Hotjar Alternatives in 2026, Compared Honestly

By Colton, a co-founder of Cortality ·

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

Hotjar is now part of Contentsquare and no longer accepts new sign-ups. Here's what to use instead, and what heatmaps and recordings miss.

Hotjar is now part of Contentsquare, and Hotjar sign-ups are closed. "New users can sign up for free on Contentsquare" (Contentsquare). If you were about to sign up for Hotjar, or you're rethinking your setup, below are 8 alternatives compared honestly, including when free Microsoft Clarity is all you need.

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, one of the tools on this list. We've tried to be fair, and where a free tool is the better choice, we say so.

TL;DR

  • Hotjar no longer takes new sign-ups. Hotjar is now part of Contentsquare, and new users sign up for Contentsquare's free plan instead (source).
  • Best free alternative: Microsoft Clarity. It's free forever with no traffic limits, and it includes session recordings plus click and scroll heatmaps (Clarity FAQ). If watching recordings is all you need, start there and stop reading.
  • Closest like-for-like replacement: Contentsquare Free (200k sessions a month), or Mouseflow and Lucky Orange if you want a smaller, simpler paid tool.
  • For product teams: PostHog (free recordings every month, plus analytics and feature flags) or FullStory (a free plan, with paid plans by quote).
  • If you want a ranked list of what to fix instead of footage to watch: Cortality. It measures how real visitors use every part of a page, hands you the fixes in order, and re-measures each fix to tell you whether it worked. It's from $99/month, and the first week is free, with your first report before you pay.

Comparison table

Tool Free plan Paid from (as listed) What you get Best for
Microsoft Clarity Yes, free forever, no traffic limits None. There is no paid tier Session recordings, click and scroll heatmaps, rage and dead click insights, Copilot summaries Anyone who wants free recordings and heatmaps
Contentsquare (now includes Hotjar) Yes: 200k sessions/mo, 1 month of data, replays on 5% of sessions (max 10k) Growth $49/mo monthly or $39/mo billed yearly; Pro and Enterprise by quote Replays, heatmaps, funnels, surveys, error and performance monitoring, Sense AI Former Hotjar users and teams that want one big suite
Mouseflow Yes: 500 sessions/mo Essential $39/mo monthly ($25/mo yearly), 5,000 sessions Replays, click, scroll, attention and friction heatmaps, funnels, form analytics on higher tiers Small sites that want friction detection without a big suite
Lucky Orange 7-day free trial (we couldn't confirm a free plan) Build $39/mo monthly ($32/mo yearly), 3,500 sessions Every feature on every plan: dynamic heatmaps, recordings, surveys, live chat, funnels, form analytics Shopify and small e-commerce stores that want recordings plus live chat
Crazy Egg Yes: web analytics, instant heatmaps, surveys Starter $29/mo, billed yearly Heatmaps, recordings, A/B testing (from Plus, $99/mo), surveys, AI analysis Marketers who want heatmaps and simple A/B tests in one tool
FullStory Yes: 30,000 sessions/mo, 12 months of analytics, up to 10 users Business, Advanced and Enterprise by quote Session replay, product analytics, StoryAI on paid plans Product and engineering teams in larger companies
PostHog Yes: 5K recordings and 1M events a month; heatmaps on 3 pages Pay as you go above the free limits Replays, heatmaps, product analytics, feature flags, experiments, surveys Developer-led SaaS teams that want one open-source-friendly stack
Cortality Free page scan at /leak/ (a prediction, not a measurement). No free plan Starter $99/mo; Growth $249/mo; Scale $499/mo; Enterprise custom. Month to month Attention on every element as numbers, a ranked Fix List with the exact change, a before-and-after verdict on each fix Lead-gen sites, stores and SaaS that want to know what to change, especially sites too small to A/B test

What heatmaps and recordings miss

Heatmaps and session recordings are good at showing what happened. They leave three questions for you to answer:

  1. Which element is the problem? A heatmap shows where clicks and scrolls landed. It doesn't tell you that only 1 in 14 visitors noticed the headline above your form, or which of ten page elements is costing you the most.
  2. What exactly should I change? Recordings show people hesitating. Working out why and what to change means watching dozens of sessions and guessing.
  3. Did my fix work? Most small sites can't run an A/B test to significance, so teams ship a change and compare date ranges by eye.

If you have the time and the traffic to answer those yourself, a free tool plus a few hours a week is a perfectly good setup. If you don't, measure attention per element, rank the fixes, and re-measure after each change. That's the gap Cortality is built for.

Further reading: CRO without A/B testing: a guide for low-traffic sites · Why is my landing page not converting? 10 checks, in order

The alternatives, one by one

1. Microsoft Clarity: best free option

Best for: anyone who wants free recordings and heatmaps and is willing to watch them.

Clarity is "a free service forever," with "no traffic limits" and no paid upgrade (Clarity FAQ). You get session recordings, click and scroll maps, rage-click, dead-click and quick-back insights, and Copilot summaries of your heatmaps. Recordings are kept for 30 days, and heatmaps for up to 9 months.

Watch out for: Clarity uses first-party cookies, and visitors in the EEA, UK and Switzerland must consent first. Without consent, sessions are fragmented and full replays aren't available. Microsoft also says its AI summaries "shouldn't be treated as expert recommendations."

Our honest take: if you're replacing a free Hotjar plan, start with Clarity. It's what we'd tell a friend.

2. Contentsquare (Hotjar's new home): closest replacement

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

Hotjar is now part of Contentsquare, and Hotjar sign-ups are closed (source). Contentsquare's Free plan covers 200k monthly sessions with 1 month of data access. It records replays on 5% of sessions, up to 10k. Growth is $49/month monthly or $39/month paid yearly, and the trial needs no payment details (pricing). Voice of Customer (surveys) is priced separately from $79/month. Pro and Enterprise are sold through a call.

Watch out for: on Free and Growth, data stops when you hit your session limit until next month's reset.

3. Mouseflow: friction detection on a budget

Best for: small sites that want friction scoring and form analytics without an enterprise suite.

Mouseflow has a Free plan (500 sessions/month) and paid plans at $39, $149 and $399 a month billed monthly ($25, $109 and $319 billed yearly) for 5,000, 25,000 and 100,000 sessions (pricing). It offers click, scroll, attention, movement and friction heatmaps, plus funnels and journeys. The 14-day trial doesn't need a credit card.

Watch out for: when you run out of sessions, "all tracking will stop until your next refill date" unless you request a refill or upgrade.

4. Lucky Orange: recordings plus live chat

Best for: Shopify and small e-commerce stores.

Lucky Orange puts every feature on every plan: dynamic heatmaps, session recordings, surveys, live chat, live visitor view, funnels and form analytics. Build is $39/month monthly or $32/month yearly (3,500 sessions), and Grow is $72/month yearly (10,000 sessions). Expand ($249 monthly / $199 yearly) and Scale ($1,049 / $839) cover larger stores. There's a 7-day free trial (pricing). Its Discovery AI is an add-on.

5. Crazy Egg: heatmaps plus simple A/B tests

Best for: marketers who want heatmaps and A/B testing in one tool.

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

Watch out for: A/B testing only pays off if you have enough traffic to reach a clear result.

6. FullStory: product analytics depth

Best for: product and engineering teams at larger companies.

FullstoryFree is a permanent free plan with "30,000 sessions per month" and 12 months of analytics retention for up to 10 users, and it doesn't need a credit card (pricing). Business, Advanced and Enterprise prices are by request.

7. PostHog: the developer's all-in-one

Best for: developer-led SaaS teams that want replays, analytics, feature flags and experiments in one place.

PostHog's free tier renews every month: 5K session recordings and 1M analytics events, without a credit card (pricing). The free plan collects heatmap data for up to 3 pages you choose. Pay-as-you-go unlocks unlimited pages, and heatmap data doesn't add to your bill (heatmaps). Recordings are kept for 1 month on free and 90 days on pay-as-you-go.

8. Cortality: ranked fixes instead of footage

Best for: lead-gen sites, online stores and SaaS that want to know what to change, especially sites that can't run A/B tests to significance.

Cortality is not a heatmap. One tag measures how real visitors use every part of your page: what they notice, where they stop and what they skip, for every headline, image, button and form field. You don't get color maps to interpret. You get a Fix List in order of impact, and each finding has four lines: what was measured, why it costs you, the exact change, and how it'll be proven. When you ship a fix, Cortality re-measures on the same instrumentation and gives a plain verdict: Improved, Worse, No change, or Not enough data yet.

  • Example finding: "Only 1 in 14 visitors noticed the headline above this client's contact form."
  • Example result: form reach went from 26% to 56% in one week. That's one client's measured result, and results vary.
  • Honest sample sizes: counts always come with totals ("9 of 345"), there are no percentages from a base under 30, and weak evidence is labeled "worth testing."
  • Privacy: no cookies, no keystrokes, and form values are masked on the visitor's device before anything is sent (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. Billing is month to month with 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. If there's no report by day 30, you're never charged. Start your free week, and you can switch plans during the trial. Any charge can be refunded within 14 days, no reason needed (refunds).

Want to audit a landing page first? See the landing page CRO audit. Running a store? Try the Shopify product page audit checklist.

Watch out for: Cortality doesn't replace a full recordings suite. If you want to watch every session, keep Clarity. Many teams run both: Clarity shows what happened, and Cortality shows which part of the page caused it.

Not sure yet? Scan your page free. It takes about a minute, with no install needed. The free scan is a prediction of where visitors look, made by our attention model, plus an estimate of what fixing it is worth. The paid product measures real visitors.

How to choose

  • "I just want free recordings and heatmaps." → Microsoft Clarity.
  • "I used Hotjar and want the same thing." → Contentsquare Free.
  • "I want a small paid tool with friction scoring." → Mouseflow.
  • "I run a Shopify store and want live chat too." → Lucky Orange.
  • "I want heatmaps and A/B tests together, and I have the traffic." → Crazy Egg.
  • "I'm a product or engineering team." → PostHog or FullStory.
  • "I don't have time to watch recordings. Tell me what to fix and prove it worked." → Cortality, alongside Clarity if you like.

FAQ

Is Hotjar still available? Hotjar sign-ups are closed. Existing Hotjar accounts carry on. Hotjar is now part of Contentsquare, and new sign-ups go to Contentsquare's free plan (source).

What is the best free Hotjar alternative? Microsoft Clarity. It's free forever, has no traffic limits, and includes session recordings plus click and scroll heatmaps. Contentsquare Free (200k sessions a month) is the closest match to the old Hotjar experience.

Is Microsoft Clarity really free? Yes. Microsoft says Clarity is "a free service forever" with no traffic limits and no paid version. Recordings are kept for 30 days.

What do heatmaps and session recordings miss? They show where visitors clicked and scrolled, but you still have to work out which element is hurting conversions, what to change, and whether the change worked. On small sites, there's often too little traffic to see a clear pattern or run an A/B test.

Is Cortality just another heatmap product? No. Cortality measures how real visitors use every part of a page, ranks the fixes with the exact change for each, and re-measures to show whether each fix worked. Its only prediction is the free page scan at cortality.com/leak/.

How much does Cortality cost, and does the free week need a card? Starter is $99/month, Growth $249/month, Scale $499/month, and Enterprise is custom, all month to month. 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. Start your free week and get your first report before any charge. Any charge can be refunded within 14 days.

Can I use Cortality with Microsoft Clarity or Contentsquare? Yes. Cortality is designed to run alongside your analytics and recording tools. They show what happened, and Cortality shows which part of the page caused it and what to change.

Which tool works for a site with too little traffic to A/B test? Cortality is built for sites that can't run A/B tests to significance. It compares before and after on the same measurement and says "Not enough data yet" when the evidence is thin. With a free tool, you can also watch Clarity recordings of the one page that matters. Our guide to CRO without A/B testing walks through the method.

Sources (checked October 27, 2026)

Ready to see what your page is missing? 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

Best Heatmap Tools in 2026 (Prices Checked)The 7 best heatmap tools for 2026, prices checked Oct 2026. Clarity is the best free pick. When you need ranked fixes instead of a heatmap, here's why.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.