# The best conversion rate optimization tools in 2026, grouped by job _Updated 2026-10-11_ Conversion rate optimization tools do five different jobs: measure what happens, show how visitors behave, ask them why, build new pages and offers, and prove which change earns more. No single tool does all five well, so this guide sorts 15 CRO tools by the job each one does, with prices checked on October 11, 2026, and shows how to build a working stack for $39 a month. If you already know you need a testing tool, our [A/B testing tools guide](https://www.otterab.com/ab-testing-tools) goes deeper on that one job. > Otter makes Otter, the A/B testing tool listed first. We assessed every tool, Otter included, from its own pricing page and documentation on October 11, 2026, and we list Otter's limits as plainly as everyone else's. ## Quick picks - **Best A/B testing at a flat price:** Otter - **Best free measurement:** Google Analytics 4 and Tag Manager - **Best free heatmaps and recordings:** Microsoft Clarity - **Best replays and surveys from one vendor:** Contentsquare (formerly Hotjar) - **Best heatmaps plus simple A/B tests:** Crazy Egg - **Best low-cost all-in-one suite:** Zoho PageSense - **Best on-site surveys:** Qualaroo - **Best landing page builder with testing:** Unbounce - **Best prototype testing:** Maze ## Comparison table | Tool | Category | Starting price | Free plan | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | Otter | A/B testing | $39/mo, unlimited visitors | No (14-day trial) | | Google Analytics 4 and Tag Manager | Measurement and tags | Free | Yes | | Microsoft Clarity | Behavior analytics | Free | Yes (no paid tier) | | Contentsquare (formerly Hotjar) | Behavior analytics and surveys | $49/mo (annual) | Yes (replays on 5% of sessions) | | Crazy Egg | Behavior analytics and A/B testing | $29/mo (annual); testing from $99/mo | Yes (no A/B testing) | | Zoho PageSense | All-in-one SMB suite | $12/mo (yearly); testing from $29.42/mo | Yes (5,000 tracked users) | | Lucky Orange | Behavior analytics | $32/mo (annual) | No (7-day trial) | | Mouseflow | Behavior analytics | EUR 25/mo (annual) | Yes (500 sessions/mo) | | Unbounce | Landing pages | $22/mo (annual); testing from $112/mo | No (14-day trial) | | OptinMonster | Popups and lead capture | $9/mo (first year, annual) | No (14-day money-back) | | Qualaroo | On-site surveys | $49.99/mo (annual) | Yes (50 responses) | | Fullstory | Behavior and product analytics | Not published | Yes (30,000 sessions/mo) | | VWO (now Wingify) | Experimentation suite | Not published | No (30-day trial) | | Maze | User testing | $99/mo | Yes (1 study/mo) | | UserTesting | User testing | Not published | No (one free test) | ## 1. Otter: proving which change earns more, at a flat price Otter is the A/B testing tool we make. It installs with one async script tag and runs split URL (redirect) tests, A/B/n tests built in a visual editor on your live site, targeted personalization, and WordPress whole-theme tests through its plugin. Goals can be pageviews, clicks, custom JavaScript events, GTM dataLayer events, revenue or imported GA4 events, and results show revenue per visitor and average order value for every variant. Otter has no heatmaps, recordings or surveys, so pair it with a research tool from this list. **Pricing:** Starter $39/mo (1 project), Growth $79/mo (5 projects), Scale $149/mo (unlimited projects). Priced per project, with unlimited visitors and unlimited tests on every plan. Annual billing saves 20%. 14-day free trial, no credit card. **Strengths:** - Flat per-project pricing with unlimited visitors and tests, so a traffic spike doesn't change the bill. - Revenue per visitor and average order value per variant, captured from Shopify, WooCommerce or a JavaScript call on any site. - Uses imported GA4 events as goals and sends impressions and conversions to GA4 and the GTM dataLayer. - REST API and a hosted MCP server on every plan, so Claude, Cursor or another MCP client can draft tests and read results. **Limitations:** - No heatmaps, session recordings or surveys; you need a separate research tool for that job. - No free plan, only a 14-day trial. - Browser-based only: no server-side or mobile SDKs, no feature flags, and split URL redirects run client-side. - On Shopify, revenue capture needs opt-out consent mode, and Otter can't test checkout or the price charged. Website: https://www.otterab.com ## 2. Google Analytics 4 and Tag Manager: free baseline measurement and tag deployment Google Analytics 4 is the free measurement layer most CRO work starts from: traffic, key events (conversions), explorations and funnel reports across web and app. Google Tag Manager, also free, adds and updates analytics, ad and testing tags without code changes, with preview and debug tools. Neither one tests anything. Google Optimize shut down on September 30, 2023, and Google now points to third-party testing tools that integrate with Analytics. **Pricing:** Free for standard GA4 properties and Tag Manager. Analytics 360 and Tag Manager 360 prices are not published. **Strengths:** - Free, with web and app measurement in one property. - Native links to Google Ads, Search Console and Google Cloud. - Tag Manager's preview, debug and workspaces let marketers ship tags without a code release. **Limitations:** - No A/B testing since Google Optimize shut down on September 30, 2023. - On the free tier, event-level data for explorations and funnels is kept for 14 months at most. - Tag Manager deploys tags but analyzes nothing itself. Website: https://marketingplatform.google.com/about/analytics/ ## 3. Microsoft Clarity: free heatmaps and session recordings Microsoft Clarity records sessions, builds click, scroll, area and conversion heatmaps, flags rage clicks and dead clicks, and summarizes sessions with Copilot. Microsoft says it is free forever, with no paid version to upgrade to and no sampling. Free doesn't mean unlimited: recording caps at 100,000 sessions per project per day, and most recordings are deleted after 30 days. For most sites it is the first research tool to install. **Pricing:** Free. No paid plan exists. Caps: up to 100,000 recorded sessions per project per day, most recordings kept 30 days, and heatmaps cover up to 100,000 pageviews each. **Strengths:** - No cost and no paid tier to outgrow; Microsoft says it doesn't sample traffic. - Unlimited heatmaps, websites and team members, per its pricing page. - Built-in Google Analytics integration brings GA segments into Recordings. **Limitations:** - Most recordings are deleted after 30 days; favorites and a random sample are kept up to 9 months. - Needs an explicit consent signal for visitors in the EEA, UK and Switzerland, or full replays aren't available. - Microsoft says it is free partly because anonymous behavior data improves its ML models, and it shouldn't be used on sites aimed at under-18s. Website: https://clarity.microsoft.com ## 4. Contentsquare (formerly Hotjar): heatmaps, replays and surveys from one vendor Hotjar is now part of Contentsquare: hotjar.com redirects there, and new Hotjar accounts can no longer be created. Contentsquare sells Experience Analytics (heatmaps, session replay, funnels, journey analysis, error and performance monitoring) and Voice of Customer (surveys and feedback widgets) as separately priced products, each with a free tier. The free plan analyzes up to 200,000 sessions a month but records replays for only 5% of them, 10,000 at most. **Pricing:** Free plan. Experience Analytics Growth from $49/mo billed annually for 7,000 monthly sessions ($159/mo for 30,000). Voice of Customer Growth from $99/mo billed annually. Pro and Enterprise not published. 15-day Growth trial, no payment details. **Strengths:** - Free plan analyzes up to 200,000 sessions a month with heatmaps, funnels and error monitoring. - Survey answers can be paired with the session replay behind them. - Lists integrations with Optimizely, AB Tasty and Kameleoon for replaying sessions by test variation. **Limitations:** - Free records replays for only 5% of sessions; Growth records all of them up to 20,000, then 15%. - On Free and Growth, hitting the session cap stops new heatmap and funnel data until the monthly reset. - Surveys are billed as a separate product, and Pro and Enterprise prices aren't published. Website: https://contentsquare.com ## 5. Crazy Egg: heatmaps, recordings and simple A/B tests in one plan Crazy Egg pioneered click heatmaps in 2005 and now bundles heatmaps, session recordings, web and conversion analytics, funnels, surveys, popup CTAs, error tracking and A/B testing in one subscription with unlimited domains and seats. Plans are priced by tracked pageviews, counting only the pages you track or test. A/B testing, from the Plus plan, includes a visual editor, split URL tests, optional bandit allocation and a chi-squared significance test. **Pricing:** Free plan without A/B testing. Starter $29/mo for 5,000 tracked pageviews. A/B testing from Plus at $99/mo for 150,000 tracked pageviews. All plans billed annually. 30-day trial, card required. **Strengths:** - One subscription covers heatmaps, recordings, surveys and, from Plus, A/B testing, with unlimited domains and seats. - Published prices and a 'no overages, ever' policy. - Sends variant-view events to GA4 and can score tests on client-side GA4 events. **Limitations:** - A/B testing starts at $99/mo billed annually; Free and Starter have no testing. - Test traffic counts against the pageview cap, and testing pauses at the cap until the next month. - Statistics are a single chi-squared test, and Crazy Egg doesn't document revenue or AOV metrics in A/B reports. Website: https://www.crazyegg.com Full comparison: https://www.otterab.com/compare/crazy-egg ## 6. Zoho PageSense: small teams that want one low-cost suite Zoho PageSense bundles web analytics, goals, funnels, heatmaps, session recording and form analytics, then adds polls, pop-ups, banners and push notifications on its Professional plan. A/B, split URL and full-stack testing plus personalization arrive only on Enterprise, with Bayesian or frequentist analysis and Thompson Sampling bandits. Plans are priced by monthly tracked users, and running experiments pause if you go over until you buy a top-up. **Pricing:** Forever Free up to 5,000 monthly tracked users. At 10,000 tracked users: Professional $20/mo ($12/mo billed yearly); Enterprise, the first plan with A/B testing, $49/mo ($29.42/mo billed yearly). 15-day trial, no card. **Strengths:** - Free plan includes heatmaps, session recording, funnels and form analytics. - Low entry price for a suite that covers research, pop-ups and testing. - Connects to Zoho CRM and the rest of the Zoho suite, plus a WordPress plugin. **Limitations:** - A/B testing and personalization need Enterprise; Free and Professional can't run experiments. - Going over your monthly tracked users pauses running experiments. - Free keeps 1 month of data on a single project with 5 goals. Website: https://www.zoho.com/pagesense/ ## 7. Lucky Orange: every research feature, plus live chat, on every plan Lucky Orange bundles dynamic heatmaps, session recordings, conversion funnels, page and form analytics, surveys and announcements, live chat and a live view of who is on your site. Every feature is on every plan, so tiers differ only by monthly sessions tracked. Extra data storage, extra websites and its Discovery AI are sold as add-ons. **Pricing:** Build $39/mo, or $32/mo paid annually, for 3,500 sessions/month. Grow $72/mo paid annually for 10,000 sessions. Expand from $199/mo paid annually. Extra websites $5 each. 7-day trial. **Strengths:** - Tiers change only the session count, never the feature set. - Unlimited team members on all plans. - Live chat, surveys and a live visitor view alongside heatmaps and recordings. **Limitations:** - No free plan on the pricing page, only a 7-day trial. - Base storage is 60 days; 90, 180 and 365 days cost extra. - Discovery AI is an add-on in the plan table. Website: https://www.luckyorange.com ## 8. Mouseflow: friction detection and form analytics on a small budget Mouseflow records sessions and builds click, scroll, geo, attention and movement heatmaps, then adds funnels, journey analytics, form analytics, friction detection and feedback surveys. It also has an AI assistant, a REST API and an MCP connector. Plans are metered by monthly sessions, include unlimited users and are priced in euros. When the allowance runs out, tracking stops until the next refill unless you buy more. **Pricing:** Free forever for 500 sessions/month. Essential EUR 39/mo, or EUR 25/mo billed annually, for 5,000 sessions/month. Advanced EUR 109/mo billed annually for 25,000 sessions. 14-day trial, no card. **Strengths:** - Free-forever plan plus a 14-day full-feature trial with no card. - Unlimited users on every plan. - Friction detection, form analytics and journey analytics go beyond basic heatmaps. **Limitations:** - Tracking stops entirely when the monthly session allowance runs out. - The free plan is small: 500 sessions a month and 1 month of retention. - The pricing page doesn't show which tier includes form analytics, the API or SSO. Website: https://mouseflow.com ## 9. Unbounce: paid-traffic landing pages with built-in A/B tests Unbounce is a drag-and-drop landing page builder with lead-gen forms, popups and sticky bars, AI copywriting and 1,000+ integrations. A/B testing lives inside the builder: duplicate a variant, set traffic weights and promote the winner, with significance from a chi-square test. Smart Traffic, on Optimize and above, uses a contextual multi-armed bandit to send each visitor to the variant most likely to convert. Plans cap monthly visitors; conversions are unlimited. **Pricing:** Starter $29/mo ($22/mo annually) for 5 pages and 500 visitors/month. A/B testing from Experiment at $149/mo ($112/mo annually) for 30,000 visitors. Smart Traffic from Optimize at $249/mo ($187/mo annually). 14-day trial, no card. **Strengths:** - Testing is built into the page builder, with no separate testing script. - Unlimited conversions and hosting on every plan, plus an MCP server for AI assistants. - Smart Traffic starts optimizing after 30 visitors. **Limitations:** - A/B testing needs the Experiment plan or higher. - Tests cover pages, popups and sticky bars built in Unbounce, not your existing site. - Visitor caps (500 on Starter, 30,000 on Experiment) with billed overages. Website: https://unbounce.com ## 10. OptinMonster: popups and exit-intent offers that grow an email list OptinMonster builds lightbox popups, floating bars, inline and sidebar forms, slide-ins, fullscreen overlays and coupon wheels, with page, time and scroll targeting and 700+ templates. Plus adds A/B testing of campaigns, Pro adds Exit Intent and revenue attribution, and Growth adds geolocation and onsite retargeting. Plans are metered on campaign impressions and sites, and first-year annual prices are introductory. **Pricing:** Basic $9/mo introductory ($108 for the first year, renews at $210/yr) or $21/mo monthly for 2,500 impressions. A/B testing from Plus ($27/mo intro, $57/mo monthly). Exit Intent from Pro ($37/mo intro, $87/mo monthly). **Strengths:** - Wide range of campaign types and 700+ templates. - A/B testing of campaigns from the Plus plan. - Exit-intent, cart and form abandonment targeting, and revenue attribution, on Pro. **Limitations:** - First-year prices are introductory; renewals run at full price, roughly double. - Exit Intent, its signature feature, needs Pro or higher. - Going over your impressions moves you up a tier automatically, and there's no free plan or stated trial, only a 14-day money-back guarantee. Website: https://optinmonster.com ## 11. Qualaroo: targeted on-site surveys and exit-intent questions Qualaroo, a ProProfs product, shows short 'Nudge' surveys on websites, in iOS and Android apps, on prototypes, and by email or link. Targeting covers identity, behavior, cookies, custom properties and location, with branching logic, NPS, CSAT and CES, and sentiment analysis by IBM Watson. The Business plan, the first that lists website Nudges, adds exit-intent triggers, heatmaps and session replay. **Pricing:** Free for 50 responses in total. Business $69.99/mo, or $49.99/mo billed annually, for 100,000 pageviews/month and unlimited responses. Enterprise from $149.99/mo, annual only. Metered on pageviews where a Nudge shows, plus email sends. **Strengths:** - Targeting by behavior, identity, cookies, custom properties and location, plus exit intent. - Works on the web, in iOS and Android apps, on prototypes and by email. - Unlimited domains, admins and creators. **Limitations:** - The free plan stops at 50 responses in total. - The cheaper Essentials plan appears to be ProProfs Survey Maker, and whether it includes on-site Nudges is unclear. - Enterprise is annual-only, and the pricing page shows strikethrough 'list' prices. Website: https://qualaroo.com ## 12. Fullstory: product teams that want replay and product analytics together Fullstory pairs session replay, heatmaps and click and scroll maps with product analytics (funnels, journeys, retention and segmentation) built on autocapture. FullstoryFree covers 30,000 sessions a month with 12 months of retention for up to 10 users, a bigger free replay allowance than most tools here. Paid plans (Business, Advanced and Enterprise) are sold through sales, with mobile, StoryAI agents and Guides and Surveys as add-ons. **Pricing:** FullstoryFree: 30,000 sessions/month, 12 months retention, up to 10 users, no card. Business, Advanced and Enterprise prices are not published. **Strengths:** - Large free plan: 30,000 sessions a month with 12 months of retention. - Replay and product analytics in one tool. - Says private and sensitive data is excluded by default. **Limitations:** - Paid pricing is not published. - On the free plan, Fullstory holds rights to anonymized non-PII data and may use it to train AI models; paid customers keep full ownership. - Email support is paid-only, and mobile and surveys are add-ons. Website: https://www.fullstory.com ## 13. VWO (now Wingify): enterprise teams buying testing, personalization and analytics together VWO is now part of Wingify, formed when VWO and AB Tasty merged (announced January 20, 2026; the Wingify brand launched in September 2026), and vwo.com redirects to wingify.com. Its Web Experimentation & Rollout plans include a visual and code editor, A/B and split URL tests, multi-armed bandits, and fixed-horizon or sequential statistics. The same vendor sells personalization, feature management, behavior analytics and user feedback. Every plan is a custom proposal after a demo. **Pricing:** Not published; custom proposals metered on monthly active users. Third-party estimate: Vendr reports a median contract of $16,330/yr (range $7,820 to $35,790). 30-day free trial, no card. **Strengths:** - Mature visual testing with bandits, rollouts, and fixed-horizon or sequential statistics on every plan. - One vendor for testing, personalization, feature management, behavior analytics and feedback. - 30-day free trial with no credit card, and data storage in the US, EU or India. **Limitations:** - No published prices; every plan routes to a demo. - Multivariate tests and SRM detection need Pro; API access and SSO need Enterprise. - GA4 conversions can't be used directly as goals, and the VWO-to-Wingify transition is still under way. Website: https://wingify.com Full comparison: https://www.otterab.com/compare/vwo ## 14. Maze: unmoderated prototype and usability tests Maze is a user research platform for prototype tests, surveys, usability and information-architecture tests, live website and mobile tests, and moderated and AI-moderated interviews, with automated reports. Recruit from its participant panel with demographic targeting or bring your own participants. For CRO, it answers a question analytics can't: do people understand a new page or flow before you spend traffic testing it? **Pricing:** Free: 1 study/month, 5 seats. Starter $99 per month (the page doesn't state the billing period) for 1 study/month. Enterprise custom. Panel participants are pay-per-use credits on Free and Starter. **Strengths:** - Free plan for trying prototype tests and surveys. - Panel recruitment with demographic targeting, or bring your own participants. - Automated, shareable reports. **Limitations:** - Free and Starter are both limited to 1 study a month. - AI moderator, moderated interviews, card sorting and the AI study builder are Enterprise-only. - Panel participants cost extra on Free and Starter. Website: https://maze.co ## 15. UserTesting: video think-aloud research at enterprise scale UserTesting runs unmoderated tests (surveys, interaction tests and think-out-loud sessions) and moderated Live Conversation interviews with a panel across 60+ countries, then adds AI insight summaries, sentiment analysis, path flows and click maps. Editions are Advanced, Ultimate and Ultimate+, sold as test-based consumption or team-based unlimited plans. You can run one free test that returns a video of a real person reviewing your website. **Pricing:** Not published; annual subscription through sales, priced by users, test types and features. One free website review test. **Strengths:** - Large panel across 60+ countries, with video think-aloud and live interviews. - Lists SOC 2, ISO 27001, GDPR and HIPAA compliance. - Unlimited users with no per-seat charges. **Limitations:** - No published pricing, and it's sold as an annual subscription. - Card sorting, tree testing, AI test creation and custom audiences aren't in the Advanced edition. Website: https://www.usertesting.com ## What conversion rate optimization tools do: five jobs Conversion rate optimization is a loop: measure where visitors drop off, find out why, design a fix, and prove the fix works before it goes to everyone. Conversion optimization tools each cover part of that loop. Lists that rank twenty tools on one scale hide this, which is how teams end up with three heatmap tools and no way to test anything. Measurement tells you what happened: traffic, conversions and the funnel steps where people leave. GA4 and Tag Manager do this for free. Behavior analytics shows how people use a page through heatmaps, session recordings, rage clicks and form drop-off. Clarity, Contentsquare, Crazy Egg, Lucky Orange, Mouseflow and Fullstory sit here. Voice-of-customer tools ask. On-site surveys such as Qualaroo catch visitors at the moment they hesitate, and user testing platforms such as Maze and UserTesting record real people working through a page or prototype. Landing page and popup builders such as Unbounce and OptinMonster let marketers ship new pages and offers without a developer. Experimentation tools split traffic between versions and run a statistical test to show which one converts or earns more. Otter and VWO are built for this, and Crazy Egg, Zoho PageSense and Unbounce include testing on their higher plans. All-in-one suites cover several jobs with less depth in each, which can be the right trade for a small team that wants one login and one bill. ## How to build a CRO stack on a budget Start with the free layer. GA4 and Tag Manager handle measurement, and Microsoft Clarity handles heatmaps and recordings within its caps. Contentsquare's free plan adds 100 survey responses a month if you want to ask visitors a question, such as what stopped them from buying. That covers three of the five jobs for $0. Then add one testing tool, because research shows you a problem but only a controlled test shows whether your fix worked. Our [A/B testing tools guide](https://www.otterab.com/ab-testing-tools) compares the options in depth. Otter costs $39 a month for one site, or $31 a month billed annually, with no visitor cap. A GA4, Clarity and Otter stack therefore costs $39 a month for measurement, behavior analytics and unlimited A/B tests. If you'd rather have one product, Zoho PageSense Enterprise covers analytics, heatmaps, recordings, pop-ups and A/B testing for $29.42 a month billed yearly at 10,000 monthly tracked users. Crazy Egg Plus bundles heatmaps, recordings, surveys and A/B testing for $99 a month billed annually at 150,000 tracked pageviews. Both pause testing when you pass the cap, so size the plan to your busiest month, not your average one. Pay for more only when a free allowance becomes the bottleneck. Upgrade surveys when 100 responses a month is too few, and add a user testing tool when you're about to redesign a key page and want to watch real people try it first. ## Why research tools aren't enough without testing Heatmaps and recordings are good at finding problems. A recording of a visitor rage-clicking a button that doesn't respond is hard to argue with. But you watch a handful of sessions, not your whole audience, and a redesign that looks better in recordings can still sell less. An A/B test answers the question research can't. Part of your traffic sees the current page, part sees the fix, and a statistical test tells you whether the difference is bigger than chance. The working pattern is simple: find the problem with behavior analytics, write the hypothesis down, then prove the fix with a test before you roll it out. Measure the outcome that pays the bills. Otter reports revenue per visitor and average order value for every variant next to conversion rate, and a revenue goal can be the test's primary goal, so the verdict rests on revenue rather than clicks. See the [Otter feature overview](https://www.otterab.com/features) for how results are reported, or [Otter pricing](https://www.otterab.com/pricing) to compare costs. ## How to choose conversion rate optimization software Start with your traffic. A test needs enough visitors to detect the change you care about, and smaller lifts need far more visitors. A page converting at 3% needs roughly 14,000 visitors per variant to detect a 20% relative lift (3% to 3.6%) at 95% significance and 80% power. Run your own numbers in the [sample size calculator](https://www.otterab.com/free-tools/sample-size-calculator) before you pay for a testing tool. If a test would take months, put the budget into research and bigger changes first. Then look at what each piece of CRO software meters. Contentsquare, Lucky Orange and Mouseflow charge by monthly sessions, Crazy Egg by tracked pageviews, Zoho PageSense by monthly tracked users, VWO by monthly active users, Unbounce by unique visitors, OptinMonster by campaign impressions and Qualaroo by pageviews where a survey shows. Otter charges a flat price per project with unlimited visitors. Metered pricing is cheap at low traffic and climbs as you grow; flat pricing is easier to budget but costs the same in a quiet month. Check what happens at the limit. Mouseflow stops tracking until the next refill. Contentsquare's Free and Growth plans stop new heatmap and funnel data until the monthly reset. Crazy Egg pauses heatmaps and A/B testing until the next month, Zoho PageSense pauses running experiments, OptinMonster moves you up a tier and Unbounce bills a one-time overage. A testing tool that pauses mid-experiment can cost you weeks of data. Finally, check privacy and consent. Recording tools capture more than analytics does, so your consent setup needs to cover them. Clarity needs an explicit consent signal for visitors in the EEA, UK and Switzerland, or full replays aren't available. FullstoryFree gives Fullstory rights to anonymized non-PII data. Otter's opt-in consent mode keeps it dormant, with no cookie and no request, until a visitor agrees, and it works with Cookiebot, OneTrust, CookieYes, Complianz, iubenda, Usercentrics and Google Consent Mode. ## Common mistakes with website optimization tools Tool sprawl. Three tools that all record sessions means three scripts on every page, three entries in your consent banner and three bills, and usually nobody watching the recordings. Pick one tool per job, and cancel any tool nobody has opened in a month. Testing without enough traffic. A low-traffic site running small copy tests waits months for a result, then often stops early and ships noise. Check the sample size first, test bigger changes, and lean on research and user testing while traffic is thin. Optimizing conversion rate while revenue falls. A discount popup can lift orders while shrinking average order value, and a louder add-to-cart button can raise clicks without raising purchases. Track revenue per visitor next to conversion rate, and choose the metric that pays the bills as the primary goal before the test starts. Calling winners too early. Checking a test every morning and stopping the first day it crosses your threshold inflates false wins. Decide the sample size up front and let the test reach it. ## CRO tools for Shopify, WordPress and landing pages On Shopify, Otter runs on the storefront and captures order revenue through a Custom Pixel, which needs opt-out consent mode. It has no Shopify app and can't test checkout or the price charged; Shopify-only apps such as Shoplift and Intelligems handle price tests. Crazy Egg's Shopify integration counts Add to Cart by default, while its checkout conversions need a custom pixel and Shopify Plus. Our [Shopify A/B testing](https://www.otterab.com/ab-testing/shopify) page has the setup detail. On WordPress, Otter's plugin captures WooCommerce revenue and runs whole-theme tests, and Zoho PageSense has a WordPress plugin that installs its tracking code; see [WordPress A/B testing](https://www.otterab.com/ab-testing/wordpress). For paid-traffic campaigns, Unbounce builds and tests landing pages in one tool. If your landing pages already live on your own site, [landing page A/B testing](https://www.otterab.com/ab-testing/landing-pages) covers testing them where they are. ## How we compared We grouped tools by the CRO job they do instead of ranking them on one scale, because a heatmap tool and a testing tool don't compete. Otter is listed first because this is our guide. The rest are ordered by how broadly useful each is to a typical website team, with free, general-purpose tools ahead of specialist and enterprise ones. Every price and plan limit comes from the vendor's own pricing page, checked on October 11, 2026. Where a vendor shows monthly and annual prices, we give both or say which one we quote. Zoho PageSense prices come from the US-dollar pricing data its own page loads, and Mouseflow's page declares euros, so we quote euros. Where a vendor publishes no price, we say so; the one third-party figure on this page, Vendr's VWO contract estimate, is labeled as an estimate. Strengths and limitations come from vendor pricing pages and documentation, not review sites. For Otter, every claim traces to the product's code and documentation, and we list what Otter doesn't do, such as heatmaps, recordings, surveys and server-side testing, as plainly as we list everyone else's limits. Two tools changed names recently. Hotjar no longer takes new accounts: hotjar.com redirects to Contentsquare, which announced its acquisition of Hotjar in September 2021. VWO now redirects to Wingify after its merger with AB Tasty. We list each under the name you can buy today. Prices were checked on October 11, 2026 against each vendor's own pricing page, in US dollars unless marked EUR, and vendors change prices and plan limits often, so confirm on the vendor's site before you buy. ## Try Otter free for 14 days No credit card required. No visitor limits. Set up in under 5 minutes. - [Start Free Trial](https://www.otterab.com/signup) - [View Pricing](https://www.otterab.com/pricing) ## Frequently asked questions ### What are the best conversion rate optimization tools? It depends on the job. For measurement, Google Analytics 4 and Tag Manager are free. For heatmaps and recordings, Microsoft Clarity is free, and Contentsquare (formerly Hotjar), Crazy Egg, Lucky Orange, Mouseflow and Fullstory add funnels, surveys or bigger allowances. Qualaroo handles on-site surveys, Maze and UserTesting handle user testing, and Unbounce and OptinMonster handle landing pages and popups. For A/B testing, Otter offers flat per-project pricing with revenue per variant, and VWO suits enterprise teams. ### What is the best free CRO tool? Microsoft Clarity is the strongest free option for behavior analytics: heatmaps, session recordings and rage-click detection with no paid tier. It has limits, though: recording caps at 100,000 sessions per project per day, and most recordings are deleted after 30 days. Pair it with free Google Analytics 4 for measurement. Free plans rarely include A/B testing. Crazy Egg's and Zoho PageSense's free plans don't, and Otter offers a 14-day trial rather than a free plan. ### Is Hotjar still available? Not as a separate product for new customers. Contentsquare announced its acquisition of Hotjar in September 2021, and hotjar.com now redirects to Contentsquare, which says new Hotjar accounts can no longer be created. Existing users log in through Contentsquare. Hotjar's heatmaps, recordings and surveys continue inside Contentsquare's Experience Analytics and Voice of Customer products, which have a free plan and Growth plans from $49 a month billed annually. ### What's the difference between CRO tools and A/B testing tools? A/B testing tools are one kind of CRO tool. CRO tools as a group cover measurement, behavior analytics, surveys, user testing, landing pages and testing. Research tools such as heatmaps and recordings show where visitors struggle. A/B testing tools split traffic between versions of a page and use statistics to show which version converts or earns more. You need research to find good ideas and testing to prove them. ### How much do CRO tools cost? From nothing to five figures a year. GA4, Tag Manager and Microsoft Clarity are free. Paid behavior analytics starts between EUR 25 and $49 a month: Mouseflow from EUR 25, Lucky Orange from $32 and Contentsquare Growth from $49, all billed annually. Otter's A/B testing starts at $39 a month with unlimited visitors. VWO doesn't publish prices, and Vendr estimates a median contract of $16,330 a year. Prices were checked on October 11, 2026. ### Do I need a CRO agency or a CRO tool? You need tools either way; an agency adds people to run them. If someone on your team has time to review analytics, watch recordings, write hypotheses and build tests, a free research stack plus one testing tool is enough to start. An agency makes sense when nobody in-house owns the work or you need design and development time to build variants. Keep the tool accounts in your own name so the data stays with you. ### Which CRO tool is best for Shopify? Most stores pair free research tools with one testing tool. For testing, Otter runs on the Shopify storefront and captures order revenue through a Custom Pixel, so results show revenue per visitor for each variant. Otter has no Shopify app, can't test checkout or the price charged, and its pixel revenue capture needs opt-out consent mode. Shopify-only apps such as Shoplift and Intelligems handle price tests, and Crazy Egg tracks Add to Cart through its Shopify integration. ### How much traffic do I need for A/B testing? It depends on your conversion rate and the smallest lift you want to detect. At a 3% conversion rate, detecting a 20% relative lift (3% to 3.6%) at 95% significance and 80% power takes roughly 14,000 visitors per variant, or about 28,000 for a two-variant test. Higher conversion rates and bigger expected lifts need fewer visitors. Run a sample size calculator before you start, and test bigger changes if the numbers are too high for your traffic. ### Is Microsoft Clarity really free? Yes. Microsoft says Clarity is free forever and that you'll never be asked to upgrade to a paid version, and no paid tier exists. It has operating limits instead of pricing tiers: up to 100,000 recorded sessions per project per day, most recordings kept for 30 days, and heatmaps covering up to 100,000 pageviews each. Microsoft also says Clarity is free partly because it uses anonymous behavior data to improve its machine learning models. ### Can Google Analytics 4 run A/B tests? No. GA4 measures traffic, key events and funnels but has no built-in A/B testing. Google Optimize, its old testing companion, shut down on September 30, 2023, and experiments still running that day ended. Google now points to third-party testing tools that integrate with Google Analytics. Otter, for example, sends experiment impressions and conversions to GA4 and can use imported GA4 events as test goals. --- Canonical page: https://www.otterab.com/conversion-rate-optimization-tools