A Microsoft Clarity alternative that keeps your visitors' data out of Microsoft's hands.
Clarity is free and shows heatmaps, recordings, rage and dead clicks. In exchange, Microsoft processes recordings of your visitors, and in the EEA, UK and Switzerland it now needs their consent. Trace finds the same frustration as numbers, without recordings, cookies or a third party.
Keep Microsoft Clarity if you need
- Free heatmaps and session recordings
- Its Google Analytics integration
- AI summaries of recordings
Choose Trace if you want
- No recordings and no consent needed for cookies
- Data kept in the EU, or on your own server
- Problems ranked, fixed by your coding agent and checked after release
Side by side
| Microsoft Clarity | Trace | |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free to start, or self-host for free |
| What is stored | Session recordings | Totals per page and element |
| Consent | Consent signal required in the EEA, UK and Switzerland since October 2025 | No cookie, so no cookie consent |
| Frustration | Rage clicks, dead clicks, quick backs | Rage and dead clicks per element, ranked |
| Browser errors | JavaScript errors and click errors | Errors and failed requests, with visits broken |
| Funnels | Yes | Yes, in trace.json |
| Did it work? | No per-release verdict | A verdict 14 days after each release |
| Self-host | No | Yes, open source |
Microsoft Clarity details from its public documentation, checked 29 October 2026. Spot something out of date? Tell us.
Moving from Microsoft Clarity: what maps to what
The frustration Clarity shows in recordings, Trace shows as rates you can track.
| In Microsoft Clarity | In Trace |
|---|---|
| Rage click and dead click filters | Problems ranked by visits affected |
| Heatmaps | Clicks per element, as numbers |
| JavaScript errors | Errors with the visits they broke |
| Recordings | No equivalent, on purpose |
Run them side by side for a month
Add the Trace tag next to Microsoft Clarity. It adds 8.4 KB and does its work when the browser is idle.
Compare Trace's dead-click list with Clarity's. Ship the top fix.
Read the verdict on what you shipped. Keep what still earns its place.
Questions from Microsoft Clarity users
Clarity is free. Why pay?
Trace is free too for one site, and free without limits self-hosted. What you pay Clarity with is your visitors' recordings.
Does Trace show recordings?
No. That is the point.
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