Best Heatmap Tools in 2026 (and When You Need Something Other Than a Heatmap)

By Colton, a co-founder of Cortality ·

Cortality: see why visitors do not buy, then fix it

Last updated: October 27, 2026. Prices were checked on each vendor's own pricing page that day. Prices are in USD as shown on those pages and change often, so confirm before you buy.

Disclosure: We make Cortality, which is included here as the alternative to a heatmap, not as another heatmap product. Where a no-cost tool is all you need, we say so.

TL;DR

  • Best free option: Microsoft Clarity. It's free forever with no traffic limits, and includes click and scroll heatmaps plus session recordings (Clarity FAQ).
  • Best all-in-one suite: Contentsquare, which now includes Hotjar. The free plan covers 200k sessions a month, and Growth starts at $39/month billed yearly (pricing).
  • Most heatmap types on a small budget: Mouseflow (click, scroll, attention, movement and friction heatmaps; free plan, paid from $39/month monthly).
  • Heatmaps plus A/B tests: Crazy Egg. For e-commerce with live chat: Lucky Orange. For developer-led SaaS: PostHog. For product teams: FullStory.
  • When a heatmap isn't the answer: if you'd rather get a ranked list of exactly what to change, with a re-measure that shows whether each fix worked, use Cortality. It isn't a heatmap. It measures how real visitors use every part of your page and returns the fixes in order. It's from $99/month, and the first week is free, with your first report before you pay.

Comparison table

Tool Heatmap types Free plan Paid from (as listed) Best for
Microsoft Clarity Click, scroll (plus rage and dead click insights) Yes, free forever, no traffic limits None. No paid tier Anyone who wants heatmaps and recordings at no cost
Contentsquare (incl. Hotjar) Heatmaps on Free; zone-based heatmaps from Growth Yes: 200k sessions/mo, 1 month of data Growth $49/mo monthly or $39/mo yearly Former Hotjar users; teams that want a full suite
Mouseflow Click, scroll, geo, attention, movement, interactive and friction (higher tiers) Yes: 500 sessions/mo Essential $39/mo monthly ($25/mo yearly) Small sites that want many heatmap types cheaply
Crazy Egg Heatmap reports (5 on Starter), plus recordings Yes: web analytics, instant heatmaps, surveys Starter $29/mo, billed yearly Marketers who want heatmaps and A/B tests together
Lucky Orange Dynamic heatmaps (all plans) 7-day free trial Build $39/mo monthly ($32/mo yearly) Shopify and small stores that also want live chat
PostHog Click, mouse movement and scroll (via toolbar) Yes: heatmaps on 3 pages; 5K recordings/mo Pay as you go above free limits Developer-led SaaS teams
FullStory Part of its replay and analytics platform Yes: 30,000 sessions/mo Paid plans by quote Product and engineering teams at larger companies
Cortality (not a heatmap) None. Attention on every element as numbers, a ranked Fix List, before-and-after verdicts Free page scan at /leak/ (a prediction). No free plan Starter $99/mo; Growth $249; Scale $499; Enterprise custom. Month to month Sites that want to know what to change and prove it worked, especially sites too small to A/B test

When a heatmap is enough, and when it isn't

A heatmap is enough when you have the time to read it, enough traffic for the colors to mean something, and a team that's comfortable turning "people don't scroll past the fold" into a specific change. For most people, that's Clarity, for free.

You need something other than a heatmap when:

  1. You can't tell which element is the problem. Heatmaps show click and scroll density, but they don't tell you that only 1 in 14 visitors noticed the headline above your form.
  2. You don't know what to change. A red blob on a button isn't an instruction.
  3. You can't prove the fix worked. Small sites rarely have the traffic to A/B test, so changes get judged by comparing date ranges by eye.

That's where Cortality fits. See our guide to CRO without A/B testing for the full method on a low-traffic site.

The tools, one by one

1. Microsoft Clarity: best free option for heatmaps

Best for: anyone starting out, and anyone who just needs heatmaps and recordings.

Clarity is "a free service forever" with "no traffic limits" (FAQ). It includes click and scroll maps, rage and dead click detection, session recordings, and Copilot heatmap summaries. Heatmaps are kept for up to 9 months, with up to 100,000 page views per heatmap. Recordings are kept for 30 days.

Watch out for: Clarity sets first-party cookies and needs visitor consent in the EEA, UK and Switzerland. Microsoft notes its AI summaries "shouldn't be treated as expert recommendations."

2. Contentsquare (now including Hotjar): best all-in-one suite

Best for: former Hotjar users and teams that want heatmaps, replays, funnels and surveys together.

Hotjar is now part of Contentsquare, and Hotjar sign-ups are closed (source). The Free plan includes heatmaps, replays and funnels on up to 200k monthly sessions with 1 month of data. Growth ($49/month monthly or $39/month yearly) adds zone-based heatmaps, heatmap summaries, side-by-side comparison and 13 months of data (pricing). Growth starts with a 15-day free trial that needs no payment details.

3. Mouseflow: most heatmap types for the money

Best for: small sites that want attention, movement and friction heatmaps without an enterprise contract.

Mouseflow has click, scroll, geo, attention, movement, interactive and friction heatmaps, with friction detection and funnels on top. Plans: Free (500 sessions), Essential $39/month (5,000), Advanced $149 (25,000) and Premium $399 (100,000) billed monthly, or $25, $109 and $319 billed yearly. The 14-day trial doesn't need a credit card (pricing).

4. Crazy Egg: heatmaps plus A/B testing

Best for: marketers with enough traffic to run A/B tests.

Crazy Egg has a Free plan with without a credit card, and paid plans at $29, $99, $249 and $599 a month, all billed yearly, with a 30-day trial (pricing). Starter gives 5 heatmap reports, 5,000 tracked pageviews and 50 recordings a month. A/B testing starts on Plus ($99/month).

5. Lucky Orange: heatmaps for online stores

Best for: Shopify and small e-commerce stores.

All Lucky Orange plans include dynamic heatmaps, recordings, surveys, live chat, funnels and form analytics. Build is $39/month monthly or $32/month yearly for 3,500 sessions, and there's a 7-day free trial (pricing).

6. PostHog: heatmaps inside a developer platform

Best for: SaaS teams that already use, or want, product analytics and feature flags.

PostHog heatmaps show clicks, mouse movement and scrolling, overlaid on your page through the PostHog toolbar. The free plan collects heatmap data for up to 3 pages, pay-as-you-go unlocks unlimited pages, and heatmap data doesn't add to the bill (heatmaps). The free tier also includes 5K recordings a month, without a credit card (pricing).

7. FullStory: enterprise product analytics

Best for: product and engineering teams at larger companies.

FullstoryFree includes 30,000 sessions a month and 12 months of analytics retention for up to 10 users, without a credit card. Paid plans (Business, Advanced, Enterprise) are priced by request (pricing).

The alternative: Cortality, when you want ranked fixes instead of a heatmap

Best for: lead-gen sites, stores and SaaS that want to be told what to change, in order, and shown whether it worked.

Cortality is not a heatmap. One tag measures how real visitors use every part of your page: every headline, image, button and form field. You get attention per element as numbers, not color maps to interpret. The output is a Fix List ranked by impact, and each finding has four lines: what was measured, why it costs you, the exact change, and how it'll be proven. After you ship a fix, Cortality re-measures on the same instrumentation and gives a verdict: Improved, Worse, No change, or Not enough data yet (how it works).

  • Example: "Only 1 in 14 visitors noticed the headline above this client's contact form."
  • Result: form reach went from 26% to 56% in one week. That's one client's measured result, and results vary.
  • Built for small traffic: counts always come with totals, there are no percentages from a base under 30, and thin evidence is labeled "worth testing."
  • Privacy: no cookies, no keystrokes, and form values are masked on the device (Trust Center).
  • Pricing: Starter $99/month (2,500 visitors, 1 page), Growth $249/month (10,000 visitors, 3 pages, session viewer), Scale $499/month (25,000 visitors, 5 pages), Enterprise custom. Month to month, no contract (pricing).
  • Free first week: you save a card at sign-up, and nothing is charged until 3 days after your first report, which comes once your page has 100 visitors. Cancel before then and you pay nothing. Start your free week, and you can switch plans any time. Any charge can be refunded within 14 days (refunds).
  • Want to audit a landing page first? See the landing page CRO audit.

Watch out for: if you want to watch individual sessions, keep Clarity running alongside it.

Try it with no commitment: Scan your page free. It takes about a minute, with no install needed. The free scan is a prediction of where visitors look, from our attention model. The paid product measures your real visitors.

How to choose

  • Free, and you'll read it yourself → Microsoft Clarity.
  • Full suite with surveys and funnels → Contentsquare.
  • Many heatmap types on a budget → Mouseflow.
  • Heatmaps plus A/B tests, and you have traffic → Crazy Egg.
  • Online store that wants live chat → Lucky Orange.
  • Developer-led SaaS → PostHog. Larger product org → FullStory.
  • You want the exact fixes, ranked, with proof they worked → Cortality (not a heatmap).

FAQ

What is the best free option for heatmaps? Microsoft Clarity. It's free forever with no traffic limits, and includes click and scroll heatmaps plus session recordings.

How much traffic does a heatmap need? More than most small sites think. With a few hundred visits, the colors mostly reflect noise. Look at counts, not just colors, and be wary of conclusions drawn from a handful of sessions.

Are heatmaps worth it for a small website? A free one is, for spotting obvious problems like a button nobody reaches. On a low-traffic site, though, it's hard to tell which change will help or to prove it worked. Our landing page checklist covers the checks to run first.

What's the difference between a heatmap and Cortality? A heatmap shows where clicks and scrolls landed, as colors. Cortality measures how real visitors use each element on the page, ranks the fixes with the exact change for each, and re-measures to show whether each fix worked. Cortality is not a heatmap.

Is Cortality's data predicted by AI? No. The paid product measures real visitors on your page. Only the free page scan at cortality.com/leak/ is a prediction, and it's labeled as one.

Does Cortality's free week need a credit card? Yes. You save a card at sign-up, but nothing is charged until 3 days after your first report. Cancel before then and you pay nothing. If there's no report by day 30, you're never charged. The free /leak/ page scan takes about a minute, with no install needed.

Is Hotjar still one of the best heatmap tools? Hotjar sign-ups are closed, and its features now live in Contentsquare. Contentsquare's free plan is the closest equivalent.

Sources (checked October 27, 2026)

See what a heatmap won't tell you. Scan your page free: a one-minute prediction with no install needed. Or start your free week. You see your first report before you pay.

Keep reading

Hotjar Alternatives in 2026, Compared HonestlyHotjar now lives inside Contentsquare. See 8 alternatives with prices checked Oct 2026, when free Microsoft Clarity is enough, and what recordings miss.Contentsquare Alternatives in 2026, Compared HonestlyContentsquare now includes Hotjar and runs from a free plan to enterprise contracts. Here's what to use instead, depending on why you're leaving.Lucky Orange Alternatives in 2026, Compared HonestlyLucky Orange bundles recordings, heatmaps, surveys and live chat. Here's what to use instead, depending on why you're looking.