Overview
Waterfall enrichment is currently in beta and rolling out to Apollo users gradually. Functionality and data providers may change as we develop this feature. Stay tuned!
Waterfall enrichment allows you to enrich contact emails and phone numbers in Apollo through a series of cascading data providers, giving you access to more actionable data.
Once you connect your preferred data providers, waterfall enrichment pulls data from each provider, in the order you define, until you have complete email addresses and phone numbers for your contacts. You can also choose to connect an email validation provider to add an extra verification layer when you access contact emails.
Get Started
Ready to enrich your records? Check out Use Waterfall Enrichment to learn how to configure and run waterfall enrichment in Apollo.
FAQs
Is waterfall enrichment the same as CRM enrichment?
No, waterfall enrichment is not CRM enrichment.
Waterfall enrichment pulls information from Apollo and other third-party data providers to enrich emails and phone numbers for net-new and saved contacts. You can select which providers to include and connect these providers natively through Apollo or via an API key.
CRM enrichment is a separate enrichment process that uses firmographic, demographic, and technographic data from Apollo to enrich your existing CRM records in Salesforce or HubSpot.
In addition, waterfall enrichment and CRM enrichment charge credits in different ways. Check out the credits FAQs below to learn about credit requirements for waterfall enrichment.
Can I connect other data providers beyond the ones Apollo offers?
No. You can only connect to the data sources or validation providers listed in Apollo when you configure waterfall enrichment. You can connect natively or via API key to available data sources and validation providers during setup.

What’s the difference between global and local configuration for waterfall enrichment?
Global configuration refers to the waterfall enrichment settings configured by your admin that apply to your entire team on Apollo. Admins can follow the process outlined here to enable waterfall enrichment globally for your team. When enabled globally, waterfall enrichment runs automatically for the following activities:
- Saving net-new contacts from People.
- Enriching saved contacts from People.
- Clicking Access email or Access mobile from People.
- Enriching saved contacts from the contact profile page.
- Enriching missing emails from the Data Health Center.
- Enriching emails or phone numbers via AI research templates.
- Saving prospects via the Apollo Chrome Extension.
Local configuration refers to the activities where individual team members can enable or deactivate waterfall enrichment on a case-by-case basis. You can locally deactivate waterfall enrichment for the following activities without disrupting your team's global configuration settings:
- Saving net-new contacts from People.
- Enriching saved contacts from People.
- Enriching contacts from the contact profile page.
- Saving prospects via the Apollo Chrome Extension.
Can I enrich only mobile phone numbers during waterfall enrichment?
Yes. Once an admin configures waterfall enrichment globally, you can run waterfall enrichment for phones by clicking Access Mobile for any contact in People. This enriches your selected contacts' phone numbers only.
Can I access emails or phone numbers in Apollo without running waterfall enrichment?
When enabled globally, waterfall enrichment runs automatically when you click Access email or Access mobile to enrich a contact from search. Admins should deactivate global waterfall enrichment to use only Apollo data when accessing email or phone numbers.
How many records can I enrich at once?
You can run waterfall enrichment on up to 5000 contact records at once.
Will enriched data sync to my CRM?
If you’ve connected your HubSpot, Salesforce, or Pipedrive account to Apollo, primary emails and phone numbers will sync to your CRM automatically after waterfall enrichment. Any existing CRM data prior to enrichment will remain in contact profiles as secondary emails or phone numbers.
Can I re-enrich contacts I’ve already run through waterfall enrichment?
Yes, you can re-enrich your contacts with waterfall enrichment, regardless of how recent your previous waterfall enrichment job happened.
When you re-enrich your contacts, Apollo locates the data provider that successfully found contact data in the previous enrichment and skips to the next data provider in your waterfall lineup. Re-enrichment begins with this provider and continues until you find a new email or phone number.
Can I turn off waterfall enrichment?
Yes. Admins and non-admins can deactivate waterfall enrichment on an individual basis when saving net-new contacts, enriching saved contacts from search, enriching contacts from the profile page, or saving contacts via the Chrome extension. Admins can deactivate waterfall enrichment for their entire team from the global configuration settings panel.
Learn more about deactivating waterfall enrichment here.
How do I know which data comes from external providers?
After you access a contact’s email or phone through waterfall enrichment, hover over their email or phone number to see additional details about which source provided the data. You can also review the data source for enriched data from the contact profile or your waterfall enrichment report.

What’s the difference between verified, valid, and catch-all emails?
During waterfall enrichment, Apollo and other data providers can return verified, valid, or catch-all emails when you enrich your contacts.
Verified emails are up-to-date emails verified and returned by Apollo or another third-party data provider in your waterfall lineup.
Valid emails have gone through an extra layer of verification through a data validator. Admins can connect a data validator when setting up your team’s global settings for waterfall enrichment.
Catch-all emails are shared domains used by organizations to receive messages sent to anyone with the same domain name. Typically, catch-all emails help teams capture emails sent in error to the wrong email address or non-existent email addresses. When you run waterfall enrichment for contacts in bulk, you can configure whether Apollo or third-party data providers are allowed to return catch-all emails during enrichment.
Learn more about how Apollo verifies contact emails.
How do I know if an email retrieved by a third-party provider is verified?
If you’ve run and completed waterfall enrichment from People, Apollo displays a status in the Email column next to each retrieved email. Emails with a green checkmark indicate a verified status.
You can also check your enriched contact’s profile page to confirm their email status.
Can I access reporting for waterfall enrichment?
Yes! Admins and non-admins can report on your team’s waterfall enrichment activities by accessing:
- An analytics dashboard for a quick glance into key waterfall enrichment metrics.
- A system-wide enrichment log for all waterfall activities across your organization.
- An individual enrichment report for each completed waterfall enrichment run.
Check out Use Waterfall Enrichment to learn more about reporting on waterfall enrichment.
Does waterfall enrichment require credits?
Yes, you need credits to use waterfall enrichment.
Apollo initially provides teams with a limited number of free credits to use toward waterfall enrichment. You can track your free credit usage when you configure your global waterfall settings or try to run waterfall enrichment. Once you run out of free credits, Apollo asks for your consent to continue using waterfall enrichment with your own credits. If you approve, you consume Apollo credits from your team’s plan each time you run waterfall enrichment.
Credit charges vary for each data provider, and your total credit usage depends on how many data providers you cycle through to access enriched data. Every time you run waterfall enrichment, Apollo estimates how many total credits you can expect to use to enrich your selected contacts. Check out the following FAQ to learn more.
How many credits does each provider charge?
The number of credits you consume during waterfall enrichment depends on your selected data providers.
Once you use up your free waterfall credits, you consume Apollo credits to run waterfall enrichment through Apollo and natively integrated third-party data providers. These credits count toward the credit limit set in your Apollo plan.
Data providers connected via an API key set their own credit charges. In other words, if you connected data providers via an API key, you won’t use Apollo credits to run waterfall enrichment through them. You should check with these providers to monitor your credit usage.
When an admin configures your team’s global waterfall settings, Apollo provides a preview of credit charges for each natively integrated data provider.

When you run waterfall enrichment locally on net-new or saved contacts, Apollo also provides a preview to help you estimate how many credits you might use for enrichment and data validation.

Why do some third-party data providers cost more than others?
Third-party data providers set their own credit charges for waterfall enrichment. If you’re an admin, you can review estimated credit charges for each provider when setting up your team’s global waterfall configuration.
Will I use credits if an email retrieved by a third-party provider is not verified?
Yes. You consume credits any time Apollo or a third-party provider returns an email, regardless of whether the email is verified or not.
What happens if waterfall enrichment doesn't find any data?
You won’t use credits if Apollo or connected third-party data sources don’t find any data to enrich your records. Apollo alerts you when enrichment completes without enriching any contact data.
Heads up! Global Database charges full credits for every enrichment run, even if no data is found. Keep this in mind if you decide to add Global Database as a data source to your enrichment lineup.
Click Edit configuration to update your lineup of waterfall data providers or include additional data providers.
Can I check my credit usage for waterfall enrichment?
Yes. Open your enrichment report after enriching contacts to view your activity log and get quick insights into the number of credits used for waterfall enrichment.
You can also go to Settings > Data requests > Waterfall to view your entire activity log for waterfall enrichment.
Can admins set a credit limit for waterfall enrichment?
If you’re an admin, you can set credit limits for each user on your team from Settings > Users and teams > Users. Be aware that this limits how many credits each user can consume throughout Apollo, not just waterfall enrichment.
You can also deactivate waterfall enrichment across your entire account to prevent users from spending waterfall enrichment credits.
I’ve run out of free waterfall credits. What happens now?
Apollo helps you track your team’s free credit usage each time you run waterfall enrichment or update your waterfall enrichment configuration.

Once you run out of free credits, you can choose whether to continue using waterfall enrichment with your own credits or to deactivate waterfall enrichment for your team. Apollo asks for your consent to keep waterfall enrichment activated for your team. If you approve, waterfall enrichment begins charging credits toward your team’s Apollo plan.

You can purchase add-on credits or upgrade your plan if you need additional credits to use toward waterfall enrichment. Otherwise, you can deactivate waterfall enrichment to prevent enrichment from running. Admins can deactivate waterfall enrichment globally for your entire team, or non-admins can turn off waterfall enrichment locally for the following activities:
- Saving net-new contacts.
- Enriching saved contacts.
- Enriching contacts from the contact profile page.
- Enriching missing emails from the Data Health Center.