What do you like best about Hotjar?
What I Like Best About Hotjar
Clear visibility into user behaviour — beyond what analytics alone can show
Hotjar’s combination of heatmaps, session recordings, and user-feedback tools surfaces what users actually do (clicks, scrolls, movement) and, where needed, why (via surveys/feedback).
Bridges quantitative & qualitative — heatmaps + feedback + recordings in one platform
This “all-in-one” approach helps me connect behavioural data (scrolling, clicks, navigation paths) with sentiment or user-reported feedback. That holistic view is invaluable for diagnosing UX friction or conversion drop-offs.
Fast setup and accessible to non-technical users
Installing Hotjar is straightforward (a simple tracking snippet) and you don’t have to be a developer or data-analyst to start getting insights. This lowers friction for teams and accelerates the feedback–analysis loop.
Ideal for spotting UX/UX issues, conversion bottlenecks, and improving funnels
With its heatmaps, recordings, and form-analysis features, Hotjar helps reveal where users hesitate, get confused, or abandon before converting — especially useful on landing pages, checkout flows, or signup forms.
Flexibility: behavioural tracking, feedback collection, and research tools under one roof
The platform supports a mix of tools: heatmaps, session replay, surveys, feedback widgets — making it easy to run mixed-method UX research without stitching together multiple tools.
From a CRO / UX-optimization standpoint, this makes Hotjar a powerful “first-stop” tool for diagnosing issues, gathering qualitative insight, and building hypotheses to test — faster and more informed than guessing or relying solely on aggregate analytics. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
What do you dislike about Hotjar?
What I Dislike (or What Could Be Better)
Limits on recordings and data when on free or lower-tier plans
The free plan (and lower-end plans) have session-recording caps, which can restrict visibility especially for higher-traffic sites or when you need to analyze many user sessions.
Filtering and segmentation for recordings/heatmaps can feel limited at scale
Users report that when you have a lot of data (many sessions, many users), the filtering and analysis tools can become overwhelming or less efficient — which makes it harder to quickly extract actionable insights.
Performance overhead and possible slower page load / tracking overhead
Because Hotjar tracks detailed user interaction, some users note that enabling full recording/analytics can add overhead to site performance (especially on heavy/complex pages).
May not replace full analytics — lacks deep quantitative analytics or experimentation features
While great for behaviour + feedback insight, Hotjar doesn’t aim to replace a full analytics/experimentation platform (e.g. A/B testing frameworks or in-depth event analytics). For some sophisticated needs, it's more of a qualitative/visual supplement than a full data-stack.
Scalability & cost — as traffic grows, may become expensive or require higher-tier plans to remain useful
For small sites or early-stage CRO work, the free or low cost plans offer value; but as volume increases, upgrades may be needed — which can raise cost and requires weighing ROI.
From a CRO lens: these trade-offs matter — especially if you aim to use it for high-traffic sites, large-scale experiments, or rely heavily on data for funnel optimization and segmentation. It’s valuable, but one must plan accordingly around data volume and analysis needs. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.