AML tool comparison
Sanctuary vs Elliptic
Elliptic screens at bank and exchange scale under an enterprise contract. Sanctuary screens at desk scale for $199 a month with the price on the page. The comparison is about which scale you actually operate at.
The short answer
Facts checked August 2026Elliptic sells three products: Navigator for transaction screening at scale, Lens for wallet screening, and Investigator for cross-chain investigations. Bitget adopted Navigator and Lens in 2025 as part of its MiCA and Travel Rule alignment, which is the kind of deployment Elliptic is built for. It publishes no pricing. Sanctuary covers the same screening motion at a published price: $199 a month for 1,000 checks with a 0-100 score on every one, across 12 chains and 20+ intelligence sources, with API, monitoring, evidence packs and a signed audit trail in the same tier.
Pick Elliptic when a licensed exchange or a bank is putting screening into a regulated programme, when the cross-chain investigation work is real and continuous, or when your reviewers require a UK-established vendor with named institutional deployments. Pick Sanctuary when a desk, an exchanger or a small compliance team needs the screening decision documented today, without an enterprise contract in front of it.
- Elliptic publishes no pricing and sells through enterprise sales. Sanctuary lists $199/month for 1,000 checks and $499/month for 5,000.
- Bitget adopted Navigator and Lens in 2025 for MiCA and Travel Rule alignment, which is the scale of programme Elliptic is designed around.
- Investigator's cross-chain depth, especially through bridges and DEXs, goes further than Sanctuary's graph, and we say so rather than claim parity.
$199/mo
1,000 checks, API and monitoring included
Elliptic: pricing not published
12 chains
screened on every paid plan
Elliptic: broad coverage, count not published
3/day
free bot checks, no signup
Elliptic: no free tier published
Feature by feature: Sanctuary vs Elliptic
Feature
Sanctuary
Elliptic
Risk score precisionSanctuary returns a 0-100 score on every check. Elliptic scores risk inside Navigator and Lens; the scale is not published outside customer documentation.
0-100 on every check
Not published
Public pricingSanctuary lists tier prices on its pricing page. Elliptic quotes through sales.
Entry priceElliptic publishes no entry price and no per-check rate. Sanctuary's entry tier is $199/month with $0.20 overage.
From $199/mo, public
Not published
Procurement motionSign up and start, or talk to sales. Elliptic runs an enterprise sales cycle.
Self-serve + sales
Sales-led
Free tierSanctuary's Telegram bot runs 3 checks a day free. Elliptic publishes no free tier.
3 free daily
Not published
Telegram botSanctuary's bot is button-driven and needs no account. Elliptic publishes no Telegram bot.
Sanctions screeningBoth screen addresses against sanctions designations.
Travel Rule supportBitget adopted Navigator and Lens in 2025 for MiCA and Travel Rule alignment. Sanctuary carries Travel Rule case handling and retention in the workspace.
Continuous monitoring (KYT)Navigator screens transactions at scale. Sanctuary includes monitoring and webhook alerts from $199/mo.
Included from $199/mo
REST APISanctuary issues an API key on the paid tier. Elliptic access comes with the contract.
Included from $199/mo
Enterprise contract
Investigation workbenchInvestigator is a dedicated cross-chain investigation product. Sanctuary ships graph tracing and case handling, not an investigation workbench of that depth.
Limited
On-chain graph analysisElliptic's stated strength is tracing through bridges and DEXs. Sanctuary's graph is built to explain a screening verdict.
Entity attributionBoth attribute addresses to services and entities; depth differs by chain on both sides.
Chains supportedSanctuary screens 12 chains. Elliptic covers a broad set; no single figure is published.
12 chains
Broad, count not published
Reviewer evidenceBoth produce reviewable output. Sanctuary packages sources, attribution and history into an evidence pack tied to the decision.
Evidence packs
Bulk screeningNavigator is built for screening at volume. Sanctuary takes bulk CSV uploads on the paid tiers.
Case managementCases, assignment and resolution are in Sanctuary's base paid tier. Elliptic does not publish its case workflow outside customer documentation.
Not published
Signed audit trailSanctuary signs a snapshot of every check. Elliptic does not publish this detail.
Not published
Where each tool wins
Choose Sanctuary if
- You need the price before the meeting: $199/month, 1,000 checks, $0.20 after that.
- The recurring work is screening deposits, withdrawals and counterparties, not cross-chain tracing.
- Monitoring, webhooks, cases and a signed audit trail have to come with the base tier.
- You want to screen this week, without a vendor review scheduled around it.
- Your traders check addresses from a phone before a deal settles, and it needs to be free.
Where Elliptic still fits
- You are a bank whose review board only clears vendors it has already seen inside other banks.
- Funds move through bridges and DEXs, and following them is a continuous part of your job.
- Screening is going into a regulated programme such as MiCA or Travel Rule alignment, as Bitget did with Navigator and Lens in 2025.
- A UK-incorporated vendor is written into your policy, so the shortlist starts and ends there.
What switching actually buys you
The invoice drops, the checks don't
Public pricing: $199 a month covers 1,000 checks with API access included. No quote call, no annual lock-in, overage at $0.20 a check.
Verdicts you can forward
Every check returns a 0-100 score with named sources — sanctions lists, darknet clusters, exchange attribution — and exports to a PDF your bank or partner can read.
Live in the next five minutes
Your first check runs in Telegram before a sales call would even be scheduled. 3 free checks a day, and the same account later carries to web and API.
Frequently asked questions
How much does Elliptic cost?
Elliptic does not publish pricing. Navigator, Lens and Investigator are quoted per customer through enterprise sales, so the figure depends on products, screening volume and term. Sanctuary publishes its numbers: $199/month for 1,000 checks with API, monitoring and case management included, $0.20 per additional check, and $499/month for 5,000 checks at $0.15. If you cannot start an evaluation without a budget figure, that is the practical split.
What is the difference between Sanctuary and Elliptic?
Elliptic splits the work across products: Lens for wallet screening, Navigator for transaction screening at scale, Investigator for cross-chain investigations, sold as one enterprise programme. Sanctuary puts wallet screening, monitoring, cases, evidence packs and a signed audit trail in a single $199/month tier with a 0-100 score on every check. The trade is depth of investigation against speed and cost of the daily decision.
Is Elliptic worth it for a mid-sized exchange?
If you are inside a regulated programme with a supervisor reviewing your controls, an established vendor with named institutional deployments carries weight that a price comparison does not capture. If you are screening deposits and counterparties and nobody has asked which vendor you use, an enterprise contract buys coverage you will not exercise. The useful test is your own queue: run last month's addresses through both and compare what a reviewer ends up reading.
Can Sanctuary replace Elliptic?
For wallet and deposit screening, often yes, at $199/month for 1,000 checks with monitoring and audit trail included. For continuous cross-chain investigation work of the kind Investigator handles, no. Teams running both usually keep the investigation tool and move recurring screening volume to Sanctuary. Start with the free Telegram bot on addresses you already have verdicts for.
Test it on your own screening queue
Take ten addresses you screened last month and re-run them in the Sanctuary bot. Three free a day, no signup, no card.
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Competitor facts checked August 2026 against public documentation and pricing pages. Product names and trademarks belong to their owners. Spotted something outdated? Tell us