Google Analytics vs. Matomo Analytics

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Google Analytics
Score 7.9 out of 10
N/A
Google Analytics is perhaps the best-known web analytics product and, as a free product, it has massive adoption. Although it lacks some enterprise-level features compared to its competitors in the space, the launch of the paid Google Analytics Premium edition seems likely to close the gap.
$150,000
per year
Matomo Analytics
Score 8.0 out of 10
N/A
Piwik is an open source analytics platform that enables users to measure web and mobile apps as well as intranet portals. It protects the privacy of users through advanced privacy features and its approach to data ownership. Piwik offers On-premises and Cloud deployment options. Available in over 50 languages, it is fully customisable and vendor-independent. Piwik offers over 70 integrations with Content Management Systems, Ecommerce solutions, Forums as well as other mobile and web platforms.…
$0
Pricing
Google AnalyticsMatomo Analytics
Editions & Modules
Google Analytics 360
150,000
per year
Google Analytics
Free
Free download (open source)
$0
Free 30 day trial
$0
limited to 30 days
Essential
$9
number of pageviews (monthly traffic)
Business
$29
number of pageviews (monthly traffic)
Enterprise
$199
your requirements and monthly traffic
Content Optimization Bundle
$579
per installation
Growth Bundle
$1,149
per installation
Premium Bundle
$1,499
per installation
Email Support Subscription
$2,090
per installation
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Google AnalyticsMatomo Analytics
Free Trial
NoYes
Free/Freemium Version
YesYes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeOptional
Additional DetailsOn-premise Edition is free to download and install on one's own servers.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Google AnalyticsMatomo Analytics
Features
Google AnalyticsMatomo Analytics
Web Analytics
Comparison of Web Analytics features of Product A and Product B
Google Analytics
8.2
Ratings
2% above category average
Matomo Analytics
10.0
Ratings
22% above category average
Lead Conversion Tracking7.50 Ratings10.00 Ratings
Bounce Rate Measurement8.50 Ratings10.00 Ratings
Device and Browser Reporting8.50 Ratings10.00 Ratings
Pageview Tracking8.00 Ratings10.00 Ratings
Event Tracking7.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Reporting in real-time10.00 Ratings10.00 Ratings
Referral Source Tracking8.00 Ratings10.00 Ratings
Customizable Dashboards8.50 Ratings10.00 Ratings
User Ratings
Google AnalyticsMatomo Analytics
Likelihood to Recommend
8.2
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
9.0
(0 ratings)
8.7
(0 ratings)
Usability
7.5
(0 ratings)
9.0
(0 ratings)
Availability
10.0
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Performance
10.0
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
7.0
(0 ratings)
6.7
(0 ratings)
Online Training
10.0
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
9.0
(0 ratings)
9.0
(0 ratings)
Configurability
6.0
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Ease of integration
10.0
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
10.0
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
10.0
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
9.0
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
Google AnalyticsMatomo Analytics
Likelihood to Recommend
Honesty, there is no reason that a company wouldn’t want to implement Google Analytics. The regular version is completely free, is very easy to configure, and provides immense volumes of website data. There are also tangible benefits to the other Google tools it can connect to, and it integrates with any BI/data platform that you might use. The only time I’d advise not using standard Google Analytics is if you’ve purchased Google Analytics 360.
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Matomo is a full-fledged website tracking and analytics tool. It offers everything and then a bit more that GA has to offer. I cannot conceive of any situation where this programme would be "less appropriate". You can use it for each and every website and do well with it. The data it provides includes everything you could wish for (country, IP, new user or not, actions taken, goals achieved etc.)
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Pros
  • Multiple reports to see website use and behavior
  • Allows you to customize reports with days, weeks, months, and years
  • You can build out a dashboard to easily view stats from multiple websites in one place
  • You can share analytics reports via the dashboard, automatically emailed PDFs or in other formats
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  • Default Admin dashboard provides a ton of very useful information that is easily maneuvered around with "click-n-drag" to meet your preferences
  • Provides some very valuable granular insights by default without needing to do additional customizations
  • Breaks down insights into categories, then sub-categories which allow you to really drill down
  • Compiles and presents the data in a nice, visually friendly way
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Cons
  • While raw data is nice to have, I do wish there was an easier way to provide reports from Google Analytics directly. Something that could answer questions straight-forward for people.
  • I would appreciate "helpful hints" or a cheat sheet of some sort, so when quickly searching for something such as time on a certain page, I can find it quickly.
  • I really don't have a third point!
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  • Their support is extremely bad with slow replies
  • Their interface and UI looks like something from 2010
  • It is only 20% of the web page that is usable and there is zero to no help as to how you use their platform
  • The website has lots of bugs that leads to that you often not get accurate analytics
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Likelihood to Renew
Having used Google Analytics for the last 9 years, I have no intention of discontinuing my service. Google Analytics is a fantastic product that provides me with almost everything I could wish for. The positives in this product outweigh any negatives that you might find. I can not think of a single reason to not immediately start using Google Analytics for your business.
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Piwik makes it easy to see which social networks are most effective for you, and the mobile data is great too. Add to this the depth of data and excellent reporting, and you have several reasons to give Piwik a try
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Usability
Google Analytics provides a wealth of data, down to minute levels. That is it's greatest detriment: find the right information when you need it can be a cumbersome task. You are able to create shortcuts, however, so it can mitigate some of this problem. Google is continually refining Analytics, so I do not doubt there will be improvements
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Piwik succeeds in presenting me (and my associates and my clients...) large amounts of data in a user friendly way. The interface and functionality can easily be customized. While some enhancements do need technical background (API calls by programming language from the webserver or javascript), others are easy to use (goal / event tracking)
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Reliability and Availability
We all know Google is at top when it comes to availability. We have never faced any such instances where I can suggest otherwise. All you need is a Google account, a device and internet connection to use this super powerful tool for reporting and visualising your site data, traffic, events, etc. that too in real time.
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No answers on this topic
Performance
This has been a catalyst for improving our site's traffic handling capabilities. We were able to identify exit% from our sites through it and we used recommendations to handle and implement the same in our sites. We have been increasing the usage of Google Analytics in our sites and never had any performance related issues if we used Analytics
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No answers on this topic
Support Rating
The Google reps respond very quickly. However, sometimes they can overly call you to set up an apportionment. I'm very proficient and sometimes when I talk to reps, they give beginner tutorials and insights that are a waste of time. I wish Google would understand my level of expertise and assign me to a rep (long-term) that doesn't have to walk me through the basics.
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The best thing about the Matomo support is that they have a forum which basically you can find the answer to almost all of your questions and most of the time you don't need to contact them regarding your questions and problems but if you need help they will answer in a reasonable time slots.
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Online Training
love the product and training they provide for businesses of all sizes. The following list of links will help you get started with Google Analytics from setup to understanding what data is being presented by Google Analytics.
  1. How to Use Google Analytics for Beginners – Mahalo’s how-to guide for beginners.
  2. A beginner’s guide to Google Analytics – A free eBook walking you through Google Analytics from setup to understanding what data is being presented.
  3. Getting to Know Your Google Analytics Dashboard – The title says it all! This is a brief post with one goal: to introduce you to the Google Analytics dashboard.
  4. Google Analytics for Beginners: How to Make the Most of Your Traffic Reports– This guide doesn’t cover setup, but it does a great job of helping you to better understand the data being presented.
  5. Google Analytics Video Tutorial 1: Setup – A video presentation that walks you through Google Analytics setup.
  6. Google Analytics Video Tutorial 2: Essential Stats – A video presentation that introduces you to some of the most important data being presented in Google Analytics.
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No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
Make sure to put the tracking code on every page. Ideally this would be part of a template or "include" so you can update the code on all pages (or at least within pages of the same category) at once.
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Only one hiccup when we were using a beta installation. Other than that, smooth sailing.
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Alternatives Considered
I have not used Adobe Analytics as much, but I know they offer something called customer journey analytics, which we are evaluating now. I have used Semrush, and I find them much better than Google Analytics. I feel a fairly nontechnical person could learn Semrush in about a month. They also offer features like competitive analysis (on content, keywords, traffic, etc.), which is very useful. If you have to choose one among Semrush and Google Analytics, I would say go for Semrush.
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Matomo Analytics offers the best of both worlds: detailed website analytics and the ability to be privacy-minded and compliant with data privacy regulations, up to and including GDPR. This allows for effective risk management, while also making compliance easy. And it doesn't block marketing from making data-driven decisions to optimize our marketing over time.
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Scalability
Google Analytics is currently handling the reporting and tracking of near about 80 sites in our project. And I am not talking about the sites from different projects. They may have way more accounts than that. Never ever felt a performance issue from Google's end while generating or customising reports or tracking custom events or creating custom dimensions
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No answers on this topic
Return on Investment
  • Great for visualizing website drop-off pages to theories and test update/iterations.
  • Bounce rates on pages to pinpoint bugs and issues.
  • Inaccuracy can lead to incorrect conclusions and decisions around CRO.
  • Segments can be very useful for validating split testing, providing a free tracking of variation vs. control - great ROI.
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  • The ROI in terms of user impact and usage in our beta test has proven to be excellent. In comparison to our AWstats system that was tracking stats based on the htaccess logs, Piwik gives the customer the ability to see stats on an almost realtime basis versus a day behind due to file processing.
  • Lead conversion is definitely easier with a robust system like Piwik. Trying to hunt down leads using a straight up htaccess logs polling system is much more difficult for non-technical users.
  • Customer service calls have dropped since the stats data is now stored in a MySQL backend rather than flat files. With a database driven system efficiency has improved with respect to response time from a customer perspective by well over 150%.
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ScreenShots

Matomo Analytics Screenshots

Screenshot of Customizable dashboardScreenshot of ReferrersScreenshot of Mouse scroll HeatmapScreenshot of Web page HeatmapScreenshot of A/B testingScreenshot of Form Analytics overview