The fast pace of digitalisation, widespread use of mobile devices and higher customer expectations make advanced analytics capabilities more crucial than ever.
Experts expect the $10 billion global mobile and web analytics market to continue to grow at a 16.1% compound annual growth rate (CAGR).
Fortunately, as the above figures indicate, there’s no shortage of web analytics tools on the market. But people often wonder: if all analytics tools can provide insights into user behaviour, does it even matter which one you choose?
The short answer is yes.
To explain why, this article compares two top analytics solutions — Matomo and Mixpanel — side by side. By highlighting their similarities and differences and the key features, capabilities, and value they provide — we’ll help you choose the best solution for your needs.
A quick introduction to Matomo and Mixpanel
Data privacy regulations and relatively high costs can pose a significant challenge when adopting analytics tools.
With that in mind, deciding between Matomo and Mixpanel — two major players in that market — requires businesses to consider not only the tools’ capabilities and pricing but also compliance with global privacy laws and available integrations.
What is Matomo?
Matomo is an open-source analytics software with privacy protection and data ownership as its guiding principles.
It launched in 2007 under the name “Piwik” as an open-source alternative to Google Analytics that respects user data, ownership and privacy.
By 2018, the platform had 100,000 active users and was renamed “Matomo. The latest version, Matomo 5.0.3, was released in March 2024.
Today, it’s known for offering a privacy-focused, GDPR-compliant alternative to Google Analytics. It’s trusted by over one million companies worldwide and supports more than 50 languages.
Matomo’s key features and capabilities:
- Visitor Profiles, with a complete list of all website visits and the option to browse individual user sessions
- User flow analysis, a visual representation of a website’s or app’s traffic patterns
- A/B testing and experimentation
- Ecommerce analytics features with key performance metrics and transaction data
- Goal conversion tracking based on pre-defined business objectives
- Funnel analysis for insights into the visitor’s journey throughout the website, with relevant charts and metrics for each step of the conversion funnel
- Cohorts for tracking engagement and retention over time by comparing groups of users based on shared acquisition dates or behaviours
- User segmentation for analysing smaller groups of visitors, with the option to compare two segments side by side
- Content tracking with impressions and content interactions for measuring the performance of on-page content, popups and banner ads
- Custom alerts with notifications via email and SMS based on pre-defined conditions and changes in relevant performance metrics
- Automated daily, weekly, or monthly custom reports sent as PDF files, CSV files or HTML
What is Mixpanel?
Mixpanel is a web analytics platform that provides insights into user behaviour through event tracking.
Mixpanel was founded in 2009 to help businesses understand how customers engage with their digital products, websites, and mobile apps. It has over 8,000 paying customers across a range of industries.
This analytics tool follows an event-based data model, where each event represents an interaction with a digital product. For this, the platform relies on three main concepts:
- Events, data points that represent in-app actions
- Users with unique identifiers — in this case, user IDs
- Properties, “attributes” that provide additional information about events and users
Mixpanel’s key features and capabilities:
- Advanced reporting, including Insights, Funnels, Flows and Retention
- Templates for faster deployment, including ready-to-use Ecommerce and Marketing KPIs, Feature Launch, Web Analytics, Lifecycle Cohort Analysis
- Fully customisable dashboards, multi-dashboard views, and extensive chart customisation options
- Cohort analysis for filtering users into groups based on common properties, events, and demographic attributes they have in common
- A/B testing for comparing and analysing the performance of different webpage variants
- Custom alerts and notifications for Insights and Funnels reports, including anomaly detection
- Session Replay (currently available in invite-only beta access for Enterprise customers)
Matomo vs Mixpanel: Comparison chart
The table below summarises Matomo’s and Mixpanel’s key features in a side-by-side comparison:
The table below summarises Matomo’s and Mixpanel’s key features in a side-by-side comparison:
| Features and Capabilities | Matomo Analytics | Mixpanel |
|---|---|---|
| Real-Time Analytics | ✅ | ✅ |
| Customisable Dashboards | ✅ | ✅ |
| Custom Reports | ✅ | ❌ |
| Ready-to-Use Templates | ❌ | ✅ |
| A/B Testing | ✅ | ✅ |
| Keyword Tracking | ✅ | ❌ |
| Audience Segmentation | ✅ | ✅ |
| Cohorts | ✅ | ✅ |
| Marketing Attribution | ✅ | ✅ |
| Ecommerce Analytics | ✅ | ✅ |
| Goal Tracking | ✅ | ✅ |
| Session Recordings | ✅ | ✅ |
| Heatmaps | ✅ | ❌ |
| Site Search Tracking | ✅ | ❌ |
| Roll-Up Reporting | ✅ | ❌ |
| Built-In Tag Manager | ✅ | ❌ |
| Alerts and Notifications | ✅ | ✅ |
| Generative AI Capabilities | ❌ | ✅ |
| Data Import and Export | ✅ | ✅ |
| Raw Data Access | ✅ | ✅ |
| Cloud Deployment | ✅ | ✅ |
| On-Premise Deployment | ✅ | ❌ |
| GDPR Compliance | ✅ | ✅ |
| White Label | ✅ | ❌ |
Key similarities between Matomo and Mixpanel
Matomo and Mixpanel are well-regarded analytics solutions that provide detailed insights into user behaviour.
Matomo’s Users Flow with interactions and paths users take
Beyond that, a few additional similarities between the two platforms are worth noting here.
1. Compliance with global privacy regulations
Between 2021 and 2023, 17 countries introduced new data privacy laws, for a total of 162 globally. And at least 20 others are currently proposing such laws. These efforts and the EU’s GDPR underline the growing commitment to protecting customer privacy.
Proportion of countries with enacted data privacy legislation, draft legislation, and no legislation
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With that in mind, businesses must consider the digital analytics platform’s ability to comply with these data protection regulations — something that Matomo and Mixpanel have in common.
Matomo
Matomo is known as a privacy-first, GDPR-compliant web analytics solution. It maintains compliance with the GDPR by storing data in the EU, relying on first-party cookies, supporting visitors’ “Do Not Track” preferences and employing data anonymisation techniques.
Additionally, it has a built-in GDPR Manager.
Moreover, it’s compliant with a range of privacy laws, including:
- Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)
- California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA)
- Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations (PECR)
- Brazilian General Data Protection Law (LGPD)
Mixpanel
Similarly, Mixpanel complies with the GDPR and CCPA, and gives users the option to enter into Business Associate Agreements to maintain HIPAA compliance.
While data is stored on US-based servers by default, Mixpanel’s flexible Cloud Data Residency allows users to store and process customer data in Europe.
In addition to the European Data Residency Program, Mixpanel Mixpanel supports GDPR compliance through:
- Dedicated APIs for retrieval and deletion of user data
- User opt-out methods for client-side SDKs
2. Marketing attribution
Both Matomo and Mixpanel have marketing attribution features, providing an accurate view of channels that lead to conversion by assigning credit to each channel or visit before conversion based on different attribution models.
Matomo
Matomo’s Multi Channel Conversion Attribution and Advertising Performance Export provide insights into the effectiveness of marketing campaigns and organic channels, making it easier to determine which touchpoints are the most effective in driving conversions.
Users can choose from six popular attribution models:
- Last Interaction
- First Interaction
- Last Non-Direct
- Linear
- Time Decay
- Position-Based
Additionally, they can compare up to three different models at a time.
Multi-Attribution reporting page in Matomo
Mixpanel
As part of its marketing analytics features, Mixpanel also supports multi-touch attribution analysis.
By default, Mixpanel relies on the Last Touch model when assigning credit and uses a 30-day lookback window. However, it also supports other attribution models, including:
- First Touch
- Linear
- Participation
- Time-Decay
- U-shaped
- J-shaped
- Inverse J-shaped
3. Historical data import
Both tools support historical data import. This feature is particularly important to users who are switching to a new analytics tool.
Matomo
Matomo’s Google Analytics Importer allows users to import historical data from GA to make the transition from one platform to another more manageable and, most importantly, eliminate the risk of losing data.
Matomo even provides insight into historical data imported from other tools.
It also allows users to import keyword data from leading search engines — including Google, Bing, Yahoo! and Yandex.
Mixpanel
It’s also possible to import historical data to Mixpanel. Users can leverage Warehouse Connectors (a paid add-on only available to Enterprise users) or the Import API to move historical data into Mixpanel.
4. Third-party integrations
Another critical feature Matomo and Mixpanel have in common is their ability to integrate with third-party software.
Matomo
Matomo supports third-party integration with over 100 other tools and technologies, including content management systems (CMSs), customer relationship management (CRM) solutions and Ecommerce platforms. It also integrates with a wide range of programming languages and frameworks.
In addition to integrations with third-party software, Matomo has over 100 plugins — including a free-to-use WordPress plugin — for extending the platform’s functionality and reporting capabilities beyond the core features. By default, Matomo users get access to more than 40 plugins.
Mixpanel
Mixpanel also allows users to expand the platform’s capabilities through integrations. It connects with over 100 tools, including CRMs, data warehouse solutions and customer data platforms (CDPs) for centralised customer databases.
It also integrates with advertising platforms — including Google Ads and Facebook Ads.
Key differences between Matomo and Mixpanel
Here’s an overview of the most notable differences between Matomo and Mixpanel.
1. Heatmap analytics
Heatmap analytics offer insights into individual user behaviour and interactions with different page elements. They show data points in colour-coded visualisations.
Example of heatmap analytics in Matomo
Matomo
Matomo’s Heatmaps feature records clicks, mouse movements and scrolls to show how visitors interact with a website’s pages. It’s part of Matomo’s visual analytics features, which, combined with Session Recordings, provide comprehensive insights into user interactions.
The three main types of heatmap reports available in Matomo are:
- Click heatmaps
- Mouse move (hover) heatmaps
- Scroll heatmaps
Mixpanel
While it does support session replays — a feature similar to Matomo’s Session Recordings — Mixpanel doesn’t currently have built-in heatmap analytics.
2. Roll-up reporting
Reviewing, comparing and analyzing aggregated data is a huge advantage for businesses managing multiple digital properties — such as websites, online stores, and apps — simultaneously.
Here’s how Matomo and Mixpanel compare in this regard:
Matomo
Matomo’s Roll-Up Reporting allows users to aggregate data from multiple websites and apps into one unified dashboard.
Digital properties in Matomo’s Roll-Up Reporting feature
(Image Source)
Of course, Matomo will track these websites, online stores and mobile apps separately, too — with the option to switch to Roll-Ups when needed.
Mixpanel
Mixpanel doesn’t have a direct equivalent to Matomo’s Roll-Up Reporting feature.
But on the plus side, it supports cross-platform tracking, allowing users to send data from multiple sources — websites and apps — to a single Mixpanel project.
3. Complete data ownership
Roughly 70% of businesses are increasing the personal customer data they collect — while consumers grow more concerned about how companies use their data.
This underlines the importance of considering data ownership when choosing a web analytics tool — or, in this case, deciding between Mixpanel and Matomo.
Matomo
Matomo offers more direct control and ownership over data — especially with its self-hosted, On-Premise option. It’s one of the few analytics solutions that guarantees complete data ownership.
Mixpanel
Mixpanel allows users to choose between EU and US Cloud Data Residency and submit requests to delete or export data. While this does give users some control over their data, it doesn’t provide full data ownership.
4. Customisation options and flexibility
Both tools feature customisable dashboards. While Matomo offers more flexibility as an open-source platform, Mixpanel’s widget-style components and visuals offer deeper customisation.
Matomo
Matomo gives users a customisable dashboard with widgets and drag-and-drop functionality and the option to create custom reports with over 200 dimensions and metrics. As an open-source platform, it’s naturally flexible and allows users to tailor it to their specific requirements rather than being restricted to existing features and default settings.
Users can even actively contribute by developing plugins and themes to customise the platform further.
The Matomo Analytics API gives users even more flexibility.
Its White Label option — supported on both Matomo Cloud and Matomo On-Premise — adds to the existing customisation options, allowing businesses to add their own branding and logo to Matomo’s dashboard and reports.
Mixpanel
While Mixpanel can’t provide the same level of flexibility that an open-source platform can, its customizable components and widget-style visualizations are among its standout features.
Mixpanel’s Custom Buckets can group users into more meaningful segments. For example, instead of reviewing separate data for Mexico, Costa Rica, and Venezuela, you can group them into a custom bucket for Spanish-speaking countries.
Its extensive chart customisation options allow users to set different colour themes and adjust the labels and visibility of their charts’ X- and Y-axes. Users can choose from the following visualization types:
- Line
- Stacked line
- Column
- Stacked column
- Funnel steps
- Retention curve
Mixpanel also has multi-dashboard views, so you don’t have to keep switching back and forth between boards. Like Matomo, it also allows users to add or remove widgets depending on their needs.
5. Additional deployment options
Matomo and Mixpanel differ in terms of available deployment options, too.
Matomo
Matomo gives users more freedom to choose the deployment option that meets their organisation’s needs.
There are two deployment options — Matomo Cloud and Matomo On-Premise — and users can migrate from one to the other anytime and keep all their data.
The Cloud version resides on Matomo’s servers in Germany, with Matomo’s core team handling all maintenance and updates.
In addition to Matomo Cloud, the platform has a self-hosted version — Matomo On-Premise. In this case, users can decide the level of security they require for their servers and maintain complete control over where they store their data.
Mixpanel
As a fully managed Cloud service, Mixpanel supports only Cloud-based deployments. There’s currently no self-hosted option.
Matomo vs Mixpanel: Available pricing plans
Before comparing Matomo’s and Mixpanel’s pricing plans, it’s worth noting that usage-based pricing is a relatively standard pricing model used for 29.98% of SaaS products.
Matomo and Mixpanel are no exceptions; both platforms have an event-based pricing model.
Here’s how these two tools compare in terms of pricing and the overall value they provide.
Matomo pricing plans
As with most web analytics platforms, Matomo’s cost depends on monthly traffic and the number of hits, including tracked page views, events, outlinks, downloads, and requests for tracking content searches.
Here’s an overview of Matomo’s pricing plans:
Matomo Cloud
- Business plan, which starts at €22 per month and supports up to 50,000 hits (with the option to get an additional 5,000 hits for €2.2)
- Enterprise plan, with custom pricing and allowances
Matomo Cloud also offers a 21-day free trial.
Matomo On-premise
Matomo’s on-premise solution is completely free to download and install.
Mixpanel pricing plans
Mixpanel’s pricing model is event-based, meaning the costs depend on the number of tracked events. It currently offers three pricing plans — including a free option.
- Free plan, which includes essential analytics and reporting features
- Growth plan, which starts at $24 per month and supports tracking up to 20 million events per month, with the base price covering the initial 10,000 events (the cost scales based on the number of additional tracked events)
- Enterprise plan, which supports tracking up to one trillion events per month and has custom pricing
Why choose Matomo Web Analytics?
Mixpanel is a popular tool for event-based analytics — especially among businesses that require insights into user interactions with digital products, namely web and mobile applications.
Its main strengths lie in:
- Customisability
- Built-in app telemetry
- Widget-style dashboards
Mixpanel’s “build-your-own-table” approach allows teams to create tailored reports, making it a popular choice for organisations focused on app analytics and engagement tracking.
That said, Mixpanel is primarily a product analytics solution. It’s great for app-centric insights into user engagement and product usage. But when it comes to understanding user behaviour on websites, it can’t compete with dedicated web analytics tools.
For instance, it doesn’t support roll-up reporting, making it harder to manage data from multiple websites and apps and get a unified view. Additionally, while it supports native integration with Google Tag Manager, it doesn’t have a built-in Tag Manager like Matomo.
While Mixpanel has the edge in product analytics, Matomo is the better option for comprehensive web analytics.
Matomo is a powerful analytics solution known for:
- Open-source nature
- Flexibility and extensive customisation possibilities
- Cloud and On-Premise deployment options
- Advanced privacy and security features
- No data sampling
- 100% data ownership
- Fully compliant with GDPR, HIPAA, CCPA
Get more comprehensive insights with Matomo
Choosing the right analytics tool is critical to driving business growth and making informed decisions; that should be clear by now. But that choice is rarely straightforward — especially when deciding between powerful platforms like Matomo and Mixpanel.
Mixpanel is a popular choice for tracking product analytics and analysing user engagement, but it has drawbacks.
Matomo is an easy-to-use, open-source platform built with privacy in mind. It gives you full control over your data and provides complete, accurate insights while ensuring compliance with various privacy laws and regulations.
You can start your free 21-day trial of Matomo today — no credit card required.