How we make this list: we compare pricing pages, product documentation and public user reviews. Ratings come from G2, Capterra or Trustpilot, with the date we checked them.
Key takeaways
- Microsoft Clarity is free, unlimited in practice, and good enough that every site should run it before paying anyone. It is the baseline of this category now.
- Hotjar is the name most teams know: heatmaps, recordings, and surveys in one friendly package, with paid plans reported from $39 per month.
- Crazy Egg and Lucky Orange serve smaller sites and stores that want answers without an analytics department, and Mouseflow adds form and funnel analysis.
- FullStory and Contentsquare are the enterprise tier, where heatmaps sit inside full session intelligence and the pricing is quoted.
- Privacy is part of the product choice: session recording watches real visitors, so consent handling, masking of form fields and personal data, and an honest privacy policy are requirements, not extras.
Quick comparison
| Tool | Best for | Starting price | Free plan |
|---|
 Microsoft Clarity | Free heatmaps for every site | Free | Yes |
 Hotjar | Heatmaps plus surveys and feedback | $39 per month | Yes |
 Crazy Egg | Simple reports for small sites | $29 per month | No |
 Mouseflow | Heatmaps with funnels and forms | See website | Yes |
 Lucky Orange | Stores that want live visitor insight | See website | No |
 Smartlook | Product and mobile app analytics | See website | Yes |
 FullStory | Enterprise session intelligence | See website | No |
 Contentsquare | Enterprise experience analytics | See website | No |
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Starting priceFree
Free planYes
Clarity changed this market by being free: heatmaps and recordings for unlimited sites, with smart frustration signals such as rage clicks surfaced without configuration. Most sites reading this page should install it today and learn what their visitors actually do before spending anything.
The trade off is breadth against depth and extras. Clarity watches and reports; it does not ask visitors anything, and its analysis stops where FullStory's begins. Clarity fits every website as the baseline, and small teams as the whole answer.
What we like- Completely free with no traffic caps in practice
- Click, scroll, and area heatmaps plus session recordings
- Rage click and dead click detection flags frustration automatically
- Five minute setup alongside any existing analytics
Watch out for- No surveys or feedback tools
- Analysis depth trails the enterprise platforms
- Data lives in Microsoft's cloud under its terms
#2Hotjar
Best for: Heatmaps plus surveys and feedback4.3/5 on
G2 (345 reviews, checked Oct 2026)
Visit hotjar.com
Starting price$39 per month
Free planYes
Hotjar is the tool most teams mean by heatmap software: watch the recordings, read the heatmap, and ask the visitor why through an on site survey, all in one place a marketer can run. Its free plan starts the habit; paid plans reported from $39 per month scale sessions and features.
The trade off is approachability against analytical ceiling. Hotjar fits marketing and product teams at small and mid size companies that want behavioural answers without hiring an analyst.
What we like- The friendliest interface in the category
- Heatmaps and recordings joined with surveys, feedback widgets, and user interviews
- A limited free plan
- Paid tiers reported from $39 per month
- Strong masking and privacy controls
Watch out for- Session limits on each tier meter growing sites
- Not a quantitative analytics replacement
- Enterprise depth sits below Contentsquare
#3Crazy Egg
Best for: Simple reports for small sites4.2/5 on
G2 (128 reviews, checked Oct 2026)
Visit crazyegg.com
Starting price$29 per month
Free planNo
Crazy Egg has sold the simple version of this category since 2005: take a Snapshot, see where people clicked and how far they scrolled, fix the obvious, and test the change with its built in A/B tool. For a small site owner that loop is the whole job.
The trade off is simplicity against modern range. Crazy Egg fits small businesses and solo site owners who want clear pictures and a testing tool without a platform to learn.
What we like- The original heatmap product, still the simplest to read
- Snapshots, recordings, and A/B testing in one subscription
- Plans reported from $29 per month
- Confetti reports segment clicks by source
Watch out for- Interface and feature pace feel dated beside Hotjar
- No free plan
- Depth for complex funnels is limited
#4Mouseflow
Best for: Heatmaps with funnels and forms4.6/5 on
G2 (691 reviews, checked Oct 2026)
Visit mouseflow.com
Starting priceSee website
Free planYes
Mouseflow is the analyst's mid range choice: every recording generates heatmaps by click, movement, scroll, and attention, and its form and funnel reports answer the conversion questions page level tools cannot. A free plan lets a small site start.
The trade off is depth against approachability. Mouseflow fits conversion focused teams, especially lead generation sites where form behaviour is the money question.
What we like- Six heatmap types including attention and movement
- Form analytics show which field kills submissions
- Funnel reports connect behaviour to drop off
- A free plan exists
- Strong privacy and masking options
Watch out for- Pricing tiers by sessions need checking against your traffic
- Interface carries more options than beginners want
- Smaller brand in the US
#5Lucky Orange
Best for: Stores that want live visitor insight4.6/5 on
G2 (389 reviews, checked Oct 2026)
Visit luckyorange.com
Starting priceSee website
Free planNo
Lucky Orange adds the present tense: watch a shopper hesitate on the checkout page now, see the form field they fight, and open a chat before they leave. For store owners that immediacy teaches more than a monthly report.
The trade off is immediacy against analytical depth. Lucky Orange fits ecommerce and small business sites that learn by watching customers and acting the same day.
What we like- Live view shows visitors on the site right now, with chat to reach them
- Recordings, heatmaps, form analytics, and polls in one plan
- Popular with Shopify and ecommerce stores
- Pricing historically simple by pageviews
Watch out for- Pricing and plan structure have changed over time, confirm current tiers
- Enterprise analysis depth is limited
- Live features tempt distraction over insight
#6Smartlook
Best for: Product and mobile app analytics4.6/5 on
G2 (874 reviews, checked Oct 2026)
Visit smartlook.com
Starting priceSee website
Free planYes
Smartlook watches web and app together: session recordings and heatmaps for the site, and the same behavioural lens inside iOS and Android apps, with events and funnels over both. Product teams with an app and a site stop running two tools.
The trade off is breadth across platforms against heatmap specialisation. Smartlook fits SaaS and product teams whose user journey crosses web and mobile and who want one recording of the whole story.
What we like- Covers websites and mobile apps in one tool, which most rivals split
- Recordings tied to events and funnels
- Always on recording means no sampling surprises
- Free plan available
Watch out for- Pricing moved upmarket and is tiered by sessions
- Heatmaps are one part of a wider product analytics pitch
- Smaller US presence
#7FullStory
Best for: Enterprise session intelligence4.5/5 on
G2 (1,052 reviews, checked Oct 2026)
Visit fullstory.com
Starting priceSee website
Free planNo
FullStory records everything, indexes it, and lets a team ask questions later that nobody thought to configure: show every session where a user saw this error, from this segment, this week. That retroactive search is why large product and support organisations pay enterprise prices for it.
The trade off is capability against cost and duty: total recording means total responsibility for masking and consent, which FullStory's tooling supports and your process must operate. FullStory fits larger digital businesses where experience questions arrive from every department.
What we like- Indexes every session so any moment is searchable later
- Frustration signals and behavioural analytics at enterprise scale
- Strong privacy tooling with element exclusion
- Connects experience data to support and product workflows
Watch out for- Enterprise pricing by quote
- Implementation and governance need ownership
- Power is wasted on a brochure site
Starting priceSee website
Free planNo
Contentsquare is where heatmaps grow up into experience analytics: every zone of every page scored for engagement and revenue contribution, journeys mapped across the estate, and AI surfacing the struggles. Its group now also owns Hotjar and Heap, which makes its roadmap the category's roadmap.
The trade off is analytical power against organisational weight. Contentsquare fits enterprise commerce and media businesses with the traffic and the team to act on zone level evidence.
What we like- The deepest experience analytics here, including zone based heatmaps that tie page areas to revenue
- Journey and struggle analysis across huge estates
- Merged with Hotjar and Heap under one group, reshaping the category
- Enterprise privacy and governance tooling
Watch out for- Enterprise contracts and implementation
- The platform's scale assumes an analytics team
- Product lines are consolidating after the mergers, so roadmap questions belong in procurement
How we chose
We compared the heatmap and session tools across the free, mid range, and enterprise tiers, requiring recordings as well as static heatmaps from every entry. Pricing was published where it is stable, Hotjar and Crazy Egg, set to free for Clarity, and marked See website where plans are session metered, restructured, or quoted. Privacy capability was a selection criterion, not a footnote: every tool listed offers text masking and element suppression, and we excluded cheap recorders with no credible privacy tooling.
Do the free step first: install Clarity, watch twenty recordings of your most important page, and write down what surprises you. If that answers your questions, stop; spend the budget on fixing what you saw. Buy Hotjar or Mouseflow when you need surveys, forms, and funnels joined to the pictures, or when session volume and team workflow outgrow the free tier. Buy FullStory or Contentsquare when the questions come from a whole organisation and need searching across millions of sessions. Whatever you choose, do the privacy work before the first recording: enable keystroke masking, suppress payment, health, and account elements, add recording to your privacy policy and consent flow, set a short retention period, and restrict who can view recordings. A heatmap tool is a camera pointed at your customers; run it like one.
Frequently asked questions
Are heatmap tools legal under GDPR and US privacy law?
They can be, run properly: disclose session recording in your privacy policy, obtain consent where your jurisdiction and setup require it, mask all text input and sensitive elements, and honour deletion requests. The tools provide the controls; the legal duty and the configuration are yours.
What is the difference between a heatmap and a session recording?
A heatmap aggregates many visits into one picture of clicks, movement, and scroll depth. A recording replays one visitor's session. Heatmaps show the pattern; recordings show the story, including the hesitation and backtracking the pattern cannot explain.
Is Microsoft Clarity really free?
Yes. Clarity is free with no session caps in practice, funded as part of Microsoft's advertising and analytics ecosystem. The honest costs are the standard ones: your data sits in Microsoft's cloud under its terms, and the analysis depth stops at the mid range.
How many recordings should I watch?
Fewer than you fear, if they are the right ones. Twenty to thirty recordings of one key page, filtered to the segment you care about, will surface the recurring problems. Teams waste hours watching random sessions; filter by page, behaviour, and frustration signals instead.
Do heatmaps work for mobile traffic?
Yes: every tool here separates device types, and scroll and tap behaviour on phones is usually the most revealing data, because mobile layouts hide content in ways desktop reviews never show. Smartlook extends the same approach into native apps.
Can heatmaps tell me why conversions are low?
They tell you where behaviour breaks: the unclicked button styled as text, the form field everyone abandons, the pricing table nobody scrolls to. The why often needs a survey or test on top, which is why Hotjar pairs recordings with feedback tools.
Sources we checked (0)
Is your product missing or out of date?
We review this list regularly. Vendors can request a listing, send updated pricing or ask about featured placement.
Shihab Mia · Founder, Rankite
Shihab has 5+ years in B2B and SaaS SEO. He writes Rankite's software buying guides from pricing pages, documentation and public user reviews. More about Shihab.