DeleteMe vs Incogni vs Optery: Broker Coverage Gap [2026]

A ranked match goes sideways, someone loses, and twenty minutes later a pizza truck and a SWAT team show up at the winner’s house. It sounds like an extreme edge case, but doxxing and swatting inside gaming and streaming communities have become common enough that data-removal services now market directly to that audience. Three names dominate that market in September 2026: DeleteMe, Incogni, and Optery. All three promise to scrub your home address, phone number, and relatives’ names off the people-search sites that make swatting possible in the first place, but they do it in different ways, at different prices, and with wildly different coverage claims.

This comparison breaks down what each service actually removes, what it costs after the introductory pricing wears off, how fast it works according to independent reviewers, and which one makes sense depending on whether you’re a casual player, a full-time streamer, or someone managing a family of gamers who share a home address. We pulled current 2026 pricing and coverage figures from CNET, ZDNet, Wirecutter, PCMag, and each vendor’s own published data, and we flag every number that comes from a vendor’s self-reported test rather than an independent one.

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Why Data Removal Matters for Gamers and Streamers in 2026

Competitive gaming and live streaming both come with a specific privacy problem that most internet users never have to think about: your real identity is broadcast, in real time, to thousands of strangers who can pause the video, screenshot a delivery label, or cross-reference a voice clip against a public records site. A Discord handle or gamertag by itself isn’t dangerous. The danger starts once that handle gets linked to a real name, and that link usually comes from a data broker or people-search site, not from anything the player posted directly.

Sites like Whitepages, Spokeo, BeenVerified, and dozens of smaller people-search operations scrape voter files, property records, and court filings, then package that data into a single profile that anyone can buy for a few dollars. Once a rival player, a toxic teammate, or a stalker has your legal name from a leaked Discord server or a poorly secured gaming account, a people-search site can hand over your street address in minutes. That is the exact chain of events that turns online harassment into a physical safety risk, and it’s the gap that DeleteMe, Incogni, and Optery are built to close.

None of the three services can promise that swatting or doxxing will never happen. What they can do is shrink the number of places an attacker can pull your address from without your involvement, and keep re-submitting removal requests as brokers republish scraped data, which they routinely do every few months.

DeleteMe, Incogni, and Optery at a Glance

DeleteMe is the oldest and most established of the three, built around a hybrid model that combines automated opt-outs with human-reviewed custom removals for sites that don’t support standard requests. Incogni, part of the same corporate family as Surfshark, leans almost entirely automated, targeting a smaller but tightly maintained list of brokers with less manual overhead. Optery sits in between on approach but splits itself into three tiers, where the cheapest plan mostly shows you where your data lives and the top tier actually removes it from the widest set of sites.

All three send an initial exposure report shortly after signup, then run recurring scans (monthly to quarterly, depending on plan) because brokers frequently re-scrape public records and republish listings that were already removed. That recurring cycle is the entire value proposition: a one-time opt-out from a single broker gets undone within months if nobody follows up.

Full Specs Comparison: DeleteMe vs Incogni vs Optery

Category	DeleteMe	Incogni	Optery
Cheapest individual plan	$129/year (no monthly option)	$15.98/month or $95.88/year (Standard)	$3.99/month or $39/year (Core)
Top individual plan	$129/year (single tier)	$29.98/month or $179.88/year (Unlimited)	$249/year (Ultimate)
Advertised broker coverage	More than 750 data brokers (per DeleteMe’s own pages)	420+ brokers on every plan	~365-380 (Core) to ~640 (Ultimate), tier-dependent
Removal model	Hybrid: automated opt-outs plus human-handled custom removals	Fully automated broker requests	Tiered: exposure reports on lower plans, automated plus custom removal on higher plans
Family plan	$229/year for 2 people, $329/year for 4	$31.98/month for up to 5 (Family), $45.98/month for 5 (Family Unlimited)	Per-account discounts: 20% off 2 accounts, 25% off 3, 30% off 4+
Monthly billing available	No	Yes, on all plans	Yes, on the Core plan only
Initial exposure report	Yes	Yes	Yes, free scan before purchase
Custom/manual removal support	Yes, for the 560+ sites CNET says don’t support automated opt-out	Unlimited tiers only; Standard is automated-only	Yes, on Extended and Ultimate tiers
Parent company / ownership	Abine, Inc.	Incogni Inc.	Surfshark
Independent reviews citing it	CNET, Wirecutter, ZDNet	CNET, ZDNet, PCMag	CNET, PCMag, Wirecutter
Best documented use case	Proactive, broad protection with human follow-up	Bulk automated removals at lower cost	Users who want to see exactly where they’re exposed first
Refund/trial structure	Money-back guarantee window (verify current term at signup)	Free scan, paid subscription to act on results	Free exposure report before paying for removal

The coverage numbers in that table are not apples-to-apples, and treating them that way is the single biggest mistake in most comparison content on this topic. DeleteMe’s headline number (more than 750 data brokers on its own official pages, and 850+ in Incogni’s October 2026 comparison) includes hundreds of custom-removal targets that require manual handling rather than a standard automated opt-out; CNET’s 2026 review specifically notes that at least 560 of those entries fall into that custom category. Incogni’s 420+ figure is a single automated list applied uniformly across plans, with the Unlimited tiers adding custom removals on top. Optery’s numbers move depending on tier: PCMag’s tier breakdown describes different counts depending on whether “monitored,” “automated,” or “custom-eligible” sites are being tallied, so a Core subscriber does not get the same coverage as an Ultimate subscriber despite both technically running “Optery.”

2026 Pricing Breakdown

Plan	Monthly	Annual	Covers
DeleteMe Individual	Not offered	$129/year	1 person
DeleteMe Couple	Not offered	$229/year	2 people
DeleteMe Family	Not offered	$329/year	4 people
Incogni Standard	$15.98/month	$95.88/year	1 person
Incogni Unlimited	$29.98/month	$179.88/year	1 person, broader removal scope
Incogni Family	$31.98/month	$191.88/year	Up to 5 people
Incogni Family Unlimited	$45.98/month	$275.88/year	Up to 5 people, broader scope
Optery Core	$3.99/month	$39/year	1 person, exposure reports plus limited automated removal
Optery Extended	Not offered monthly	$149/year	1 person, wider automated coverage
Optery Ultimate	Not offered monthly	$249/year	1 person, broadest automated plus custom removal

Incogni’s advertised pricing has shown promotional first-year rates on the company’s own site that differ from the standard renewal price, so the numbers above reflect the standard rate rather than a limited-time discount. Its homepage was promoting 55% off annual plans for Cybersecurity Awareness Month, with the Standard plan billed at $86.29 for the first year and then $95.88 annually. Anyone subscribing directly from Incogni’s pricing page should double-check whether the listed price is an introductory offer before comparing it to DeleteMe or Optery on a per-year basis.

On pure sticker price, Optery Core at $39/year is the cheapest way into any of these three ecosystems, but that plan trades price for scope: it functions closer to a monitoring and reporting tool than a full removal service until you upgrade. For a gamer who just wants full automated removal, Incogni Standard at $95.88/year is a low-cost option, though it covers 420+ broker sites while DeleteMe’s official pages cite more than 750 data brokers (some of which, per DeleteMe’s coverage list, require manual handling anyway).

How Each Service Actually Removes Your Data

DeleteMe’s hybrid approach

DeleteMe starts with a privacy report that maps out where your information currently appears, then submits opt-out requests to that list of brokers. Where a broker’s opt-out process is fully automatable, DeleteMe’s system handles it without a person in the loop. Where it isn’t (some people-search sites require a mailed form, a phone call, or manual identity verification), a human analyst processes the request instead. CNET’s 2026 review of the service frames this hybrid model as the reason DeleteMe scores well on thoroughness, at the cost of speed and higher pricing than a pure-automation competitor. DeleteMe is operated by Abine, Inc., and alongside that core service it announced an acquisition of Permission Slip, the privacy app previously associated with Consumer Reports, on July 30, 2026, according to current reporting.

Incogni’s automation-first model

Incogni’s Standard plan skips the manual-removal category almost entirely and focuses on a maintained list of 420-plus brokers where the opt-out process can be automated end to end. That narrower scope is a deliberate tradeoff: fewer total sites covered, but faster and cheaper because there’s no human labor cost baked into the subscription price. The Unlimited tiers change that picture somewhat, since they were reported to add 3,000+ additional sites, unlimited custom removal requests, and live phone support. For a gamer whose exposure is concentrated in the handful of mainstream people-search sites (the ones most likely to show up first in a Google search of your name), Incogni’s automated-only model may already catch the highest-risk listings without needing DeleteMe’s manual-removal tier.

Optery’s tiered visibility model

Optery is structured differently from the other two. Its Core plan is closer to a transparency tool: it shows you exactly which sites currently list your name, address, phone number, and relatives, and automates removal from a limited subset of them. Stepping up to Extended or Ultimate unlocks automated removal across a wider set of sites plus custom/manual handling for the ones that resist automation, mirroring DeleteMe’s approach but gated behind Optery’s most expensive tier. PCMag’s coverage of Optery describes the lower tiers as leaving some removals for the subscriber to trigger manually, which matters if you’re the type of user who wants a hands-off subscription rather than a dashboard you have to actively manage.

Broker Coverage: Who Actually Scrubs the Most Sites

Optery has published a self-reported removal-rate test claiming its Ultimate tier removed 52% of exposed profiles within one week, 58% within one month, and 68% within four months. That figure is worth including because it’s one of the only quantified speed benchmarks any of the three vendors has published, but it’s vendor-generated rather than independently verified, and none of CNET, ZDNet, PCMag, or Wirecutter has run a matching head-to-head speed test across all three services using the same methodology. Treat it as a data point from Optery about Optery, not a neutral ranking.

What independent reviewers have measured more consistently is breadth versus depth. DeleteMe’s headline number (more than 750 data brokers on its own pages) looks dominant until you account for the 560-plus sites CNET flags as custom-removal targets rather than automated ones. Incogni’s flat 420-plus automated list applies the same way across every subscriber regardless of plan, with only the Unlimited tiers adding custom removals, which makes it the most predictable of the three but also the shallowest ceiling. Optery’s numbers move depending on tier: PCMag’s tier breakdown lists roughly 365, 545, and 640 sites across Core, Extended, and Ultimate respectively in one comparison, though other Optery materials describe the tiers differently depending on whether “monitored,” “automated,” or “custom-eligible” sites are being counted.

The practical takeaway for a gamer comparing these three: ask which specific sites each service covers, not just the headline number. A people-search site that ranks on the first page of a Google search of your name matters more than a service’s total broker count if that specific site isn’t on the list.

It’s also worth being upfront about a gap in the public data: there is no single, reliable, nationally standardized count of swatting incidents in the US for 2025 or 2026. The FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center tracks internet-enabled fraud categories like business email compromise and ransomware, but swatting reports get filed under a mix of hoax-threat, harassment, and local-jurisdiction categories rather than one consistent national statistic. Any article that cites a precise “X swatting incidents per year” figure without naming a specific agency and methodology behind it should be treated skeptically. What’s well documented instead is the mechanism: once a real name and address are public, the barrier to a false emergency report drops to nearly zero, which is the actual problem these three services are trying to address upstream.

How the Three Services Describe Their Own Coverage

Each vendor’s own pages describe coverage in different terms, which is why headline counts rarely line up. Incogni’s official pages describe automated removals from 420+ data-broker sites, recurring removals, and removal of multiple emails, addresses, and phone numbers. DeleteMe is described on its official pages as a premium privacy service operated by Abine, Inc. that removes information from more than 750 data brokers, while Incogni reported DeleteMe’s coverage at 850+ brokers in October 2026. Official Optery pages advertise coverage of 940+ sites, combining automated and custom removals, plus a 30-day money-back guarantee.

The tier-level figures shift too. Another comparison reported Optery’s Extended plan at 560+ sites and its Ultimate plan at 635+ sites, showing that coverage figures vary by source or calculation date. Incogni’s Unlimited plan was reported to add 3,000+ additional sites, unlimited custom removal requests, and live phone support. In practice, a count of listed sites says little until you know whether those sites are handled by automated opt-outs, custom removals, or both. Before paying, ask each vendor for its dated site list, and check that the people-search sites that appear first when you search your own name are actually on it.

California’s Free DROP System: Do You Even Need a Paid Service?

Before comparing DeleteMe, Incogni, and Optery on price, it’s worth knowing that California residents already have a free government-run alternative. The state’s Delete Request and Opt-Out Platform, known as DROP, launched for consumers on January 1, 2026, under the Delete Act (SB 362), and is administered by the California Privacy Protection Agency’s data broker registry. It lets a California resident file a single deletion request that’s meant to reach every data broker registered with the California Privacy Protection Agency at once, instead of contacting each broker individually.

Registered data brokers became legally required to check DROP at least once every 45 days starting August 1, 2026, and to process any matching deletion requests they find. The California Privacy Protection Agency reported in August 2026 that roughly 500,000 Californians had signed up for DROP, with 654 data brokers registered in the system, and that about 25% of those brokers had reported processing at least one deletion request by that point. Brokers that fail to comply can face civil penalties of up to $200 per request per day.

DROP is a genuinely useful free option, but it comes with real limits compared to a paid service. It only covers brokers registered under California’s Delete Act, not the full universe of people-search sites, and enforcement is still ramping up less than two months after the mandatory-processing deadline took effect. There’s also no verified evidence that DeleteMe, Incogni, or Optery has built a direct technical integration with DROP’s infrastructure; each operates its own independent removal workflow rather than plugging into the state’s system. For a California-based gamer on a tight budget, filing a DROP request alongside a free Optery exposure report is a reasonable zero-cost starting point before paying for any subscription. For anyone outside California, or anyone who wants ongoing monitoring rather than a one-time request, DROP doesn’t replace what a paid service does.

Other State Data Broker Laws You Should Know About

California isn’t the only state regulating data brokers, though it’s the only one running a centralized deletion portal like DROP. Vermont, Oregon, and Texas all require data brokers to register with a state agency, which is a separate mechanism from a service like DeleteMe or Incogni actually removing your listing.

State	Law / regulator	Registration fee	What it actually does for you
Vermont	9 V.S.A. § 2446, Vermont Secretary of State	Reported ~$100	Requires brokers to register annually; doesn’t process individual deletion requests for you
Oregon	ORS 646A.593 (HB 2052), Oregon Division of Financial Regulation	Reported ~$600	Requires broker registration and renewal; no centralized deletion tool
Texas	Texas Business & Commerce Code Ch. 510 (SB 2105), Texas Secretary of State	Reported ~$300 plus processing charges	Requires broker registration before doing business in the state; no centralized deletion tool
California	SB 362 Delete Act, CalPrivacy	Reported ~$6,000 for brokers	Registration plus the free consumer-facing DROP deletion portal

The practical difference matters: a registration requirement forces a broker to identify itself to a state regulator, which creates accountability and a paper trail, but it doesn’t automatically remove your listing the way DROP or a paid removal service does. If you live in Vermont, Oregon, or Texas rather than California, none of these state laws gives you a free, centralized way to request removal, which makes a paid service like DeleteMe, Incogni, or Optery comparatively more valuable in those states than it currently is in California.

Data Removal vs. Identity Theft Protection: Different Products

It’s easy to lump DeleteMe, Incogni, and Optery in with identity-theft protection brands like Aura, LifeLock, or Identity Guard, but they solve different problems. Identity-theft protection services primarily monitor for fraud after the fact, watching credit reports, bank accounts, and the dark web for signs your information is already being misused, and they typically bundle in insurance to cover recovery costs. Data-removal services work upstream of that: they try to reduce how much of your personal information is sitting on public people-search sites in the first place, which is the specific exposure that enables doxxing and swatting rather than credit-card fraud.

For a gamer or streamer whose main concern is a stalker or harasser finding a home address, a data-removal service targets the actual risk more directly than an identity-theft monitoring product. For anyone also worried about financial fraud tied to a leaked gaming-platform payment method, pairing a removal service with a dark web monitoring setup covers more ground than either alone. They’re complementary tools, not competing categories, and treating a DeleteMe subscription as a replacement for credit monitoring (or vice versa) misunderstands what each is actually built to do.

Independent Reviews and Benchmark Data

CNET’s 2026 head-to-head between DeleteMe and Incogni frames DeleteMe as the more feature-rich of the pair, while describing Incogni as the more transparent option about what it does and doesn’t cover, and rates DeleteMe as slightly more usable day to day. ZDNet’s comparison of the same two services takes a similar split-decision approach, recommending Incogni for subscribers who want lower-cost bulk removal and DeleteMe for subscribers who want more proactive, ongoing protection with human backup on the hard cases.

Wirecutter’s 2026 data-removal roundup and Security.org’s own DeleteMe vs. Incogni breakdown list DeleteMe’s $129/year individual price alongside its $229 and $329 family tiers, and separately list Optery’s Ultimate tier at $249/year as the top of that service’s range. CNET’s standalone Optery review, along with Cloudwards’ independent Incogni vs. DeleteMe testing, describes Optery as effective but comparatively expensive at the top tier, which tracks with the pricing table above once you’re paying for Ultimate rather than Core. None of these outlets has published a single definitive ranking across all three services, because they’re measuring different things: price, usability, raw coverage, and observed removal speed don’t always point to the same winner.

DIY Data Exposure Audit: Free Steps Before You Pay

Before paying for any of these three, it’s worth running a free audit to see how exposed you actually are. Search your full legal name plus your city in an incognito browser window and note which people-search sites show up on the first two pages. Check whether your gaming handle and legal name have ever appeared together in a leaked database, which you can do for free through Have I Been Pwned’s public lookup.

Developers and technically inclined streamers can also script a basic check against the Have I Been Pwned API to see which breaches include an email address tied to a gaming account, which is often how a real name first gets linked to a handle in the first place:

curl -s "https://haveibeenpwned.com/api/v3/breachedaccount/YOUR_EMAIL_HERE" \
  -H "hibp-api-key: YOUR_API_KEY" \
  -H "user-agent: personal-privacy-audit"

A clean result doesn’t mean you’re not exposed elsewhere, but a list of breaches tied to your gaming email is a strong signal of where an attacker could start building a profile of your real identity. Combine that with a manual search of the biggest people-search sites (Whitepages, Spokeo, BeenVerified, MyLife) before deciding whether a paid service is worth it, or whether a handful of free opt-out requests will cover your actual exposure.

5 Real-World Scenarios for Gamers and Streamers

These are composite scenarios based on documented patterns in the streaming and competitive gaming community, not claims about specific named individuals.

• The full-time variety streamer who ships merchandise from a home address and has had a P.O. box exposed anyway through a delivery-tracking leak. A hybrid service like DeleteMe, which pairs automated opt-outs with manual follow-up on stubborn people-search listings, matches this level of exposure better than an automation-only tool.
• The competitive esports player whose real name became public after a tournament bracket or prize-payout list linked their gamertag to a legal name. Because the damage is concentrated on a handful of major people-search sites rather than obscure regional brokers, an automated service like Incogni can often resolve the highest-risk listings quickly and cheaply.
• The parent managing a household of young gamers who share one home address and want a single family plan rather than paying per person. Incogni’s Family Unlimited plan at $45.98/month for up to five people, or DeleteMe’s $329/year four-person plan, both scale better here than Optery’s per-account discount structure.
• The privacy-conscious hobbyist who mainly wants to know where their data currently lives before committing to a subscription. Optery’s free exposure report and low-cost Core plan fit this “look before you pay for full removal” use case better than DeleteMe or Incogni, neither of which offers an equivalent low-commitment entry point.
• The creator who relocated after a harassment campaign and needs both their old and new addresses scrubbed before brokers re-scrape updated property or voter records. This is the scenario where the recurring-scan cycle matters most, since a one-time removal doesn’t account for new public records generated by a move, a lease signing, or a change of registered voter address.

Migration Guide: Switching Between DeleteMe, Incogni, and Optery

Switching services isn’t as simple as canceling one and signing up for another, because each service tracks its own removal history and doesn’t share that data with a competitor. Follow this sequence to avoid paying twice for the same removals or losing track of what’s already been scrubbed.

1. Log into your current service’s dashboard and export or screenshot the full list of brokers it has already processed, including which ones show as “removed” versus “pending.”
2. Run a fresh manual search of your name and address before canceling, so you have a baseline of what’s currently public regardless of what your dashboard claims.
3. Sign up for the new service and complete its intake form with the same personal details (full legal name, past addresses, phone numbers, relatives) used on the old service, since incomplete intake data is the most common cause of missed removals.
4. Wait for the new service’s first exposure report before canceling the old subscription. This overlap period, typically a few days to a few weeks, confirms the new service actually found and is processing the same listings.
5. Cross-reference the new service’s initial scan against your exported list from step one. Flag any broker that appeared in your old service’s coverage but not the new one, since that’s a gap you may need to handle manually.
6. Cancel the old subscription only after the overlap check in step five is complete, not before, to avoid a coverage gap during the transition.
7. Set a recurring reminder (quarterly is reasonable) to re-run a manual name search regardless of which service you land on, since automated dashboards can lag behind what’s actually visible in a live search.

Pros and Cons of Each Service

DeleteMe

Pros: Hybrid automated-plus-manual model catches sites that resist standard opt-outs; widest headline coverage; established track record with mainstream reviewers. Cons: No monthly billing option; highest entry price of the three on a per-person basis; the headline figure of more than 750 data brokers overstates fully automated coverage, since some of those sites require custom handling.

Incogni

Pros: Lowest-cost path to full automated removal; flat, predictable coverage across every plan; monthly billing available on all tiers. Cons: Custom removals for sites that resist automation are limited to the Unlimited tiers; smaller total broker list than DeleteMe or Optery’s top tier; promotional pricing can obscure the standard renewal rate.

Optery

Pros: Cheapest entry point at $39/year; free exposure report before paying for full removal; per-account family discounts scale for larger households. Cons: Full automated-plus-custom coverage is locked behind the $249/year Ultimate tier; coverage numbers vary confusingly by page and definition; lower tiers require more subscriber involvement than a fully hands-off service.

Which Service Fits Which Type of Gamer

• Casual players who just want peace of mind: Incogni Standard at $95.88/year covers the mainstream people-search sites most likely to expose a real name without the added cost of DeleteMe’s manual-removal tier.
• Full-time streamers with public shipping addresses: DeleteMe’s hybrid model, despite the higher $129/year price, is built for exactly this kind of stubborn, hard-to-automate exposure.
• Families running multiple gaming accounts from one address: Incogni’s Family Unlimited plan or DeleteMe’s four-person plan both beat Optery’s per-account pricing once you’re covering three or more people.
• Budget-conscious hobbyists who want to see the problem before paying to fix it: Optery’s free report and $39/year Core plan offer the lowest-commitment way to gauge actual exposure.
• Esports professionals and organization staff with sponsor-linked real names: Optery Ultimate or DeleteMe both justify the higher cost given the higher-profile target these users represent.
• Anyone who has already been doxxed once: Pair any of the three services with the free Have I Been Pwned audit above and the migration checklist, since a single removal pass rarely catches everything on the first try.

Common Mistakes Gamers and Streamers Make When Trying to Stay Anonymous

Subscribing to DeleteMe, Incogni, or Optery is only part of staying anonymous online, and a lot of gamers undercut their own privacy in ways none of these services can fix.

• Reusing an email address across gaming platforms and real-world accounts. If the same email is tied to a Steam profile, a food-delivery account, and a data broker record, removing that broker listing doesn’t break the underlying link an attacker could rebuild through a breach dump.
• Signing up for a removal service after a doxxing attempt instead of before. All three services work proactively and on a recurring schedule; they’re far less effective at damage control once a specific address has already circulated in a Discord server or forum thread, because at that point the information exists outside any broker’s control.
• Ignoring the intake accuracy problem. DeleteMe, Incogni, and Optery all rely on the legal name, past addresses, and relatives you provide during signup to search for matching broker listings. An incomplete intake form (a maiden name left out, an old address forgotten) means the service simply can’t find listings tied to that missing data point. Storing that intake data in a password manager rather than a plain text file is worth the extra step, since it’s exactly the kind of profile an attacker would want to find.
• Assuming a single removal pass is permanent. Brokers routinely re-scrape voter files, property records, and marketing data lists, which is why every one of these services runs recurring scans rather than a one-time cleanup. Canceling a subscription after the first clean report typically means your listings reappear within months.
• Forgetting that livestream metadata leaks independently of any broker. IP addresses embedded in old game-server logs, EXIF data on photos posted to social platforms, and voice patterns matched against public interviews can all reveal identity without touching a single people-search site. Data removal reduces one attack vector; it doesn’t replace basic operational security like blocking IP pullers and DDoS booters during competitive play or stripping metadata before posting images.

The Verdict: Our Pick for 2026

There is no single winner across price, coverage, and speed simultaneously, and any comparison claiming otherwise is oversimplifying three genuinely different products. Based on the 2026 pricing and coverage data above: Incogni wins on value for straightforward automated removal at $95.88/year with 420-plus broker coverage on every plan. DeleteMe wins on thoroughness for users with stubborn, hard-to-automate exposure, justifying its $129/year price with human-handled custom removals that neither competitor offers at that price point. Optery wins on flexibility and transparency, letting cost-conscious users start at $39/year with a free exposure report before committing to the $249/year Ultimate tier that matches DeleteMe and Incogni’s top-tier coverage.

For most gamers and streamers whose primary concern is doxxing and swatting risk rather than general identity-theft monitoring, and who are tracking the broader 2026 cybersecurity threat landscape, Incogni’s combination of price and automated breadth makes it the reasonable default. Streamers who ship physical merchandise or have already dealt with a leaked address should weigh DeleteMe’s manual-removal capability as worth the extra roughly $33 a year. Anyone unsure how exposed they even are should start with Optery’s free report before paying for any tier of any service.

Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better for gamers worried about swatting: DeleteMe, Incogni, or Optery?

None of the three can guarantee protection from swatting, since it depends on information already public through leaks, social posts, or previous data exposure, not just current broker listings. Incogni offers the most affordable broad automated coverage, while DeleteMe’s manual-removal capability helps with harder-to-scrub sites that a purely automated service can’t reach.

How much does DeleteMe cost in 2026?

DeleteMe’s individual plan is $129/year, with no monthly billing option. Family pricing runs $229/year for two people and $329/year for four people.

Does Incogni offer a free trial?

Incogni provides an initial scan to show where your data is exposed, but acting on those results requires a paid subscription starting at $15.98/month or $95.88/year for the Standard plan.

Can Optery guarantee my address is removed from every site?

No. Optery’s own vendor-reported test claims 68% of profiles were removed within four months on its Ultimate tier, and even that figure covers a subset of sites rather than the entire internet. Public records, court filings, and sites outside its supported list can still surface your information.

How long does data broker removal actually take?

Timelines vary by broker and by service. Optery’s self-reported data shows 52% of profiles removed within one week and 58% within one month on its top tier, but neither DeleteMe nor Incogni has published a matching independent timeline, and CNET, ZDNet, and PCMag reviews describe the process as ongoing rather than a one-time fix.

Can I use more than one data removal service at the same time?

Yes, though it means paying for overlapping coverage. Some privacy-focused users run Optery’s low-cost Core plan for ongoing monitoring alongside DeleteMe or Incogni for active removal, but for most gamers a single service with broad coverage is more cost-effective than paying for two subscriptions.

Do these services stop swatting completely?

No. They reduce how easily an attacker can pull your address or phone number from commercial data-broker sites, but they can’t remove information already shared in leaked databases, social media posts, gaming profile metadata, or someone else’s contact list. Data removal is one layer of protection, not a complete solution.

Is there a free alternative to DeleteMe, Incogni, and Optery?

You can manually search and opt out of individual broker sites yourself at no cost, which is what these services automate. California residents also have the free DROP portal, which reached 654 registered data brokers as of August 2026. It’s time-consuming since brokers frequently re-list scraped data, but running the free Have I Been Pwned check, a DROP request if you qualify, and Optery’s free exposure report first can tell you whether paying for a full subscription is worth it for your specific exposure level.

What is California’s DROP system, and does it replace these services?

DROP (Delete Request and Opt-Out Platform) is a free, state-run deletion portal that launched for California consumers on January 1, 2026, under the Delete Act. It lets you file one request that registered data brokers are required to check for and act on at least every 45 days. It doesn’t fully replace DeleteMe, Incogni, or Optery because it only covers brokers registered under California law, it’s only available to California residents, and there’s no confirmed technical integration between DROP and any of the three paid services.