MB Planning Alerts watches your council's register and emails you when an application lands near a saved address, free, with Premium at £3.99/mo or £29/yr. SiteLens turns the same public registers into a lead feed for the trades: every new UK application classified by trade, project type and estimated value band, with the applicant and agent to contact, from £0 or £39/mo. Two tools, two jobs, and this page helps you pick.
No credit card, no call.
MB Planning Alerts answers "what is being built near me": you save an address and it emails you when something lands close by. SiteLens answers "which new applications mean work for me": every application across your patch, classified by trade and project type, with an estimated value band and a plain-English brief so you can tell a £15k extension from a £2m scheme at a glance.
Knowing an application exists is the easy half. SiteLens shows the applicant and agent behind each scheme, source-labelled, plus matched Companies House records on the firms involved, so you can approach the person who actually specifies and buys. A proximity alert points you at the council portal and stops there.
SiteLens covers 380+ UK councils on every paid plan and filters the feed by trade, project type, value band and area, so a roofer in the South West sees roofing work in the South West. Proximity alerting scales by how many places you save rather than by the kind of work you want, so a wide patch means a wide net.
Feature-for-feature, based on publicly available information.
| Feature | SiteLens | MB Planning Alerts |
|---|---|---|
| Core function | Trade-classified lead feed from every new application | Alerts when an application is submitted near a saved address |
| Built for | Subcontractors, material suppliers, specialist trades, small developers | Homeowners, home buyers, and anyone watching a specific area |
| Public, transparent pricing | ||
| Free tier | Yes, free forever, unlimited views, no card | Yes, search and alerts free, no card |
| Paid price | £39/mo (£29/mo billed annually) | £3.99/mo or £29/yr (Premium) |
| Council coverage | 380+ UK councils | 168 UK councils (per its own site) |
| AI classification by trade & project type | ||
| Estimated project value band | ||
| Plain-English project brief per application | Applications shown "in plain English" | |
| Applicant & agent contacts | Yes (Pro), source-labelled | |
| Companies House on the firms behind a scheme | Yes (Pro) | |
| Filter the feed by trade and value | ||
| Proximity alerts on a saved address | Area and keyword alerts | Yes, the core feature |
| Unlimited saved areas | Alert allowance by plan | Yes, on Premium |
| Map-based search | ||
| CSV export | ||
| Contract | Monthly or annual, cancel anytime | Monthly or annual |
Both tools read the same public planning registers. The difference is the filter they put on top, and that decides who each one is for.
Searching any UK address and setting up alerts is free with no card needed. Premium is £3.99/mo or £29/yr and adds unlimited saved areas, instant alerts and priority support. SiteLens has a free-forever tier at £0 with unlimited application views, and Pro at £39/mo (£29/mo billed annually) adds the contacts behind each scheme, more alerts and analytics. Figures are from mbplanningalerts.co.uk as at August 2026.
It depends whether you want to know about one address or find work across a patch. Proximity alert services are built around a saved location and tell you what is happening near it, which suits a homeowner or anyone watching a specific site. A trade needs the opposite shape: every new application across the area you cover, filtered to the work you actually do, with the applicant or agent to contact. That is what SiteLens does, and it is why it classifies each application by trade, project type and estimated value band rather than only by distance.
Both have a free tier. MB Planning Alerts lets you search and set alerts free, charging £3.99/mo or £29/yr for unlimited saved areas and instant delivery. SiteLens is free forever with unlimited application views and one daily alert, no card. The paid tiers differ because they solve different problems: one removes limits on how many places you watch, the other adds the contacts and classification that turn an application into a lead you can quote for.
Pick it if the question is about a place rather than a pipeline. If you want to know what is being proposed next door, near a site you own, or across a handful of streets, a proximity alert is exactly the right tool and Premium is £3.99 a month. It is cheap, it needs no card to start, and it is aimed squarely at that job.
SiteLens is the wrong shape for that. It is priced and built for someone whose living depends on finding work across a whole patch: classification by trade and value, the contacts behind each scheme, and a daily feed filtered to what you actually do. If you are not selling into construction, that is more tool than you need.
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The £5,000/yr enterprise platform, without the sales call.
Read →Same daily UK planning feed, without the daily phone call.
Read →Same price, plus the map, classification, and analytics.
Read →Planning data for the supply chain, not letter campaigns.
Read →Live planning leads for the supply chain, not just land sourcing.
Read →Unlimited application views at £39/mo, not 25 views at £60.
Read →Planning leads for the trades, not site sourcing.
Read →Every council included, classified by trade and value.
Read →Find the work worth chasing, not just letters to post.
Read →Construction leads from planning, not investment data.
Read →Planning-stage projects, not shared homeowner leads.
Read →Projects at planning stage, not pay-per-lead homeowner jobs.
Read →Find the projects, not just get listed for tenders.
Read →The 2026 NPPF reforms commit to 1.5 million new homes, mandatory targets and faster decisions, expanding the pipeline for every trade.
Read: What the 2026 NPPF reforms mean for SME construction →