Lighthouse vs Affinity CRM
A fair comparison of Lighthouse and Affinity CRM for venture funds and angel networks. Everything we say about Affinity is taken from its own public website.
Alberto Marzetta
Bottom line
Lighthouse is a CRM built only for venture. It finds early-stage companies before they raise and keeps relationship intelligence, sourcing, deal flow, outreach and LP reporting in one product. If your fund needs something it doesn't do yet, the founding team will usually build it within a day, and a move from Affinity takes hours. Affinity is a well-established CRM used across private capital, and a sensible choice for firms that run PE, credit or banking teams alongside venture.
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Lighthouse vs Affinity, side by side
16 criteria in seven groups.
Who each platform is built for
| Criterion | Lighthouse | Affinity |
|---|---|---|
| Built for | Venture, end to end: VC funds, angel syndicates, CVCs and family offices | Private capital broadly: PE, VC, private credit, investment banking, asset managers |
Pricing: Lighthouse vs Affinity
| Criterion | Lighthouse | Affinity |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing model | CRM €75 per seat/month and Sourcing €300/month fund-wide (1 seat incl.), billed monthly, cancel anytime. Annual billing saves 10% (€67.50 and €270). 7-day free trial, no credit card. LP platform on request | $2,000 / $2,300 / $2,700 per user/year (Essential, Scale, Advanced), billed annually. Enterprise custom. Sales-led |
Early-stage sourcing and data
| Criterion | Lighthouse | Affinity |
|---|---|---|
| Early-stage sourcing | Signals before a round: stealth companies, new registrations, new domains, GitHub activity, accelerator batches, hiring and growth. Company and people enrichment from a database of startups, founders and investors. Thesis-fit scoring, refreshed daily | Organisation and people enrichment on all tiers; headcount and leadership signals and thesis-matched Industry Insights from Advanced |
| Third-party data | Tracks 100+ data sources; own early-stage sourcing data included | Dealroom and Crunchbase enrichment from the Advanced tier |
Deal flow: inbound, outreach and relationships
| Criterion | Lighthouse | Affinity |
|---|---|---|
| Activity capture | Email, calendar and live LinkedIn sync in one shared timeline, plus an AI notetaker that files call notes to the right records. WhatsApp to forward inbound deals | Automatic email and calendar capture; LinkedIn connections imported by CSV |
| Inbound management | Forwarded decks and intros become records; the deck analyser fills fields; a workflow can scan the inbox with no forward needed | Email Bot adds emails as notes to existing records; a deck-reading agent is announced |
| Outreach sequences | Built-in email sequences | Bulk email |
| Relationship intelligence | Relationship strength score, hot, warm or cold temperature and the teammate who knows each contact best, plus warm-intro paths across the team's network. Built automatically from email, calendar and live LinkedIn | Relationship strength score and warm intro paths |
Workflows, agents and the LP portal
| Criterion | Lighthouse | Affinity |
|---|---|---|
| Workflows & agents | Workflow builder for multi-step workflows and your own agents, plus built-in agents (triage, enrichment, notetaker). Included in the CRM seat | Four predefined Ascend agents from Scale; Automation Builder (field rules, Slack alerts) from Advanced |
| LP platform | Branded LP portal for your fund: reporting, portfolio updates, capital calls, documents. Price on request | LP engagement tracking in the CRM |
| API & MCP | REST API, webhooks and MCP server, included in every plan | API on all tiers; MCP server from Scale |
| Custom features | Features and integrations built on request by the founding team, included in the subscription. Custom features typically within a day | Configurable product, with scoped onboarding support for complex customisation |
Migrating from Affinity to Lighthouse
| Criterion | Lighthouse | Affinity |
|---|---|---|
| Time to go live | Minutes for a new fund starting from scratch. Hours to migrate from Affinity with an API key; ~24h for a full replica of views; hourly Affinity sync during the transition | "Most firms are fully live within 60 days"; network mapped in the first 24 hours |
Security, permissions and support
| Criterion | Lighthouse | Affinity |
|---|---|---|
| Permissions & SSO | Granular roles and permissions, including invited externals (LPs, angel network members). Google sign-in and SSO | Team, deal and user permissions; fund-level permissions and enterprise SSO on Enterprise |
| Security & hosting | ISO 27001, CASA verified, public Trust Centre. Data hosted in the EU, AI models included | Hosted on AWS, under the EU-US Data Privacy Framework |
| Apps & support | iOS and Android apps, Chrome and Safari extension. Direct line to the founders by email, WhatsApp and Slack | Browser extensions and a mobile app; dedicated success support on Enterprise |
Lighthouse is best for
- Early-stage funds that want to spot companies before they raise: stealth teams, new domains, GitHub activity, fresh registrations.
- Funds that want relationship intelligence, sourcing, inbound, outreach and an LP portal in one CRM.
- Teams with their own way of working, who build their own agents or have the Lighthouse team build the feature.
- European funds that want their data, AI processing included, hosted in the EU.
- Teams tired of re-typing data: stages updated twice, CSV exports, founders linked to companies by hand.
- Firms that want to start in minutes, or move from Affinity in hours, and try it first with a 7-day trial and monthly billing.
Affinity is best for
- Firms running PE, private credit or banking teams alongside venture in one system.
- Teams whose current Affinity setup already fits how they work.
Frequently asked questions
What are the best Affinity CRM alternatives for VC funds?
It depends on how your fund works. Lighthouse is built only for venture, with early-stage sourcing, CRM, inbound, outreach sequences and an LP portal in one product, and custom features usually built within a day. If you also run PE, credit or banking teams in the same system, Affinity may suit you better.
Does Lighthouse have relationship intelligence like Affinity?
Yes. Every contact in Lighthouse carries a relationship strength score, a hot, warm or cold temperature and the name of the teammate who knows them best. It is built automatically from your team's email, calendar and live LinkedIn sync, so there is nothing to log, and warm-intro paths show who on your team can reach any founder or fund.
How much does Affinity CRM cost?
Affinity's public pricing lists Essential at $2,000, Scale at $2,300 and Advanced at $2,700 per user per year, billed annually, with a custom Enterprise tier. Lighthouse costs €75 per seat per month for the CRM and €300 per month fund-wide for Sourcing, billed monthly, with 10% off for annual billing and a 7-day free trial.
Can I migrate from Affinity to Lighthouse, and how long does it take?
Yes. With an Affinity API key the migration takes hours, and a full replica of your views takes about 24 hours. Lighthouse can sync from Affinity every hour during the transition, so the team can switch gradually.
What does Lighthouse include that Affinity's plans don't list?
Five things stand out: inbound management that turns forwarded decks into new records, built-in outreach sequences, live LinkedIn sync, a workflow builder for multi-step workflows and your own agents, and a branded LP portal for your fund. On top of that come early-stage sourcing signals such as stealth companies, new registrations, new domains and GitHub activity.
Why do funds move from Affinity to Lighthouse?
The reasons funds give us most often in calls: too much manual work between tools (CSV exports, deal stages updated in two places), activity capture they have to fix by hand, an interface and custom fields that don't fit their process, and little LinkedIn data in the CRM. Lighthouse answers these with an open API and MCP, live LinkedIn sync, inbound capture, and changes built for each fund. If none of these is a problem for your team, your current setup may be the right one.
Can we keep using Affinity while the team moves over?
Yes. Lighthouse can sync changes from Affinity every hour until every partner has switched, so nobody works from stale data during the transition.
Where is my data stored?
Lighthouse hosts data in the EU, including the AI models it uses, which run on Azure in the EU. Affinity runs on AWS and is certified under the EU-US Data Privacy Framework.
Does Lighthouse work for angel networks?
Yes. Lighthouse is built for angel syndicates as well as funds: one shared pipeline, relationship intelligence across members, permissions for invited members and externals, and a branded LP platform (price on request) for reporting, capital calls and document sharing.
What does "custom features in a day" mean in practice?
Lighthouse is run by three technical founders with no layers in between. When a fund needs an automation, a field or a filter that doesn't exist, the team builds it, included in the subscription. Example: a fund asked to filter founders by education level (high school, BSc, MSc, PhD, MBA); it went from the backend to the product interface within days.
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