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Rating
4.5/5
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.
A free privacy focussed open-source web analytics tool, which gives you 100% data-ownership. You can even use Matomo without needing to ask for consent.
An open-source product analytics for developers. It helps engineers understand their product usage, automate events, and user data collection.
Pirsch is a simple, cookie-free, open-source web analytics solution that integrates easily into your website or backend.
Pros
  • GA4 is free to use
  • Many functionalities
  • The reports are customisable
  • Large community
  • Extensive documentation
  • GA4 is easily scalable
  • Data display
  • Flexible data visualisation
  • Engagement reporting
  • Privacy oriented
  • Easy to set up
  • Great interface design
  • Reasonable pricing
  • Good session recordings
  • 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
Cons
  • Steep learning curve
  • Implementation can be hard
  • Inaccurate data sampling
  • UI is not easy to use
  • Integrations
  • Branding method
  • Feature flags are limited
  • Limited amount of graph types
  • Filtering could be improved
  • Visitors are only recognized for up to 24 hours to comply with the privacy policy
  • Heatmaps and session recordings are not available

Pricing information

Starting Price
StandardFree
GA4 360$50k+ per year
On-PremiseFree
Cloud€19+ p/m
Cloud LiteFree
Cloud€0.005 per event / recording
Enterprise Cloud€450 p/m minimum
Free trial period
Free plan
21 days
Free plan
30 days

Account Management

Trackable Items
100
30
Unlimited
Unlimited
User Seats
Unlimited
Unlimited
Unlimited
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)
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
15 minutes or more
Realtime
Realtime
Data Retention
Customizable up to 14 months
Unlimited and customizable
Unlimited
Unlimited
Data Sampling
Explorations might use sampled data
Matomo doesn’t use data sampling
Data Import
Import cost, offline or user/client ID data
Import Google Analytics data, search keywords & server logs
Historical data ingestion
Import from Plausible, Fathom or Google Analytics
Data Export
With sheets, BigQuery or API
to CSV, XML, Json or Looker Studio or via HTTP API
via API or CSV
Compliance
  • GDPR
  • CCPA
  • GDPR
  • CCPA
  • ePrivacy
  • GDPR
  • CCPA
  • HIPAA
  • PECR
  • GDPR
  • CCPA
  • ePrivacy
  • PECR
Cookieless
Google Analytics relies on first-party cookies.
Matomo offers cookieless tracking.
Posthog has the option to be used without cookies
Pirsch Analytics does not use cookies

Alerts & Automation

Custom Alerts
Custom insights, in interface or via email
Receive alerts from every report by email or SMS
Receive alerts via Slack or email
Email Reports
Recurring shared reporting
Detailed daily, weekly and monthly reports
Subscribe to an Insight or dashboard
Daily, Weekly, Bi-weekly, Monthly

Reporting

Trend Reporting
Device Reporting
Device type, browser, OS and more
Device type, OS, Browser, Browser version, Screen size
Funnel Reporting
Customisable funnel exploration
Basic funnel reporting
Analyze Funnels
User Flow Reporting
Flexible Sankey chart exploration
With flexible Sankey chart
Entry and exit pages
Segmentation
Segment creation and overlap exploration
Based on visit, interaction, campaign, ecommerce, demographics & device
Extensive filtering by any metric
Cohort Reports
Cohort exploration
Analyse and segment by cohort
Retention Reporting
Combined with CLTV metrics
Attribution Reporting
Attribution models comparison
Model comparison report
Ecommerce Reporting
Extensive e-commerce reports
Possible with custom events and goals

User Experience Features

Heatmaps
GA4 does not offer heatmaps
Filter specific pages or hide elements on the page
Session Recordings
GA4 does not offer recordings
Record specific pages or only after activity or duration
A/B Testing
A/B Testing Platform (premium feature)
Feature flags and A/B testing
Tag-based A/B testing and segmentation
User Feedback
Surveys

Customizability

Custom Properties
25 user-scoped & 50 event-scoped dimensions
5-15 for each scope and can't delete them
As part of custom events
Custom Metrics
50 event-scoped metrics
Custom Reports
All reports are customisable
Flexible report design
Custom Events
25 parameters per event
With additional metadata fields (key-value pairs).
Annotations
Notes feature added in 2024
On any graph or via API

Support

Support description
Support is available via chat and the support center.
Matomo offers extensive documentation and video tutorials. Because Matomo is an open source product, you can also get help from a large community. Do you need personal help? Contact Matomo's support team for general issues or contact Innocraft for Matomo Cloud-hosted services.
Posthogs' support consists of an extensive knowledge base and community on their website. For enterprise users, support is also available trough a dedicated Slack channel and via e-mail.
Email support, public Discord server
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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