOps OR "sales operations") |
| Marketing heads | (CMO OR "head of marketing" OR "VP marketing") |
| People who name a tool on their profile | (Pipedrive OR HubSpot) AND (sales OR revenue) |
That last row is underrated. If you sell something that works with a particular tool, people who list it on their profile are using it right now.
4. Use spotlights to find a reason to write
Why would this person want to hear from you this week? Spotlights help answer that. They sit above the results. The useful ones: changed jobs in the past 90 days (new leaders buy things), posted on LinkedIn in the past 30 days (they read their feed and you have something to reply to), shares experiences with you (same school or past company), and following your company. A smaller list with a real reason to reach out beats a big list without one.
5. Save leads into lists that mean something
Make one lead list per campaign or play, not one giant list called "Prospects". Something like "New VP Sales, SaaS, 50 to 200 people, Q4". Add a one line note on each lead about why you saved them. Three weeks later you won't remember, and the note is what turns a cold message into a relevant one.
6. Save the search and let alerts do the work
Saved searches send you new people who start matching your filters, and every saved lead or account generates alerts: job changes, posts, company news. How often should you check them? Once a day, on the home page, is plenty. This is where Sales Navigator earns its price, because it tells you when to write, not just who to write to.
7. Read Account IQ and Lead IQ before you write
Before you reach out, open the lead and skim Lead IQ, then Account IQ for the company. They're AI summaries, so double check anything you plan to quote. They're still the fastest way to find one specific thing to mention, like a recent hire, a new market or a post the person wrote.
8. Reach out: connection request, InMail or a warm path
Which route should you take? You've got three. A connection request with a short note is free and works well for people who post. InMail reaches anyone, and each tier includes 50 credits a month. On Advanced, TeamLink shows whether a colleague can introduce you, which beats both. Whatever you send, keep it short and about them. The LinkedIn prospecting guide has message examples that get replies.
How InMail credits work, from LinkedIn's help page on Sales Navigator credits:
- 50 a month on every tier. You get the same 50 on Core, Advanced and Advanced Plus.
- Up to 150 banked. Unused credits move to the next month, but you've got 90 days to use each one.
- Replies refund the credit. You get it back if the person responds within 90 days. "Interested", "Maybe later" and even "Not interested" all count, and so does an auto reply.
- Silence costs you. No response, no refund. A second InMail to the same person before they reply takes another credit, and deleting an unanswered InMail doesn't give one back.
- Cancelling wipes them. If you cancel or switch subscription type, the banked credits don't move with you.
So what does that mean in practice? A targeted InMail that gets any answer at all is free. A blast to 50 strangers who ignore it burns your month.
9. Record what happened somewhere that lasts
Sales Navigator isn't a CRM. Notes and lists live inside your seat, there's no native export of saved leads, and on Core and Advanced nothing you find or send goes into your CRM. What happens when the seat ends? That history goes with it. Decide on day one where conversations and next steps get logged. We cover the options further down.
What to write: three messages built on spotlights
Spotlights give you the reason. Here's how that reason turns into a first message. Each one fits a connection note, which LinkedIn caps at 300 characters, and none of them pitch anything yet.
| Spotlight | Example first message | Why it works |
|---|---|---|
| Changed jobs in the past 90 days | "Congrats on the move to Northwind, Maya. First 90 days as head of sales usually means a fresh look at the stack. What's at the top of your list?" | New leaders review tools and processes. You're early, and the question's easy to answer. |
| Posted on LinkedIn in the past 30 days | "Your post on cutting the sales handoff from nine steps to three stuck with me. Did the reps push back, or was it the managers?" | It proves you read it, and it's a question they've already thought about. |
| Shares experiences with you | "Saw we both spent time at Acme. I was on the partner team in 2021. How are you finding the switch to a smaller company?" | Common ground does the warming up for you, so the ask can stay small. |
Names and companies above are made up. What isn't made up: the message is about them, it's short, and it ends with a question that doesn't need a meeting to answer. If they reply, that's the moment to move the conversation into your CRM so the follow up doesn't depend on your memory.
A 30 minute daily Sales Navigator routine
- Alerts, 10 minutes. You'll go through job changes and posts from your saved leads, reply to one or two posts with a real comment, and flag the job changes for outreach.
- Saved search matches, 5 minutes. What's new in your saved searches? Save the people who fit into the right list and skip the rest.
- Outreach, 10 minutes. You send three to five messages, each with one specific reason from spotlights, Lead IQ or a recent post.
- Follow ups, 5 minutes. Answer replies and note next steps in your CRM, so they don't sit in the Sales Navigator inbox.
That's it. Ten good messages a week, sent on a trigger, usually do more than a hundred generic ones. And they don't burn your InMail credits or your account's reputation.
How much does Sales Navigator cost?
In 2026 Core is $119.99 a month or $1,079.88 a year ($89.99 a month), Advanced is $159.99 a month or $1,799.88 a year ($149.99 a month), and Advanced Plus is quoted per team, from about $1,600 per seat a year in quotes customers have shared with us. Does that include tax? No. There's a one month free trial of Core or Advanced for members who aren't on a paid LinkedIn plan and haven't had a trial in the past 365 days, and LinkedIn emails a reminder seven days before it ends. Euro, pound, Canadian and Australian prices, and three worked team examples, are in our Sales Navigator pricing breakdown.
Sales Navigator limits you'll run into
| Limit | Number | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Results shown per search | 2,500 | 100 pages of 25. Split big searches by geography or headcount to see the rest. |
| Saved leads and accounts | 10,000 per user | Same on every tier, per LinkedIn's plan comparison. |
| People per lead list | about 1,000 | Reported by users and tool vendors, not published by LinkedIn. Start a new list when one fills up. |
| InMail credits | 50 a month, 150 banked | Same on every tier, per LinkedIn's help page. Refunded on any response within 90 days. |
| Connection requests | Weekly cap, not published | Requests go out from your normal profile, so LinkedIn's usual weekly invitation limit applies. Users commonly report somewhere around 100 to 200 a week. |
| Export of saved leads | None | No CSV export. Only Advanced Plus writes into a supported CRM. |
| Commercial use limit on search | Doesn't apply | That cap is for free accounts. Sales Navigator searches aren't counted against it. |
Why does the weekly invitation number vary so much between people? LinkedIn doesn't say. Accounts with an established network and a healthy acceptance rate tend to report more headroom, which is one reason the Social Selling Index gets so much attention.
Is Sales Navigator worth it, and who is it for?
- Worth it if you're a founder, AE or SDR and finding new accounts is part of your week, especially where buyers are active on LinkedIn.
- Worth it on Advanced if you're four or five people or more working the same accounts. That's where TeamLink and one bill start paying off.
- Not worth it if you mostly message people you already know, or you sell to a few hundred accounts you could list in a spreadsheet. Premium or free LinkedIn will do.
- Not worth upgrading to Advanced Plus only for CRM sync. It's the priciest way to get LinkedIn data into a CRM, and it doesn't cover Pipedrive at all. See the CRM sync section of the pricing guide.
Not sure? Use the free month properly. Build two account lists, three lead lists and two saved searches in the first week, then count the conversations you started by week four. That number answers the question better than any review.
Common Sales Navigator mistakes
- Searches that are too broad. Past 2,500 results you won't see most of them, so keep adding filters until it's a list you'd actually read.
- Saving everyone. Would you read alerts on 3,000 leads? Nobody does. Save fewer and note why.
- Ignoring alerts. They're the feature you're paying for. If you never open them, Premium would have been enough.
- InMail blasts. Generic InMails get ignored, and you don't get those credits back. Fewer, specific messages keep the credits coming back.
- Treating Sales Navigator as the CRM. No native export of saved leads, and history disappears with the seat. If you're leaving, how to export LinkedIn contacts and the Sales Navigator alternatives guide list what you can still take with you.
How Ln2CRM makes Sales Navigator work harder
Sales Navigator tells you who to talk to. But who keeps the record? Not Sales Navigator. On Core and Advanced nothing you find, save or send reaches your CRM, and Pipedrive and Zoho have no full native connection on any tier. Ln2CRM is a Chrome extension that works on regular LinkedIn and inside Sales Navigator, and closes that gap for Pipedrive, HubSpot, Zoho, Salesforce and Capsule.
| Where you are in Sales Navigator | What Ln2CRM adds |
|---|---|
| Lead search results and lead lists | A badge on every row: a green check if the person is already in your CRM, a yellow question mark if the name matches but the company doesn't, a red cross if they're new. You stop prospecting existing customers and a colleague's open deal. |
| Adding a new lead from a row | The create form opens prefilled with name, company, title, location and the Sales Navigator link, so the record lands in the CRM in one click. |
| A full lead page | Save the person, their company and a deal at once, without copying a single field. |
| The Sales Navigator inbox, InMail included | Sync the thread into a note on the CRM record with timestamps. Sync again later and the new messages are added. |
| Writing the follow up | AI drafts that read the conversation, the notes and emails already on the CRM record, and your own company profile. You edit and send. Ln2CRM never sends anything on your behalf. |
So you keep Core for search and alerts, and you don't need Advanced Plus to get LinkedIn into your CRM. Ln2CRM has a free plan. Base is $13 per user a month billed yearly ($16 monthly) and Pro is $18 billed yearly ($23 monthly), see Ln2CRM pricing. Setup guides per CRM: Pipedrive, HubSpot, Zoho and Salesforce. For how conversation logging works across all four, see how to sync LinkedIn messages to your CRM.