Comparison · Analytics
Best product analytics tools for early-stage startups
Five tools compared, plus the three events worth tracking before you set up anything else.
- 5 tools compared
- Free tiers noted
- Setup guidance
Analytics goes wrong in the same way at nearly every startup: 80 events get tracked, nobody names the one that matters, and six months later the data can't answer a single question. Track three events properly and you'll learn more.
The three: signup, the action that predicts someone sticking around, and the action that predicts payment. Everything else can wait until you have a question that needs it.
How we judged them
What matters when you're small.
Session recordings alongside the numbers
At small volumes, watching ten people use the product beats any funnel chart. Tools that combine both save you a second subscription.
A free tier that lasts
You'll be on it for a year. Check the monthly event ceiling, not the headline.
Self-serve setup
If instrumenting an event needs an engineer every time, it won't happen. Pick something where marketing can add events without a deploy.
The picks
What each one is actually good at.
PostHog
Generous free tier, then usage-basedBest for: Most early-stage products
Funnels, session recordings, feature flags and surveys in one place, which is three subscriptions you don't need. The free tier covers most pre-revenue products for a long time. Self-hosting is possible if data residency matters.
Mixpanel
Free up to a large monthly event volume, then from about $28 a monthBest for: Teams who live in funnels and cohorts
Cleaner reporting than PostHog for cohort and retention analysis. No session recordings, so you'll likely add a second tool.
Plausible
From about $9 a monthBest for: Simple website traffic without cookie banners
Not product analytics — a lightweight replacement for Google Analytics. Fast, privacy-friendly and readable in ten seconds. Pair it with a product tool rather than choosing between them.
Google Analytics 4
FreeBest for: Marketing traffic and ad platform integration
Awkward to use and hard to trust for product questions, but it's the only free option that connects properly to Google Ads. Keep it for acquisition reporting, don't run product analysis in it.
June
Free tier, paid from about $149 a monthBest for: B2B SaaS that needs per-account views
Built on top of your event data with company-level reporting out of the box, which is genuinely useful for B2B. Narrower than the others — a good second tool, rarely the only one.
Skip
What we'd leave alone.
- Tracking 50 events before launch. You'll rename half of them within a month and the old data becomes unusable.
- Two overlapping product analytics tools. Pick one, and use a separate lightweight tool for site traffic if you want it.
- Dashboards nobody opens. If a chart hasn't changed a decision in a month, delete it.
Questions
Common questions.
Which three events should I track first?
Signup completed, the first meaningful action inside the product, and the action that comes right before payment. Name them clearly and never rename them.
PostHog or Mixpanel?
PostHog if you want recordings and flags bundled, which most small teams do. Mixpanel if cohort and retention reporting is the daily job and you already have recordings elsewhere.
Do I still need Google Analytics?
Only if you run Google Ads and need conversion import, or you need channel reporting for other stakeholders. It's a poor tool for product questions.
What is an activation metric?
The single in-product action that best predicts someone still using the product in a month. Find it by comparing what retained users did in week one against those who left.
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