With over 80% of people shopping online – and the numbers are bound to rise – it’s crucial to know how your would-be customers behave on your website: where they click, how they scroll, and what motivates them to take specific actions. Heatmap analytics does it, allowing you to dominate CRO and UX through effective behavior data interpretation.
Powered by heatmap software and heatmap tools, heatmap analytics can help you convert customers at scale by optimizing their on-site and mobile experience. Make no mistake: the quality of user behavior tracking can make a difference between a closed sale and a bounce.
Read on to:
- Learn everything you need to know about website heatmapping
- Get a list of the 20 best paid and free heatmap tools
With no further ado, let’s dig into heatmapping.
What Is a Heatmap?
A heatmap is a colored representation of customer interactions, with the blue-to-red color palette indicating how actively users engage with a particular webpage or app element. Warmer colors like orange and red show active areas, whereas cold colors like blue show areas with little or no interaction.
Heatmaps are quite versatile, spanning website heatmaps, mobile heatmaps, correlation heatmaps, financial heatmaps, and more. However, these are the first two – website and mobile heatmaps – that allow you to understand what your customers love and dislike.
Website and Mobile Heatmap Types
| Click Heatmaps | Click heatmaps show where users click: links, images, ads, and empty spaces. Knowing the click distribution, you can locate website elements more effectively. For example, if you’re running a product comparison website, you can set up click heatmaps on your homepage, product pages, and checkout page to see what prevents users from completing an order. |
| Scroll Heatmaps | Scroll heatmaps show how far down the page users typically scroll so you can move your valuable content and CTAs up the page and avoid drop-offs like empty space or low-quality content. For example, if users only scroll to the middle of your homepage, it would be logical to locate your most important information and CTAs above the fold. |
| Mouse Movement Heatmaps | Mouse movement heatmaps show how exactly users navigate the webpage. Mouse movement heatmaps can help you unmistakably identify where you should direct your marketing efforts. |
| Tap Heatmaps | Tap heatmaps are, in fact, click heatmaps designed for mobile phones and tablets, showing the tapping frequency for different website elements. With mobile websites generating over 58% of global website traffic, tap heatmaps are an indispensable mobile customer analytics tool. |
| Gesture Heatmaps | Gesture heatmaps show complex interactions like swiping, zooming, pinching, rotating, etc. This very specific information can help you identify website navigation issues and improve the usability of your mobile app. For example, gesture heatmap can identify excessive swiping and redundant taps & zooms when users are trying to interact with inactive or active elements incorrectly. |
How To Read a Heatmap
The interpretation of a heatmap color palette is quite simple: hot colors (orange or red) indicate areas of high activity – the most clicks, the farthest scroll depth, the longest hover time – whereas cold colors (blue) represent the opposite side of the spectrum – no clicks, no scrolling, or no hovering.
However, interpreting a heatmap usually goes beyond heatmap colors – you need a complex interpretation that takes into account the context:
- What’s the type of the webpage in question?
- Where are users coming from?
- What are the goals of a particular website heatmapping?
Answering these might help you understand what marketing avenues you should coordinate with website heatmapping to generate and convert more customers. Likewise, you should track user behavior in dynamics so you can see how your adjustments impact the conversion rates.
20 Best Heatmap Tools and Software Solutions
Drawing a heatmap isn’t a one-time event but a continuous process that helps you visualize user performance and improve the customer journey to the best of your abilities. Luckily, there are many paid and free heatmap software and website heatmap tools you can use for quality on-site and mobile app analytics.
Below are 20 heatmapping solutions, both comprehensive heatmap software and narrow-focused heatmap tools, that can decipher user behavior into specific marketing actions.
Hotjar – The Best Free Website Heatmap Software
| Monthly Visits | Page Per Visit | Time On Site | Bounce Rate | Direct Traffic | Search Traffic | Paid Referral Traffic | Referral Traffic | Mail Traffic | Social Traffic |
| 2,647,400 | 6 | 180 | 0.53 | 69.53% | 25.12% | 0.71% | 2.40% | 1.60% | 0.64% |
Hotjar is one of the most popular website analytics software suites, offering free heatmaps for desktop, mobile, and tablet within its basic subscription plan. You can create heatmaps and synergize them with other free features like user session recordings, surveys, and interviews.
The software is GDPR- and CCPA-compliant, so you can be sure you will stay within the legal boundaries in the United States and Europe. Besides identifying the most clicked buttons, Hotjar’s website heatmaps provide insights into rage clicks and click dynamics (how clicks change as you change the webpage design).
HitMetrix – Heatmap Visualization Software Under Phonexa’s Dome
Phonexa’s proprietary heatmap visualization tool HitMetrix will take the guessing game out of your customer acquisition strategies by unlocking user behavior across website elements and touchpoints.
Data visualization, heatmap, and session replay software – all part of HitMetrix – will take your lead gen game to the next level while synergizing with seven other Phonexa’s lead management solutions.
Get it all now at only $100 per month, or schedule a free consultation to learn more about Phonexa’s performance marketing toolkit.
Lucky Orange – Free Heatmapping Software for Tracking Individual Users
| Monthly Visits | Page Per Visit | Time On Site | Bounce Rate | Direct Traffic | Search Traffic | Paid Referral Traffic | Referral Traffic | Mail Traffic | Social Traffic |
| 386,844 | 11 | 734 | 0.25 | 81.48% | 10.25% | 0.59% | 0.47% | 5.30% | 1.90% |
Lucky Orange is a comprehensive website optimization platform offering free dynamic heatmap tools within its basic subscription plan that enables 100 free sessions monthly.
The key elements of website heatmapping with Lucky Orange are:
- Dynamic heatmapping – how clicks change over time
- Element analytics – tracking of individual webpage elements
- Segmentation – segmenting customers by behavior patterns
Unlike many other heatmap tools, Lucky Orange tracks every individual user, allowing you to see how far down they scroll the webpage, what buttons they click, and more. Besides regular website pages, the software works on single-page applications.
Mouseflow – Website Analytics Software With Free Heatmap Tools
| Monthly Visits | Page Per Visit | Time On Site | Bounce Rate | Direct Traffic | Search Traffic | Paid Referral Traffic | Referral Traffic | Mail Traffic | Social Traffic |
| 277,988 | 8 | 346 | 0.38 | 70.09% | 20.99% | 0.24% | 1.94% | 5.35% | 1.40% |
Mouseflow is a GDRP- and CCPA-compliant website optimization software suite that offers free heatmap tools within its basic subscription plan.
Heatmaps from Mouseflow help you do what you need most: improve website performance by removing non-interactive content and doubling down on what works like clockwork. You can factor in user location, traffic source, device, and operating system in your behavior analytics.
Crazy Egg – a Five-in-One Heatmap Reporting Tool
| Monthly Visits | Page Per Visit | Time On Site | Bounce Rate | Direct Traffic | Search Traffic | Paid Referral Traffic | Referral Traffic | Mail Traffic | Social Traffic |
| 492,928 | 3 | 282 | 0.64 | 41.69% | 52.89% | 0.01% | 2.21% | 2.20% | 0.98% |
Crazy Egg is web analytic software that comprises heatmap tools of 5 types:
- Heatmap reports – coloring the webpage based on user activity
- Scrollmap reports – showing how far down the page users scroll
- Confetti reports – representing individual clicks on a heatmap
- Overlay reports – calculating the percentage of total clicks for a chosen webpage element
- List reports – calculating the number of clicks for a chosen webpage element
Smartlook – a Free Heatmap Tool With Historical Data
| Monthly Visits | Page Per Visit | Time On Site | Bounce Rate | Direct Traffic | Search Traffic | Paid Referral Traffic | Referral Traffic | Mail Traffic | Social Traffic |
| 247,752 | 10 | 319 | 0.4 | 68.76% | 26.47% | 0.05% | 2.82% | 1.24% | 0.66% |
Smartlook is a website and mobile app analytics platform that includes click, movement, and scroll heatmaps. You can segment users by device, seeing how different operating systems and screen sizes affect the performance.
The heatmap software is included in a free subscription plan that enables 3,000 monthly sessions and some basic product analytics for mobile and web. The maximum recording capacity for the free plan is 10, meaning you can only record 10 users at the same time.
Inspectlet – a Freemium Suite of Web Analytics and Heatmap Tools
| Monthly Visits | Page Per Visit | Time On Site | Bounce Rate | Direct Traffic | Search Traffic | Paid Referral Traffic | Referral Traffic | Mail Traffic | Social Traffic |
| 32,324 | 4 | 216 | 0.42 | 66.12% | 27.07% | 0.14% | 2.35% | 2.86% | 1.45% |
Inspectlet is a web analytics toolkit that includes click, scroll, and website eye-tracking heatmaps, with the latter based on the user’s mouse movement. The heatmaps are easy to run, requiring no more than integrating a few script lines into your website.
Besides the heatmap software, the free plan includes 2,500 session recordings, 2,500 A/B tests, and 25,000 pageviews. Paid plans offer features like conversion funnel analytics, session recordings, email & phone support, and more.
FullStory – Engagement Heatmaps
| Monthly Visits | Page Per Visit | Time On Site | Bounce Rate | Direct Traffic | Search Traffic | Paid Referral Traffic | Referral Traffic | Mail Traffic | Social Traffic |
| 313,714 | 5 | 184 | 0.51 | 60.68% | 32.94% | 0.03% | 1.97% | 3.28% | 1.10% |
FullStory is a digital experience platform that provides easy-to-interpret engagement heatmaps alongside data collection and analytics products like session replays, journey mapping, frustration notifications, and more. Among other things, heatmap tools from FullStory reveal elements with error, rage, and dead clicks.
VWO – AI-Powered Free Heatmap Generator
| Monthly Visits | Page Per Visit | Time On Site | Bounce Rate | Direct Traffic | Search Traffic | Paid Referral Traffic | Referral Traffic | Mail Traffic | Social Traffic |
| 498,128 | 4 | 214 | 0.55 | 55.43% | 32.81% | 0.11% | 8.15% | 2.51% | 0.99% |
VWO is a conversion rate optimization platform that provides a free AI heatmap generator, among other CRO-focused tools. The heatmap software is CCPA- and GDPR-compliant, so you can safely collect and interpret user data in the United States and Europe.
Likewise, you can set up complex segmenting conditions to differentiate between new and returning users, mobile and desktop traffic, and more. And if you need help, there’s a dedicated customer success manager to assist you in setting and scaling your campaigns.
Microsoft Clarity – Free Website Heatmapping & Analytics Tool
| Monthly Visits | Page Per Visit | Time On Site | Bounce Rate | Direct Traffic | Search Traffic | Paid Referral Traffic | Referral Traffic | Mail Traffic | Social Traffic |
| 3,203,660 | 4 | 273 | 0.51 | 83.38% | 14.57% | 0.02% | 0.84% | 0.54% | 0.66% |
One of the brand-new CCPA- and GDPR-compliant web and mobile analytics software solutions, Microsoft Clarity, allows for integrating heatmap tools with Google Analytics for comprehensive marketing analysis. Element-level metrics and side-by-side comparisons help you dig deep into user behavior across devices, browsers, and operating systems.
Microsoft Clarity is completely free, with no paid subscription plans. You can use the heatmap tools from the get-go without traffic limits or forced upgrades.
Plerdy – CRO Platform With Freemium Heatmap Tools
| Monthly Visits | Page Per Visit | Time On Site | Bounce Rate | Direct Traffic | Search Traffic | Paid Referral Traffic | Referral Traffic | Mail Traffic | Social Traffic |
| 161,413 | 2 | 113 | 0.68 | 26.37% | 70.14% | 0 | 2.93% | 0.03% | 0.54% |
Plerdy is a conversion rate optimization platform that addresses several marketing dimensions, including webpage analytics and website heatmapping. Speaking of which, you can access 5 heatmap reports within the free subscription plan and can remove the limit anytime by switching to a paid all-in-one package.
With Plerdy’s heatmap tools, you can:
- Conduct fist-click analysis
- Improve content location
- Optimize linking structures for micro-conversions
- Maximize working and remove unprofitable webpage elements
Zoho Page Sense – Heatmap Tools from the World-Known Cloud Software Provider
| Monthly Visits | Page Per Visit | Time On Site | Bounce Rate | Direct Traffic | Search Traffic | Paid Referral Traffic | Referral Traffic | Mail Traffic | Social Traffic |
| 51,030,182 | 12 | 1054 | 0.25 | 83.80% | 10.18% | 0.06% | 2.55% | 2.37% | 1.03% |
Zoho PageSense is one of the most known cloud software providers with a huge following and a website optimization software PageSense that includes heatmap tools. On top of the standard features most heatmaps provide, PageSense offers consolidated reports so you can analyze how a particular element performs across pages.
Contentsquare – Zone-Based Heatmap Tools
| Monthly Visits | Page Per Visit | Time On Site | Bounce Rate | Direct Traffic | Search Traffic | Paid Referral Traffic | Referral Traffic | Mail Traffic | Social Traffic |
| 307,008 | 7 | 279 | 0.49 | 60.64% | 28.14% | 0 | 3.61% | 5.68% | 1.93% |
Contentsquare is a customer digital experience optimization platform with zone-based heatmap tools that help you understand the “whys” of user behavior and elevate the customer journey at scale. Zone-based heatmaps from Contentsquare unlock behavior like swipes, scrolls, and hesitations, all for maximizing the performance of your website or mobile app.
FigPii – CRO Software With Heatmap Tools
| Monthly Visits | Page Per Visit | Time On Site | Bounce Rate | Direct Traffic | Search Traffic | Paid Referral Traffic | Referral Traffic | Mail Traffic | Social Traffic |
| 75,151 | 1 | 131 | 0.19 | 46.01% | 42.43% | 0 | 5.30% | 0 | 6.26% |
FigPii is a conversion rate optimization software suite that includes click, scroll, and move heatmaps alongside session recordings, A/B testing, and survey functionality. You will know the pages and elements that draw attention or get ignored, how far down the page users scroll and why they stop, and what you can do to convert more users.
Heatmap.com – an Undervalued Website Heatmap Tool
| Monthly Visits | Page Per Visit | Time On Site | Bounce Rate | Direct Traffic | Search Traffic | Paid Referral Traffic | Referral Traffic | Mail Traffic | Social Traffic |
| 63,958 | 3 | 142 | 0.52 | 70.04% | 17.59% | 0.83% | 3.11% | 3.44% | 5.00% |
Heatmap.com is a dedicated heatmapping software that offers unique revenue-driven heatmaps, scroll maps, screen recordings, custom revenue filters, and a dynamic Chrome extension. Advanced eCommerce metrics make this heatmap tool an ideal choice for crafting a sustainably profitable sales funnel while improving the customer journey across touchpoints.
Ptengine – Multi-Dimensional Heatmapping Toolkit
| Monthly Visits | Page Per Visit | Time On Site | Bounce Rate | Direct Traffic | Search Traffic | Paid Referral Traffic | Referral Traffic | Mail Traffic | Social Traffic |
| 15,145 | 11 | 831 | 0.18 | 93.12% | 2.55% | 0 | 2.98% | 0.07% | 1.28% |
Ptengine is a narrow-focused web analytics platform that encompasses click, scroll, attention, element analysis, and historical online heatmaps, as well as the ability to compare multiple heatmaps side-by-side and convert these insights into design improvements.
The multi-dimensional approach taken by Ptengine allows for accurate user segmentation, so you can know where every target group clicks and how they behave on a webpage. Tracking events doesn’t require coding or tech stills – the heatmap software is optimized for non-tech-savvy marketers.
Attention Insight – Heatmap Software With Clarity Scores
| Monthly Visits | Page Per Visit | Time On Site | Bounce Rate | Direct Traffic | Search Traffic | Paid Referral Traffic | Referral Traffic | Mail Traffic | Social Traffic |
| 35,186 | 3 | 142 | 0.62 | 40.28% | 53.94% | 0 | 2.04% | 0 | 3.73% |
Attention Insight is an engagement optimization software that provides real-time user behavior insights via website heatmapping and unique features like clarity scores. Speaking of which, clarity scores show how understandable the design is on a 1-100 scale.
With tools like focus maps, you can identify the most engaging website elements and what less entertaining webpage elements lack. Likewise, you can A/B test your web pages to choose the best possible design.
Glassbox – The Next-Gen Heatmap Tools
| Monthly Visits | Page Per Visit | Time On Site | Bounce Rate | Direct Traffic | Search Traffic | Paid Referral Traffic | Referral Traffic | Mail Traffic | Social Traffic |
| 58,545 | 2 | 67 | 0.6 | 34.16% | 47.98% | 0.07% | 9.73% | 4.20% | 3.86% |
Glassbox is a digital experience intelligence platform covering the customer journey through and through via functionality like website heatmapping, session recording, and other performance analytics. Glassbox’s heatmap tools have it all to dissect the on-page interactions, run tests without risk, and increase user engagement with better webpage design.
Browsee – Freemium Heatmap Tool
| Monthly Visits | Page Per Visit | Time On Site | Bounce Rate | Direct Traffic | Search Traffic | Paid Referral Traffic | Referral Traffic | Mail Traffic | Social Traffic |
| 20,910 | 2 | 153 | 0.62 | 54.50% | 43.27% | 0 | 0 | 1.76% | 0.47% |
Browsee is a freemium website heatmapping and session recording tool that can help you identify customer pain points you haven’t been aware of before and translate this knowledge into engaging website design. For comprehensive user behavior analytics, you can integrate Browsee into Google Analytics, Shopify, Google Tag Manager, WordPress, and more.
NotifyVisitors – Advanced Web-Based Heatmap Tools
| Monthly Visits | Page Per Visit | Time On Site | Bounce Rate | Direct Traffic | Search Traffic | Paid Referral Traffic | Referral Traffic | Mail Traffic | Social Traffic |
| 484,787 | 0 | 48 | 0.77 | 36.93% | 46.73% | 0 | 2.00% | 14.33% | 0 |
NotifyVisitors is a marketing automation software platform that offers heatmap tools as part of its toolkit. The real-time heatmaps – the maximum delay is only 1 minute – allow for discovering where exactly users are engaging and dropping off and what converts them best.
The heatmap software includes:
- Submission attempts – successful and failed attempts to fill out the form
- Left blanks – how many times the field is left blank
- Interaction time – the time the user spends on a particular field
How To Choose Your Best Heatmapping Software
While you might want to opt for free heatmap tools in the first place, there are quite a few factors you might want to take into account besides the subscription price:
- Accuracy: How well the heatmap tool collects and interprets user interactions
- Data freshness: Whether the collected data is real-time or delayed
- Heatmapping type: What data sets the heatmap shows – clicks, scrolling, etc.
- Customization: How many settings can you apply to represent the data you need
- Ease of use & integrations: How representative the display is and whether it integrates with your other marketing tools
It’s true that many heatmapping services include free heatmap software in their basic plans, but it’s also true that such software is always limited and, therefore, may not be enough. Make sure to thoroughly review each of your candidates – beyond the price factor – and how well each of them resonates with your other marketing software and fits the big picture.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is a heatmap?
A heatmap is a colored representation of user activity on a webpage or in a mobile app, with hot colors marking the areas of the highest activity (most clicks, views, scrolling, etc.) and cold colors marking the areas of the lowest activity.
What is a heatmap creator?
A heatmap creator, or a heatmap maker, is software or a tool used to draw a heatmap that represents interactions on a webpage – clicks, scrolling, phone rotation, etc. Implementing a heatmap is as easy as adding a script to your webpage.
How do I read a heatmap?
Reading a website heatmap is simple: hot colors correspond to the most active zones on a webpage – for example, where users click the most – while cold colors correspond to the least active zones that users ignore or almost ignore.
What is the best heatmap software?
The best heatmap software is the one that fits your marketing goals, such as improving user experience, optimizing conversion rates, streamlining website navigation, reducing bounce rates, or else. When choosing your heatmap tools, pay attention to the accuracy, data freshness, type of heatmapping, customization, ease of use, and integrations.
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