What is GA4 used for?

GA4 helps businesses monitor how users interact with their websites and apps. When it comes to understanding your audience and how they behave online, it’s a powerful place to start.

With a suite of tools designed to surface meaningful data, GA4 makes it easier to improve user experience, measure key goals, make informed business decisions, and benchmark performance.

Some of its core features include:

• Live user data: GA4 gives you access to real-time reporting, showing how users are interacting with your site or app right now. You can see their locations, traffic sources, events they’re triggering, and even which pages they’re on in real time.
• Audience creation: GA4 lets you build dynamic audiences based on user behaviours, demographics, device types, and engagement patterns. These audiences can then be used for reporting or connected directly to Google Ads for remarketing.
• Acquisition insights: GA4 splits acquisition into “User” and “Traffic” views, helping you see not just where sessions come from, but how new users first found you. Its attribution models provide a broad view of your marketing channels’ impact across the conversion path.
• Conversion tracking: GA4 uses an event-based model where you can define any user interaction, like clicks, downloads, or purchases, as a conversion. It’s flexible but requires intentional setup and naming conventions to keep things clean and useful.
• Ecommerce tracking: GA4 supports Ecommerce tracking, but you’ll need to implement enhanced event tagging manually. Once set up, you can track product performance, transactions, revenue, and more—all in a format that’s adaptable to your business model.
• Custom reporting: The “Explore” section in GA4 lets you build tailored reports that go beyond standard dashboards. You can dig into user paths, funnel drop-offs, segment overlaps, and more. For advanced visuals or broader reporting, GA4 also integrates with Looker Studio.

Whether you’re optimising campaigns, testing landing pages, or trying to better understand your users, it gives you a solid foundation for growing online.

However, GA4 might not tick every box for every business. Read on to find out why exploring a Google Analytics alternative could be the right move for you.

Why consider Google Analytics alternatives?

While GA4 is one of the most widely used analytics platforms in the world, it’s not always the best fit for every business. Some very real limitations might leave you looking for something more flexible, accurate, or user-friendly.

Here’s why many teams are exploring Google Analytics alternatives:

Steep learning curve

One of the biggest frustrations with GA4 is how hard it is to set up and navigate, even for seasoned marketers. The interface can be clunky, the terminology confusing, and the setup process time-consuming.

There are hours of official training videos, and it can take months to get fully comfortable. If your team doesn’t have time for that kind of onboarding, a simpler platform might be more suitable.

The right Google Analytics alternative should offer intuitive navigation, simple setup (preferably with a single tracking snippet), and built-in reporting templates that save you time and guesswork.

Frequent changes

Google has a habit of making big changes, often without much warning. With GA4, the entire structure, interface, and terminology shifted from previous versions, leaving many users feeling like they’re starting from scratch.

Missing or misleading data

If your website complies with privacy regulations like GDPR, you’re likely using a consent banner. The catch? If users opt out of tracking, GA4 simply doesn’t collect their data, leaving you with gaps that can seriously affect your reporting accuracy.

GA4 also relies heavily on data modelling and sampling, which means some of the numbers you see are approximations.

Moreover, it doesn’t always separate real visitors from internal traffic or bot hits. If your team regularly checks your site, that activity could inflate your numbers and give a skewed view of what’s really happening.

For better insights, look for a platform that uses server-side tracking or cookieless tracking to capture cleaner, more accurate user data—even when privacy tools are in play.

The more reliable your data, the more confident you can be in your decisions.

Limited customisation

While GA4 has added more flexibility than its predecessor, it’s still fairly rigid when it comes to tailoring the platform to your unique needs. If your team thrives on custom reports, creative workflows, or niche KPIs, GA4 can feel a bit restrictive.

If opting for an alternative analytics platform, make sure it offers easy-to-use custom filters, segmentation, and reporting without needing to code everything from scratch.

The best tools make it simple to build views and dashboards that match your specific goals—whether that’s conversions, engagement, or campaign attribution.

Fewer integrations

GA4 supports fewer third-party integrations than Universal Analytics did. While it connects well with other Google products, its compatibility outside that ecosystem is limited.

The issue?

If your marketing stack relies on tools that don’t play nicely with GA4, you could end up with a disjointed data pipeline—or more manual work to fill the gaps.

When choosing an alternative, check that it connects seamlessly with your other digital tools, CRM, advertising platforms, and so on.

The more your analytics tool can “talk” to your other systems, the smoother your workflows and the more complete your insights.

Features to look for in an alternative to Google Analytics

The right analytics platform should support your team’s workflow, data priorities and wider business goals.

Ideally, it wouldn’t only solve the problems you already know about but also reveal opportunities and gaps you hadn’t considered.

So, as well as the factors in the previous section, here are some core features to consider when weighing up alternatives to Google Analytics:

Automatic event tracking

Manually setting up event tracking can be tedious and error-prone.

A strong GA4 alternative should automatically track user actions like clicks, scrolls, form submissions, and page views—right out of the box.

That way, no interaction slips through the cracks, and you’ll have complete visibility over your user journey.

Visual tools

Numbers tell you what is happening. Visual tools like heatmaps and session recordings help you understand why.

These features let you watch how users interact with your site, uncover drop-off points, and fine-tune experiences based on real behaviour, not just assumptions.

Built-in privacy compliance

With data protection laws like GDPR, the Australian Privacy Act, and others evolving rapidly, privacy can’t be an afterthought.

Some GA4 alternatives offer built-in compliance tools, anonymisation features, and transparent data handling policies, taking the burden off your legal and tech teams.

If your audience includes users in privacy-sensitive regions like the EU, this is non-negotiable.

Real-time data and reporting

Waiting hours for data to update is a thing of the past. Look for a platform that offers live data streaming, minimal processing delays, and fast-loading dashboards.

This gives you the speed to act quickly, whether you’re troubleshooting an issue or responding to sudden traffic spikes.

Actionable insights that drive growth

The right tool doesn’t just report on data—it helps you act on it.

Whether it’s identifying high-converting content, revealing where users are dropping off, or discovering untapped segments to reach with better messaging, a great analytics platform should unlock actionable opportunities.

Google Analytics alternatives and complementary tools in 2025

1. Fathom Analytics

Pricing: From USD$15 per month for up to 50 websites.

Fathom Analytics is a basic, privacy-first analytics platform that delivers essential insights without the complexity of traditional tools.

With a clean, single-page dashboard and no cookies required, it’s a great fit for small businesses, startups, or anyone wanting clear, simple data without sacrificing user privacy.

Fathom tracks key metrics like pageviews, referral sources, UTM parameters, and custom events—all displayed in an intuitive interface that’s easy even for non-technical users. Reports can be exported in one click, making it easy to share insights or dig deeper into the numbers using your own tools.

Because it doesn’t rely on cookies, Fathom helps you stay compliant with privacy laws like GDPR and CCPA without intrusive consent banners. Data is anonymised and aggregated, so you’re getting meaningful insights without collecting personal identifiers.

You’ll also benefit from real-time traffic data that automatically filters out bots, crawlers, and even DDoS traffic. For even more control, you can exclude data from specific IP addresses or entire regions to ensure your analytics only reflect relevant user behaviour.

Pros

• Clear, clutter-free dashboard for faster decision-making
• Import data directly from Google Analytics
• Fully compliant with GDPR, ePrivacy, PECR, and CCPA
• Unlimited data retention on all plans
• Built-in uptime monitoring

Cons

• Designed for simple analytics, so not ideal for complex reporting needs
• Conversion events must be set up manually—no event migration support
• No local hosting option available
• Limited third-party integrations (e.g. no connection to Google Search Console)

2. Plausible Analytics

Pricing: From £9/month for 10,000 monthly page views across up to 10 websites.

Plausible is a simple Google Analytics alternative built with privacy and simplicity at its core. It’s designed for website owners who want fast, reliable insights without invasive tracking or tricky dashboards.

This open-source, cookieless platform doesn’t collect personal data, making it a privacy-first choice that’s fully compliant with regulations like GDPR, CCPA, and PECR—without the need for cookie banners.

All your key metrics—like unique visitors, pageviews, bounce rates, and traffic sources—are displayed on a single, easy-to-read dashboard. It’s straightforward, fast to set up, and ideal for those who want essential data without technical overhead. For SEO insights, Plausible integrates with Google Search Console to show which keywords are driving visits.

Unlike GA4, Plausible automatically filters out spam traffic and bot visits, helping you get a more accurate read on real users. You can also customise event tracking and goal completions in just a few clicks, with no need for complex tagging setups.

Pros

• Simple, single-page dashboard with key website metrics
• Lightweight tracking script that won’t slow your site down
• 100% data ownership with no third-party access
• Built-in compliance with privacy laws like GDPR and CCPA
• Self-hosting is available for added data control
• Easy migration of past data from Google Analytics

Cons

• Lacks advanced segmentation and funnel tracking features
• No built-in qualitative tools like heatmaps or session replays
• Plan upgrades may be needed if traffic exceeds limits on annual plans

3. Matomo

Pricing: From £17 per month with up to 50,000 hits for Matomo Cloud. Matomo On-Premise is free.

Matomo is a robust, open-source Google Analytics alternative that gives you full control over your data.

Available as a cloud-hosted service (Matomo Cloud) or a self-hosted solution (Matomo On-Premise), it’s a strong choice for businesses that want to prioritise data ownership without sacrificing features.

It delivers a wide range of insights, similar to Google Analytics, but goes a step further with built-in tools like heatmaps, tag management, session recordings, form analytics, A/B testing, and SEO keyword reports.

These features offer deeper visibility into user behaviour and help you understand not just what’s happening on your site, but why.

Matomo’s flexibility also makes it ideal for businesses with unique data needs. The interface is fully customisable, and you can track performance across websites, apps, social channels, and even intranet systems.

Intranet tracking is particularly useful for internal communications, allowing you to measure employee engagement with internal portals and resources.

One of Matomo’s key strengths is its commitment to privacy. It doesn’t share data with third parties and offers full compliance with global privacy laws, including GDPR and CCPA.

The on-premise option is especially suitable for organisations with strict data security policies, allowing you to host and protect your analytics data entirely in-house.

Pros

• Full ownership of your data with no third-party access
• Advanced features like heatmaps, A/B testing, and session recordings
• Supports both cloud and self-hosted deployments
• Large open-source community and 120+ integrations
• Compliant with major data privacy regulations
• Tracks users across multiple channels (web, mobile, social)
• Direct import available for your historical Google Analytics data

Cons

• Dashboard customisation can be complex, especially with layered dimensions
• Self-hosting requires technical setup and ongoing maintenance
• Some data inconsistencies may appear due to fingerprint-based user identification

4. Clicky

Pricing: Free for one website with up to 1,000 daily page views. Paid plans from USD$9.99 per month.

Clicky is a real-time web analytics tool built for businesses that value speed, simplicity, and data transparency. Trusted by over a million websites, it offers a more straightforward alternative to Google Analytics with a strong focus on privacy and performance.

What sets Clicky apart is its ability to deliver both qualitative and quantitative insights.

You’ll get standard metrics like traffic sources, bounce rate, and time on page—plus behavioural data through built-in heatmaps and session recordings. These features let you visualise how users engage with your content and pinpoint where improvements are needed.

Clicky also tracks on-site searches, giving you direct insight into what your visitors are looking for. This helps you align your content with user intent and improve site navigation.

Despite its no-cookie tracking approach, Clicky still supports user path analysis, so you can follow visitor journeys through your website in real time. Its “Spy” view even offers a live visitor stream that gives you instant access to who’s on your site and what they’re doing.

Pros

• GDPR-compliant and privacy-focused, with strong anti-bot protection
• Built-in heatmaps, session recording, and real-time visitor tracking
• Lightweight tracking code for fast site performance
• Customisable filtering and tracking options

Cons

• The user interface feels outdated compared to more modern platforms
• The reporting range is more restricted than some advanced analytics platforms
• Limited integration options with third-party marketing tools

5. Adobe Analytics

Pricing: You’ll need to request a quote directly.

Adobe Analytics is a premium, enterprise-level platform designed for large businesses that need advanced data insights and complete control over multi-channel performance.

It allows businesses to collect and analyse data from websites, apps, email campaigns, offline channels, and more—all in one place.

Whether you’re mapping out detailed customer journeys, building audience segments, or optimising performance across devices, Adobe delivers comprehensive tools for every step.

One of its standout strengths is its attribution and predictive modelling capabilities, driven by machine learning. You can see which channels contribute most to conversions and anticipate future customer behaviours based on historical trends.

Adobe also provides rich segmentation and cohort analysis, helping you drill deep into user behaviour and uncover nuanced differences across audiences.

Unlike more rigid platforms, Adobe offers flexible data retention policies, detailed dashboard customisation, and smooth integrations—making it a strong fit for businesses that need tailored reporting and granular control over data.

Pros

• Enterprise-level analytics with unmatched depth and flexibility
• Powerful attribution and predictive modelling tools
• Advanced cohort and segmentation features
• Real-time analytics across web, mobile, and offline channels
• Integrates seamlessly with Adobe Experience Cloud products
• Custom dashboards and scalable reporting tools
• Designed for data-driven organisations with complex user journeys

Cons

• Expensive—best suited to larger businesses
• Steep learning curve due to feature complexity
• Implementation and ongoing management may require specialist support
• Not ideal for smaller teams or those new to analytics

6. Statcounter

Pricing: Free plan available, with paid plans starting at €7 per month based on usage.

Statcounter is a straightforward, beginner-friendly analytics tool designed for businesses that need quick, easy access to essential website data.

Statcounter’s dashboard focuses on clarity over complexity. It strips away the noise and makes website analytics approachable, even for non-technical users. That simplicity makes it a good fit for smaller websites, early-stage businesses, or anyone who’s just starting with analytics.

While it may not offer the deep segmentation or data modelling tools found in GA4, Statcounter helps you monitor trends, detect unusual activity, and make basic performance optimisations.

This platform covers key metrics like pageviews, sessions, new vs. returning visitors, and traffic sources. It also includes helpful features like visitor tagging, Google Ads integration, and session replays, allowing you to see how users interact with your site and identify areas for improvement.

Pros

• Ideal for small businesses or solo operators
• Easy to use with no steep learning curve
• Filters out bots and spam traffic automatically
• Session replays help you understand user behaviour
• Flexible reporting across pageviews, sessions, and more
• Google Ads integration for detailed campaign tracking

Cons

• The free version includes ads and has limited data retention
• May struggle with accuracy on high-traffic sites
• Lacks advanced cross-device or multi-service tracking features

7. Piwik PRO

Pricing: Free plan for up to 500,000 monthly actions. Enterprise plan starts from €10,995 per year.

Piwik PRO is a privacy-first analytics platform built for organisations that work with sensitive data and strict compliance requirements. It’s a strong fit for industries like healthcare, finance, government, and enterprise IT, where data control and security are essential.

Functionally, it covers many of the same bases as GA4—like user journey tracking, funnel analysis, audience segmentation, and custom reports—but with a much greater focus on privacy, flexibility, and ease of use.

Unlike most cloud analytics platforms, Piwik PRO gives you full control over your data. You can self-host it or use their secure cloud option, depending on your compliance needs.

It stands out with features many other platforms lack, including built-in consent management, advanced privacy settings, and the ability to track activity behind logins or within private networks. It even offers an SEO dashboard to monitor keyword performance—something GA4 doesn’t provide natively.

The interface is intuitive and familiar for teams used to Google Analytics, making the switch simple. Plus, with integrations for Google Ads and Search Console, you can unify your campaign tracking without sacrificing data privacy.

Pros

• Accurate, unsampled data for reliable decision-making
• User-friendly interface similar to Google Analytics
• Full control over data with self-hosted or cloud deployment options
• GDPR, CCPA, and HIPAA compliant out of the box
• Built-in consent and privacy tools
• Works in secure environments like intranets and post-login areas
• Supports integration with Google Ads and Search Console

Cons

• Pricing jumps significantly for enterprise features
• Ecommerce tracking is more limited compared to other platforms
• Fewer native third-party integrations than GA or Adobe Analytics

 8. Hotjar

Pricing: Free for up to 35 daily sessions; paid plans start at USD$39 per month.

Hotjar isn’t a direct replacement for GA4, but it’s one of the best tools you can use alongside it. While GA4 tells you what is happening on your website, Hotjar helps you understand why.

This behaviour analytics platform lets you visualise user interactions and gather direct feedback from your audience. It offers tools like heatmaps to show where users click, tap, and scroll, and session recordings that let you watch real user journeys in action.

These insights are invaluable when identifying friction points, confusing layouts, or underperforming CTAs.

The platform also enables feedback collection through surveys, polls, and user interviews—giving you a way to hear directly from visitors in the moment, without disrupting their experience.

Designed with privacy in mind, Hotjar doesn’t collect sensitive information, and it complies with major global data privacy regulations, including GDPR, CCPA, and PECR. You can also block specific IPs and anonymise visitor data as needed.

For the full picture, Hotjar integrates easily with GA4 and other analytics tools. By combining quantitative data from GA4 with the qualitative insights from Hotjar, you’ll not only see the numbers but truly understand the user experience behind them.

Pros

• Adds visual context to GA4 data with heatmaps and recordings
• Built-in tools for capturing user feedback and surveys
• Simple, user-friendly dashboard
• Easy integration with GA4 and other platforms
• Compliant with major privacy laws
• No sensitive data collected by default

Cons

• Doesn’t provide traditional web metrics like GA4 (e.g. traffic sources)
• Not suited for full performance tracking on its own

9. Heap

Pricing: Free for up to 10,000 monthly tracked sessions; paid plan (Growth, Pro, Premier) prices are available on request.

Heap is a web analytics tool that automatically captures every user interaction—no manual event setup required.

While it’s not a replacement for GA4, Heap is an excellent complement, offering deeper behavioural insights that reveal how and why users engage with your digital products.

One of Heap’s standout features is retroactive tracking. As soon as you install the tracking snippet, it begins recording all user actions—clicks, views, form submissions, and more. You can then create reports and funnels later, without needing to define events in advance.

Heap also goes beyond numbers, offering visual tools like heatmaps, session replays, journey mapping, and funnel analysis.

With Heap Illuminate, it automatically highlights friction points, like drop-offs or incomplete conversions, helping you optimise user flows without guesswork.

Its strength lies in product analytics, making it ideal for SaaS platforms, ecommerce businesses, and mobile apps focused on user experience and retention across multiple channels.

To make analysis even more accessible, Heap includes an AI assistant that lets anyone query data in plain English.

Pros

• GDPR-compliant with a privacy-focused data model
• Automatically captures every user interaction—no manual setup required
• Built-in heatmaps, session replays, and journey mapping tools
• Strong product analytics for apps and SaaS platforms
• Retroactive event tracking gives flexibility and saves time
• Highlights optimisation opportunities with Heap Illuminate
• Connects directly to your data warehouse with Heap Connect
• AI Copilot makes data easy to explore for non-technical users

Cons

• Pricing for higher tiers may be out of reach for smaller teams
• Advanced features can be overwhelming without training
• Tracks a large volume of data, which can be difficult to filter without guidance

10. Woopra

Pricing: Free for up to 10,000 actions per month. Pro plans start at $49 per month.

Woopra isn’t technically a direct Google Analytics alternative, but it’s still worth mentioning for Ecommerce brands and SaaS companies.

Unlike GA4, which excels at broad performance tracking, Woopra dives deep into customer lifecycle analytics—helping you understand not just what happened, but who did it and why.

Rather than focusing solely on traffic and pageviews, Woopra connects individual user behaviour with key data points like purchase history, product usage, and engagement over time.

It categorises data into five key areas: Journey, Trends, Cohort, Retention, and Behaviour. These insights allow you to personalise user experiences, optimise conversions, and increase customer lifetime value.

Woopra also makes it easy to connect your stack. With one-click integrations for popular tools like Google Ads, HubSpot, Slack, Zendesk, WordPress, and more, it consolidates marketing, product, and support data into a single platform, giving you a unified view of each user’s journey.

It’s ideal for teams who want granular, real-time insights across multiple channels. That said, it’s important to note that Woopra isn’t focused on privacy-first tracking, so it might not suit businesses with strict compliance needs.

Pros

• Easy to implement and use, even for non-technical users
• Full visibility into the entire customer journey across channels
• Tracks individual user activity over time with real-time analytics
• Built-in customer segmentation, cohort tracking, and retention insights
• Supports cross-platform tracking (web, mobile, product)
• Extensive third-party integrations for a unified analytics ecosystem
• Designed for marketing, product, and support teams

Cons

• Premium pricing may be too steep for smaller teams or startups
• The user interface can feel less intuitive compared to simpler tools
• Not focused on privacy or compliance features

Get specialist support with digital marketing

GA4 is a powerful platform with advanced features and deep integration across the Google ecosystem. But it mightn’t suit every business out of the box.

Whether you’re after simpler reporting, stronger privacy compliance, or more flexible insights, there are plenty of great Google Analytics alternatives available in 2025. The key is finding a tool that aligns with your goals, your team, and the way you want to work with data.

Not sure how to choose or leverage the right analytics tools?

At Redback, our specialists can take care of it all for you—from platform recommendations and setup to monitoring and reporting. We help businesses build, implement and optimise digital strategies that deliver tangible results.

We also specialise in building custom GA4 tracking and reporting configurations that can help simplify your Google Analytics experience and make those key business insights much easier to access.

For complete support with your website and digital marketing, give us a call at (02) 4962 2236 or enquire online today.