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Agriculture · head to head

Farmers Business Network (FBN) vs METER Group ZENTRA

Farmers Business Network (FBN) logo

Farmers Business Network (FBN)

Agriculture

Farmer-to-farmer network and marketplace

From
$700/year
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
METER Group ZENTRA logo

METER Group ZENTRA

Agriculture

Research-grade soil, plant and atmosphere sensors with the ZENTRA Cloud data platform

From
On request
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Each has a real cost: Farmers Business Network (FBN) the Internet Archive's capture of Farmers Business Network's homepage on 2 January 2021 stated core FBN membership is free, with fees applying only to add-on services such as FBN Direct input purchases, crop marketing advisory, brokerage, financing and insurance, each offered by separately licensed FBN subsidiary entities.; METER Group ZENTRA hardware costs several times what commodity soil probes cost, so a farm that only needs a rough irrigation trigger is paying for calibration accuracy it will never use.
  • They diverge on capability: Farmers Business Network (FBN) covers Seed performance analytics, METER Group ZENTRA covers TEROS soil sensors.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 1 September 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Farmers Business Network (FBN) and METER Group ZENTRA actually diverge.

Attributes where Farmers Business Network (FBN) and METER Group ZENTRA differ
AttributeFarmers Business Network (FBN)METER Group ZENTRA
Starting price$700/yearOn request
Pricing modelsubscriptionPer device subscription
Founded2014Unknown

Identical on both: free tier (No), platforms (Web, Ios, Android), user rating (Not yet rated), category (Agriculture).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Farmers Business Network (FBN)

  • Seed performance analytics
  • Input price transparency
  • Direct input purchasing
  • Yield analytics
  • Crop marketing tools
  • Farm financing
  • Agronomic insights
  • Farmer network access

Only in METER Group ZENTRA

  • TEROS soil sensors
  • Water potential measurement
  • ZL6 data loggers
  • ZENTRA Cloud
  • Threshold alerts
  • Open API
  • ATMOS weather stations

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Farmers Business Network (FBN)

  • Input purchasingnot METER Group ZENTRA
  • Seed selectionnot METER Group ZENTRA
  • Price comparisonnot METER Group ZENTRA
  • Farm financingnot METER Group ZENTRA
  • Market insightsnot METER Group ZENTRA

METER Group ZENTRA

  • A university soil physics group that needs measurements defensible enough for peer reviewnot Farmers Business Network (FBN)
  • An irrigation district accounting for water applied and lost across a schemenot Farmers Business Network (FBN)
  • A vineyard managing deficit irrigation from water potential rather than volumetric moisture alonenot Farmers Business Network (FBN)
  • An environmental consultancy monitoring a remediation or drainage site where the data may be contestednot Farmers Business Network (FBN)

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Farmers Business Network (FBN)

  • The Internet Archive's capture of Farmers Business Network's homepage on 2 January 2021 stated core FBN membership is free, with fees applying only to add-on services such as FBN Direct input purchases, crop marketing advisory, brokerage, financing and insurance, each offered by separately licensed FBN subsidiary entities.

METER Group ZENTRA

  • Hardware costs several times what commodity soil probes cost, so a farm that only needs a rough irrigation trigger is paying for calibration accuracy it will never use.
  • ZENTRA Cloud is a per-device subscription, so a large sensor network carries a recurring bill that grows linearly with every probe added and is easy to underestimate at design stage.
  • The three-year subscription bundled with the ZL6 Pro means the renewal decision arrives exactly when a typical research grant has ended, which is how long-running datasets get abandoned.
  • METER sells measurement rather than recommendations; there is no irrigation scheduling engine, so someone has to turn the numbers into decisions or buy a second platform that will.
  • Installation quality dominates results with soil sensors, and a badly installed TEROS probe produces confidently wrong data, so the accuracy you paid for depends on field technique the vendor cannot supply.

Pricing, plan by plan

Farmers Business Network (FBN)

$700/year
  • FBN Membership$700/year
    • Access to FBN Analytics
    • Seed performance data
    • Chemical price transparency
  • FBN DirectFree
    • Transparent input pricing
    • Direct-to-farm delivery
    • Seed & crop protection

METER Group ZENTRA

On request
  • ZENTRA Cloud$undefined/year
    • Priced per activated device, pay for what you use
    • Three year subscription included with the ZL6 Pro logger
    • Cellular data included in the device subscription

Which should you pick?

Choose Farmers Business Network (FBN) if

  • You need seed performance analytics.
  • You work on Web, Ios, Android.
  • You also want input price transparency.
Farmers Business Network (FBN) review

Choose METER Group ZENTRA if

  • You need teros soil sensors.
  • You work on Web, iOS, Android.
  • You also want water potential measurement.
METER Group ZENTRA review

Questions people ask

Is Farmers Business Network (FBN) or METER Group ZENTRA better?
Neither clearly leads. Farmers Business Network (FBN) starts at $700/year and METER Group ZENTRA at On request, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Farmers Business Network (FBN) or METER Group ZENTRA?
Farmers Business Network (FBN) starts at $700/year and METER Group ZENTRA at On request.
Does Farmers Business Network (FBN) or METER Group ZENTRA run on more platforms?
Farmers Business Network (FBN) runs on Web, Ios, Android. METER Group ZENTRA runs on Web, iOS, Android.
What is Farmers Business Network (FBN) best used for?
Farmers Business Network (FBN) is most often used for input purchasing, seed selection, price comparison, farm financing. Of those, input purchasing and seed selection are not what METER Group ZENTRA is typically brought in for.
What can Farmers Business Network (FBN) do that METER Group ZENTRA cannot?
Farmers Business Network (FBN) covers Seed performance analytics, Input price transparency, Direct input purchasing, Yield analytics. METER Group ZENTRA covers TEROS soil sensors, Water potential measurement, ZL6 data loggers, ZENTRA Cloud.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

METER Group ZENTRA: Is ZENTRA Cloud included with the loggers?

A three-year subscription is included with the ZL6 Pro. Other loggers require a separate per-device subscription.

METER Group ZENTRA: Do I need a separate cellular data plan?

No. Cellular data is covered within the device subscription rather than billed as a separate SIM contract.

METER Group ZENTRA: Will it tell me when to irrigate?

No. METER provides measurement, not scheduling recommendations. You either interpret the data yourself or feed it into a scheduling platform.

METER Group ZENTRA: Why is it more expensive than commodity soil probes?

Individual sensor calibration and documented measurement physics, which is what makes the data hold up in research, regulatory and legal contexts.

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