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Rating
4.5/5
4/5
4/5
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.
Powerful, self-serve product analytics to help you convert, engage, and retain more users. Build funnels, see top user flows, create cohorts, and more with just a few clicks.
Hotjar provides Product Experience Insights about your website that show how users behave and what they feel strongly about, so product teams can deliver real value to them.
Enterprise-level web analytics. Adobe Analytics lets you mix, match, and analyze data from any digital point in the customer journey.
Pros
  • GA4 is free to use
  • Many functionalities
  • The reports are customisable
  • Large community
  • Extensive documentation
  • GA4 is easily scalable
  • Interface is easy to understand
  • Great support options
  • Reporting is in realtime
  • Good community
  • Comes with great heatmaps
  • Includes session recordings
  • Good polling function
  • Hotjar features exit surveys
  • Great segmentation
  • Good video tracking
  • Customizable
  • Easy report creation
Cons
  • Steep learning curve
  • Implementation can be hard
  • Inaccurate data sampling
  • UI is not easy to use
  • Event setup requires tech skills
  • Contains hard to discover features
  • Has a steep learning curve
  • Hotjar is not available for mobile
  • Steep pricing for large organisations
  • Hard to exclude URLs from reports
  • Pricing can be quite steep
  • Tech support can be improved
  • Can be difficult to implement
  • Can be challenging to get educated

Pricing information

Starting Price
StandardFree
GA4 360$50k+ per year
FreeFree
EnterpriseOn req.
BasicFree
Plus$49+ p/m
BusinessOn req.
ScaleOn req.
SelectOn req.
PrimeOn req.
UltimateOn req.
Free trial period
Free plan
Free plan
Free plan
Free plan

Account Management

Trackable Items
100
1
Unlimited
Unlimited
User Seats
Unlimited
Unlimited
1
Unlimited
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
  • European Economic Area (EEA)
  • United States
  • European Economic Area (EEA)
  • United States
  • 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
Mixpanel
Hotjar
Adobe Analytics
Data Freshness
4-8 hours (most reports), up to 24-48 hours
Realtime
30 minutes
2 hours
Data Retention
Customizable up to 14 months
Unlimited
12 months
25 months by default
Data Sampling
Explorations might use sampled data
Some Audience Manager reports display results sampled data
Data Import
Import cost, offline or user/client ID data
Via one-off script or Ingestion API
Send user data to Hotjar to enhance analysis
Though data sources, API or data connectors
Data Export
With sheets, BigQuery or API
Via raw data export API
Export recording meta data
Through data feeds, a data warehouse or FTP and SFTP
Compliance
  • GDPR
  • CCPA
  • GDPR
  • CCPA
  • HIPAA
  • GDPR
  • CCPA
  • GDPR
  • CCPA
  • HIPAA
  • PECR
Cookieless
Google Analytics relies on first-party cookies.
Mixpanel relies on first-party cookies
Hotjar relies on first-party cookies.
Adobe uses tracking cookies

Alerts & Automation

Custom Alerts
Custom insights, in interface or via email
Hourly, daily, or weekly base on event threshold
in the interface, via e-mail or Slack
Via e-mail or SMS
Email Reports
Recurring shared reporting
Same as custom alerts
e.g. daily survey responses reports
Flexible scheduled reporting

Reporting

Trend Reporting
Device Reporting
Device type, browser, OS and more
See on which device the user was
Device types, OS, OS versions & mobile carriers
Funnel Reporting
Customisable funnel exploration
Funnel trend, time to convert & frequency visualisations
Discover why users drop off
Bar chart funnel report
User Flow Reporting
Flexible Sankey chart exploration
Sankey chart with selected, immediate & drop off events
Fallout & Flow (Sankey chart) reports
Segmentation
Segment creation and overlap exploration
Automatically find interesting segments & receive per email
Create custom filters for recordings
Advanced segments with Segment builder & Segment manager
Cohort Reports
Cohort exploration
User cohorts of users to filter reports
Churn, rolling & latency tables
Retention Reporting
Combined with CLTV metrics
Retention curves, trends & user cohort buckets
Retention cohort report
Attribution Reporting
Attribution models comparison
Simple UTM tracking with "first touch" attribution
Apply to metrics, breakdowns or compare models
Ecommerce Reporting
Extensive e-commerce reports
Option to track purchases but no special reporting
Very flexible ecommerce reporting

User Experience Features

Heatmaps
GA4 does not offer heatmaps
Unlimited
Called activity map
Session Recordings
GA4 does not offer recordings
Record all interaction with your site
A/B Testing
Experiments
No A/B testing tool only integrations
User Feedback
Place NPS ratings or a survey pop-up on every page

Customizability

Custom Properties
25 user-scoped & 50 event-scoped dimensions
Custom Metrics
50 event-scoped metrics
Max 255 properties per event
Unlimited calculated metrics
Custom Reports
All reports are customisable
Unlimited custom dahboards & reports
Reports in Analysis workspace are customisable
Custom Events
25 parameters per event
Combine events into a custom event
Track and filter sessions & heatmaps
Up to 1.000 success events
Annotations
Notes feature added in 2024
Directly on the linechart in Insights
Hotjar does not have annotations
Available in Workspace

Support

Support description
Support is available via chat and the support center.
Mixpanel offer extensive documentation and knowledgable support through a ticketing system. They have a support email address but regular support requests are directed to the ticketing system. Join their Slack group for community access.
Hotjar offers extensive documentation and a ticketing support system. Most requests are answered within 1-2 business days, but often faster.
The support of Adobe Analytics consists of an expansive knowledge base and an online community. Phone and chat options exist for certain user types. Besides that, they offer many training options and tutorials.
Support Options
  • Phone
  • Email
  • Live Chat
  • Ticketing system
  • Knowledge base
  • Community
  • Phone
  • Email
  • Live Chat
  • Ticketing system
  • Knowledge base
  • Community
  • Phone
  • Email
  • Live Chat
  • Ticketing system
  • Knowledge base
  • Community
  • Phone
  • Email
  • Live Chat
  • Ticketing system
  • Knowledge base
  • Community
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