Compare
Compare Analytics Tools
Rating
4.5/5
5/5
4/5
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.
A free analytics suite with a focus on user privacy and data security. Optimize the customer journey where it was previously impossible.
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.
A simple but powerful real-time web analytics tool that helps you track, analyse and understand your visitors. It features click fraud detection and session playback.
Pros
- GA4 is free to use
- Many functionalities
- The reports are customisable
- Large community
- Extensive documentation
- GA4 is easily scalable
- Ease of use
- Great authorisation management
- Packed with features
- Community forum
- Intergrated tag & consent management
- Comes with great heatmaps
- Includes session recordings
- Good polling function
- Hotjar features exit surveys
- Easy to use
- Google Ads integration
- Great session playback
- Click fraud detection
- Visitor alerts
Cons
- Steep learning curve
- Implementation can be hard
- Inaccurate data sampling
- UI is not easy to use
- No progressive payment plan
- Ecommerce reporting can be improved
- Hotjar is not available for mobile
- Steep pricing for large organisations
- Hard to exclude URLs from reports
- Limited free plan
Pricing information
Starting Price
| Standard | Free |
| GA4 360 | $50k+ per year |
| Core - 500k | €35 p/m |
| Enterprise | €366 p/m |
| Basic | Free |
| Plus | $49+ p/m |
| Business | On req. |
| Scale | On req. |
| Free | Free |
| 100k Page Views | €9+ p/m |
| 250k Page Views | €19+ p/m |
Free trial period
Free plan
Free plan
Free plan
30 days
Account Management
Trackable Items
100
10 sites or apps (free) Unlimited (Enterprise)
Unlimited
1
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)
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
Hotjar
Statcounter
Data Freshness
4-8 hours (most reports), up to 24-48 hours
30 min
30 minutes
Realtime
Data Retention
Customizable up to 14 months
Up to 25 months
12 months
Unlimited*
Data Sampling
Explorations might use sampled data
By default Piwik does not sample data
Data Import
Import cost, offline or user/client ID data
Import cost data, search keywords, user/client ID and audience data
Send user data to Hotjar to enhance analysis
Import Google keyword data
Data Export
With sheets, BigQuery or API
As CSV, XML, JSON, or via an API
Export recording meta data
To a spreadsheet or other third party software.
Compliance
- GDPR
- CCPA
- GDPR
- CCPA
- HIPAA
- LGPD
- ePrivacy
- PECR
- GDPR
- CCPA
- GDPR
Cookieless
Google Analytics relies on first-party cookies.
Piwik features a cookieless tracking option
Hotjar relies on first-party cookies.
Statcounter uses cookies
Alerts & Automation
Custom Alerts
Custom insights, in interface or via email
Email alerts based on thresholds
in the interface, via e-mail or Slack
Important visitor alerts
Email Reports
Recurring shared reporting
Daily, weekly or monthly reports
e.g. daily survey responses reports
Detailed, mobile-friendly reports
Reporting
Trend Reporting
Device Reporting
Device type, browser, OS and more
See on which device the user was
Device type, browser, OS & screen resolution
Funnel Reporting
Customisable funnel exploration
Detailed funnel report up to 5 steps
Discover why users drop off
User Flow Reporting
Flexible Sankey chart exploration
Standard, transition & reverse Sankey charts
Simple ordered list of pages visited
Segmentation
Segment creation and overlap exploration
Unlimited segments
Create custom filters for recordings
Cohort Reports
Cohort exploration
Retention Reporting
Combined with CLTV metrics
Customer loyalty eCommerce report
Attribution Reporting
Attribution models comparison
Multi-channel attribution with 98% accuracy
Simple referral & UTM sources
Ecommerce Reporting
Extensive e-commerce reports
Overview, order list, product, days and sessions to purchase & customer loyalty
User Experience Features
Heatmaps
GA4 does not offer heatmaps
Create an overlay with the site inspector Chrome extension
Unlimited
Session Recordings
GA4 does not offer recordings
Record all interaction with your site
Recordings with many filtering options
A/B Testing
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
200 slots for each scope and they can't be removed
Custom Metrics
50 event-scoped metrics
Also called Calculated metrics
Custom Reports
All reports are customisable
Custom Events
25 parameters per event
Include category, action, and optionally name and value
Track and filter sessions & heatmaps
Max 5 custom tags + values per page
Annotations
Notes feature added in 2024
Add to any graph or include them in scheduled reports or alerts
Hotjar does not have annotations
Support
Support description
Support is available via chat and the support center.
Piwik Pro offers extensive documentation and video tutorials. They have support offices for different regions which can be contacted by email and phone.
Hotjar offers extensive documentation and a ticketing support system. Most requests are answered within 1-2 business days, but often faster.
Statcounter offers various support options like phone, email, live chat, and an extensive knowledge base.
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