The Key Difference
Here's the fundamental distinction between these platforms:
Hotjar excels at helping you understand what users are doing on your site. EarlyCRO does that AND gives you the tools to test solutions.
The A/B Testing Gap
Here's the biggest difference: **Hotjar doesn't do A/B testing. At all.**
This means with Hotjar alone, you can:
But to actually *test* your fixes, you need a separate tool. This means:
With EarlyCRO, the workflow is seamless:
All in one platform, with one bill, and one consistent user experience.
Pricing Comparison
Hotjar Pricing (2024)
EarlyCRO Pricing
If you only need heatmaps and recordings, Hotjar's free tier is a good starting point. But the moment you want to test changes (which you will), you need to add another tool.
"We were using Hotjar free + Google Optimize. When Google Optimize shut down, we switched to EarlyCRO and got everything we had before, plus better A/B testing." — Product Manager at a D2C brand
The Bottom Line
Hotjar pioneered the heatmap + recording combination and remains a solid choice for pure user research. But if you want to act on what you learn—if you want to test solutions and improve conversions—EarlyCRO is the more complete platform.