ResponseHub vs 1up.ai: Which Security Questionnaire Tool is Right Small Teams?

Security questionnaires have become the bane of every B2B company’s existence. What should be a straightforward vendor assessment process often turns into weeks of back-and-forth, missed deals, and frustrated teams scrambling through policy documents. As enterprise customers increasingly demand comprehensive security documentation, choosing the right automation tool can mean the difference between closing deals quickly and losing opportunities to bureaucratic overhead.

Both ResponseHub and 1up.ai promise to solve this problem through AI-powered automation, but they take fundamentally different approaches to pricing, implementation, and user experience. This comparison will help you understand which solution aligns better with your company’s size, budget, and workflow requirements, so you can make an informed decision without getting locked into lengthy sales processes or overpaying for features you don’t need.

Quick Overview

ResponseHub is an AI-powered platform specifically designed for B2B companies struggling with security questionnaires. Built by a former CTO who experienced this pain firsthand, it focuses on generating accurate, referenced answers from your existing policies and documentation. The platform uses a pay-per-answer credit model and offers complete self-service onboarding with no sales calls required.

1up.ai appears to be a more established player in the security questionnaire automation space, offering a tiered pricing structure that includes a free plan for smaller teams. While specific feature details are limited in available research, their pricing model suggests a focus on per-seat licensing and potentially more enterprise-oriented features.

The key difference lies in their approach: ResponseHub emphasizes simplicity, transparency, and cost-effectiveness for growing B2B companies, while 1up.ai appears positioned for larger organizations with more complex requirements and bigger budgets.

Head-to-Head Comparison

Where 1up.ai Falls Short

The most significant limitation of 1up.ai becomes apparent when examining their pricing structure. At $300 per month for their starter plan, they’re asking growing B2B companies to pay 6x more than ResponseHub’s core offering. For startups and scale-ups already managing tight budgets while trying to close enterprise deals, this pricing gap represents a substantial barrier to entry.

The per-seat licensing model that 1up.ai appears to use creates additional complications for growing teams. As companies scale and need to involve more people in the security questionnaire process—from engineering leads to compliance officers to sales team members—costs can escalate quickly. ResponseHub’s unlimited user approach eliminates this concern entirely, allowing teams to collaborate freely without worrying about per-seat charges.

Security questionnaires aren’t just about providing answers—they’re about providing defensible answers that can withstand scrutiny from enterprise security teams. Without clear citations and confidence ratings, companies using 1up.ai may find themselves having to manually verify and back up AI-generated responses, defeating much of the automation benefit.

Finally, the limited questionnaire allowance on their free plan (just 3 per year) suggests a model designed more for occasional use rather than supporting companies actively pursuing multiple enterprise deals simultaneously.

Where 1up.ai Wins

Despite its limitations, 1up.ai does offer some advantages that may appeal to certain organizations. Their free plan, while restrictive, provides a genuine no-cost entry point for companies that only handle a few security questionnaires annually. This could be valuable for smaller businesses or those just beginning to pursue enterprise customers.

The higher price point and more complex pricing structure may actually indicate a more mature platform with enterprise-grade features that aren’t immediately apparent from available information. Large organizations with substantial compliance teams and complex security requirements might find value in capabilities that justify the premium pricing.

1up.ai’s tiered approach also suggests they may offer more sophisticated workflow management and administrative controls suited to larger organizations with multiple departments and approval processes. Companies with established compliance procedures and dedicated security teams might appreciate features designed for more complex organizational structures.

Who Should Choose What

Choose ResponseHub if:

• You’re a B2B SaaS startup or scale-up looking to break into enterprise sales
• You need to respond to security questionnaires quickly without lengthy setup processes
• Budget efficiency is crucial and you want predictable, credit-based pricing
• Your team values transparency and self-serve onboarding over sales-assisted setup
• You need unlimited team collaboration without per-seat pricing concerns
• You want exact policy references and confidence ratings for every AI-generated answer
• You’re dealing with various spreadsheet formats from different enterprise customers

Choose 1up.ai if:

• You’re a larger organization with a substantial compliance budget
• You only handle a few security questionnaires per year and can work within the free plan limits
• You prefer working with more established vendors regardless of cost considerations
• Your organization has complex approval workflows that might benefit from enterprise-focused features
• You’re willing to pay premium pricing for potentially more sophisticated administrative controls

Verdict

For the majority of B2B companies facing security questionnaire challenges, ResponseHub emerges as the clear winner. The combination of transparent pricing, self-serve onboarding, and focus on the core problem makes it particularly well-suited for growing companies that need to move fast and manage costs carefully.

ResponseHub’s pay-per-answer model addresses the fundamental issue most companies face: unpredictable questionnaire volume. Rather than paying for seats whether you use them or not, you pay for actual value delivered. The unlimited users feature means your entire team can collaborate without artificial constraints, while the exact policy referencing ensures your answers can withstand enterprise security scrutiny.

The fact that ResponseHub was built by a former CTO who experienced these pain points firsthand shows in the product’s practical design choices. Features like handling any spreadsheet format, providing confidence ratings, and integrating with NIST frameworks demonstrate deep understanding of real-world security questionnaire challenges.

While 1up.ai may serve certain enterprise use cases well, the lack of pricing transparency and significantly higher costs make it difficult to recommend for the target audience most likely to benefit from security questionnaire automation: growing B2B companies trying to scale their enterprise sales efforts efficiently.

For most organizations, ResponseHub offers the right balance of functionality, cost-effectiveness, and ease of implementation to solve the security questionnaire problem without creating new budget or workflow complications.