What is F5Bot?
F5Bot (f5bot.com) is a free keyword-alert service. You give it keywords, and it emails you within minutes whenever those words appear on Reddit, Hacker News, or Lobsters. It is one of the simplest, most reliable mention monitors on the internet, and it has been a staple for founders and marketers for years.
How F5Bot works
Add your keywords, confirm your email, and the alerts start. The free tier covers email notifications with basic filtering. Paid plans add capacity and integrations: Power, at $14.17/mo billed annually, adds more keywords, advanced filtering, and RSS and JSON feeds; Ultra, at $58.33/mo billed annually, adds thousands of keywords, AI semantic alerts, a REST API, webhooks, and Slack and Discord delivery.
Where F5Bot shines
It is free, it is fast, and it covers Hacker News and Lobsters alongside Reddit, which most Reddit-specific tools do not. For brand monitoring and competitor alerts, it is hard to beat.
The honest catch
F5Bot stops at the alert. It does not judge whether the person is a real buyer, draft a reply, or track anything to revenue. It matches the literal keyword (Ultra adds AI semantic matching), not buyer intent. In our study of 5,756 Reddit conversations, the reply rate came from personalized outreach to high-intent posts, the step F5Bot leaves entirely to you.
