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Compare Analytics Tools
Rating
4.5/5
5/5
Summary
A customisable and free web analytics tool. Get insights into user behavior with an event-based tracking model, and know what drives sales and traffic with extensive attribution methods.
Open Web Analytics is the free and open source web analytics framework that lets you stay in control of how you instrument and analyze the use of your websites and application
Pirsch is a simple, cookie-free, open-source web analytics solution that integrates easily into your website or backend.
AI-powered analytics and attribution platform that unifies website, product, and marketing data in one tool.
Pros
- GA4 is free to use
- Many functionalities
- The reports are customisable
- Large community
- Extensive documentation
- GA4 is easily scalable
- The software is open source
- It is very customizable
- Ecommerce reporting
- Privacy friendly
- The script is lightweight
- Lightweight, cookie-free and open-source
- Pirsch's backend integration requires no client-side scripts and delivers the same accurate results without the interference of adblockers
- Extensive API
- Fully-fledged access management
- Comprehensive filtering by any metric including event metadata
- AI-powered attribution
- Combined web + product analytics
- Auto-capture without developers
- Privacy-friendly
Cons
- Steep learning curve
- Implementation can be hard
- Inaccurate data sampling
- UI is not easy to use
- Limited reporting features
- Technical skill required
- Comply with data privacy regulations
- You need a secure server
- Visitors are only recognized for up to 24 hours to comply with the privacy policy
- Heatmaps and session recordings are not available
- Relatively new player
- No self-hosting option
Pricing information
Starting Price
| Standard | Free |
| GA4 360 | $50k+ per year |
Free trial period
Free plan
Free plan
30 days
Free plan
Account Management
Trackable Items
100
Unlimited
Unlimited
Unlimited
User Seats
Unlimited
Unlimited
Unlimited
3+ depending on plan
Account Security
- Single Sign-on
- Two-factor Authentication
- Single Sign-on
- Two-factor Authentication
- Single Sign-on
- Two-factor Authentication
- Single Sign-on
- Two-factor Authentication
Data Processing
Data Center Locations
- European Economic Area (EEA)
- United Kingdom
- United States
- Not applicable
- European Economic Area (EEA)
- European Economic Area (EEA)
- United States
Software Hosting
- Public Cloud
- Private Cloud
- On-Premise
- Public Cloud
- Private Cloud
- On-Premise
- Public Cloud
- Private Cloud
- On-Premise
- Public Cloud
- Private Cloud
- On-Premise
Data Ownership
Google Analytics 4
You
You
You
Data Freshness
4-8 hours (most reports), up to 24-48 hours
Realtime
Realtime
Realtime
Data Retention
Customizable up to 14 months
Unlimited
Unlimited
Unlimited
Data Sampling
Explorations might use sampled data
Usermaven does not sample data
Data Import
Import cost, offline or user/client ID data
by means of the REST API
Import from Plausible, Fathom or Google Analytics
Google Analytics importer
Data Export
With sheets, BigQuery or API
by means of the REST API
via API or CSV
Via API or CSV
Compliance
- GDPR
- CCPA
- GDPR
- CCPA
- GDPR
- CCPA
- ePrivacy
- PECR
- GDPR
- CCPA
Cookieless
Google Analytics relies on first-party cookies.
Sets first-party cookies (owa_v, owa_c, session). Lifetimes can be shortened or made session-only.
Pirsch Analytics does not use cookies
Cookieless tracking available
Alerts & Automation
Custom Alerts
Custom insights, in interface or via email
Threshold-based alerts
Email Reports
Recurring shared reporting
Daily, Weekly, Bi-weekly, Monthly
Scheduled email reports
Reporting
Trend Reporting
Device Reporting
Device type, browser, OS and more
Device type, OS, Browser, Browser version, Screen size
Funnel Reporting
Customisable funnel exploration
Analyze Funnels
AI-powered funnel analysis
User Flow Reporting
Flexible Sankey chart exploration
Entry and exit pages
User journey visualization
Segmentation
Segment creation and overlap exploration
Extensive filtering by any metric
Segments & cohorts
Cohort Reports
Cohort exploration
Retention Reporting
Combined with CLTV metrics
Retention analysis (Business plan)
Attribution Reporting
Attribution models comparison
Multi-touch attribution with 7 models
Ecommerce Reporting
Extensive e-commerce reports
Possible with custom events and goals
Revenue attribution
User Experience Features
Heatmaps
GA4 does not offer heatmaps
Session Recordings
GA4 does not offer recordings
Domstream
A/B Testing
Tag-based A/B testing and segmentation
User Feedback
Customizability
Custom Properties
25 user-scoped & 50 event-scoped dimensions
As part of custom events
Custom properties
Custom Metrics
50 event-scoped metrics
Custom Reports
All reports are customisable
Custom dashboards
Custom Events
25 parameters per event
With additional metadata fields (key-value pairs).
Auto-captured events
Annotations
Notes feature added in 2024
Support
Support description
Support is available via chat and the support center.
Because Open Web Analytics is open source, all documentation is found on GitHub. Apart from the community, there are no support options available.
Email support, public Discord server
Usermaven offers documentation, live chat support, and email support.
Support Options
- Phone
- Live Chat
- Ticketing system
- Knowledge base
- Community
- Phone
- Live Chat
- Ticketing system
- Knowledge base
- Community
- Phone
- Live Chat
- Ticketing system
- Knowledge base
- Community
- Phone
- Live Chat
- Ticketing system
- Knowledge base
- Community


