The Options Side by Side
Fit and price, not a performance ranking.Seven tools cover congressional trading seriously, and they split into research tools and copy-trading apps. Coverage and pricing were checked in August 2026; prices change often, so treat the paid column as a starting point and confirm on each site before subscribing.
Best Congress Stock Trackers Compared (2026): coverage, price and best use for each tool| Tool | What it covers | Free tier | Paid from | Best for |
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| Capitol Trades | Congress only, around 200 filers | Full access, no signup | Free | Free browsing with deep filters |
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| Quiver Quantitative | Congress, insiders, 13F, contracts, lobbying | Limited | About $25 a month, billed yearly | The widest alternative-data spread |
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| Unusual Whales | Options flow, dark pool, congress | Flow: 2 trading days; news: 15 minutes; alerts: 30 minutes | $50 a month or $504 a year (checked September 2026) | Options traders who also want congress data |
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| AlphaYou | Congress, insider Form 4, 13F, contracts, influencers | Free forever | $29 a month or $199 a year | One alert feed across every filing type |
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| Barebone.ai | Insiders, congress, 13F through AI chat | Free to start | Not published | Mobile-first question and answer |
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| Autopilot | Copies congress and investor portfolios | One portfolio | $29 a quarter or $100 a year | Mirroring a portfolio automatically |
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| Dub | Copies congress and creator portfolios | None | $9.99 a month or $89.99 a year | Copy trading with a broker built in |
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The detail
Trackers vs. Copy-Trading Apps
This is the fork that matters most, and it decides everything else. Capitol Trades, Quiver, Unusual Whales, Barebone.ai and AlphaYou are research tools: they show you the filing and you decide what to do. Autopilot and Dub are brokerage products that mirror a chosen portfolio into your own account automatically, which means an account minimum, a management relationship, and far less control over individual positions. Autopilot asks for a $500 minimum per portfolio; Dub lets you start at $100. Neither is a bad product, but if you wanted to read filings and were sold an automated account, that is a mismatch worth catching early.
Compare Trade Dates With Filing Dates
Public-filing trackers depend on the underlying disclosure. Covered congressional transactions generally use the earlier of 30 days after awareness or 45 days after the transaction. That is a reporting deadline, not a fixed delay: a filer can report sooner, and some records are filed later. Compare the transaction and filing dates, then separately assess delivery after publication.
What a Free Tier Actually Gets You
Capitol Trades is the real outlier here: free, no account required, and built by 2iQ Research on top of an established insider-filing database. If congress trades are all you want, it is hard to justify paying anyone. The paid tools are selling one of two things: breadth, meaning insider and fund filings in the same place, or delivery, meaning an alert that reaches you rather than a dashboard you have to remember to open. Check which of those you are actually buying, because a free tier that delays everything by a day is a preview, not access.
Where AlphaYou Fits
AlphaYou bundles congressional filings with insider Form 4s, 13F fund disclosures, government contract awards and tracked influencer calls in one alert feed, on the logic that these signals read better together than alone. A congress purchase next to an insider buy in the same sector tells a fuller story than either does by itself. The free plan stays free rather than expiring into a trial. Where it is a weaker fit: there is no options flow, and its stock research does not place brokerage share orders. AlphaYou does offer user-directed copy trading, but only for Hyperliquid traders, so if you want US stock portfolios copied into your broker, Autopilot or Dub is the honest answer.
A Measured Example of the Disclosure Gap
Our study of House filings submitted July 1 through September 30, 2026 found a median trade-to-filing gap of 23 days across 888 stock and option purchase/sale rows marked New in 72 filings. The calculation date is October 1, 2026. Amendments are separated, and 19 of 135 source PDFs remain unmeasured.
This measures the gap between the reported transaction and filing dates. It does not measure a tracker's alert speed, the exact time a filing first became public, or all congressional trading. The study, downloadable rows and coverage manifest are linked below so you can check the calculation.
