What is Pirsch best at?

Developer-focused, privacy-friendly analytics. It is API-first with server-side tracking through Go, JavaScript and PHP SDKs, the breakdowns are generous (pages, entry and exit pages, channels, UTM, geo down to city level), every plan keeps unlimited data retention, and it starts at just $6 a month. Pulsetic asks a different question: not where traffic came from, but how fast the site was and whether it was up at all.

How much does Pirsch cost?

$6 per month for 10,000 pageviews (Standard) and $12 for Plus, which adds unlimited pageviews, funnels, A/B tests and segments. There is a 30-day trial with no credit card required, capped at 100,000 pageviews, but no free tier. Pulsetic starts free, and its $9 Solo plan includes 10,000 RUM pageviews a month plus 10 uptime monitors and status pages.

Does Pirsch measure page speed or Core Web Vitals?

No. Pirsch has no performance reporting: no load times, no Core Web Vitals, and no error tracking beyond 404s captured via events. It measures traffic, not experience. Pulsetic records LCP, CLS, INP, FCP and load time percentiles (p50, p75, p95) from every real visit, on every plan.

Can Pirsch tell me when my website is down?

No. Pirsch offers traffic alerts, but those are data-gap warnings: they fire when analytics data stops flowing, not when an external check fails, and there are no status pages. Pulsetic checks your site every 30 seconds from up to 15 regions and alerts you via Slack, Microsoft Teams, Discord, Telegram, email, SMS or phone call.

Is Pulsetic a drop-in replacement for Pirsch?

No. Pulsetic does not track goals, custom events, funnels or UTM campaigns, and it does not count unique visitors. If your work depends on that reporting, keep Pirsch for it. Both scripts are around 4 KB and cookieless, so many teams run the two side by side: Pirsch for traffic, Pulsetic for performance and uptime.

Does Pulsetic's tracking script use cookies?

No. Like Pirsch, Pulsetic sets no cookies; it also keeps no client-side visitor identifier at all, because it does not need to count unique visitors. Nothing is written to localStorage. The script is under 4 KB and sends a single beacon per pageview, with no sampling.

How does data retention compare?

Pirsch wins this one outright: unlimited retention on every plan, which is rare at its price. Pulsetic keeps RUM data for 3 months on Free, 1 year on Solo and Team and 5 years on Organization, alongside your uptime history. For most performance work recent percentiles matter more than old ones, but if you need years of raw analytics, Pirsch has the stronger offer.

When should I switch from Pirsch to Pulsetic?

When the questions you are asking change: you care less about channels and campaigns and more about why the site felt slow, whether Core Web Vitals pass, and who tells you when it goes down. Pulsetic answers those from its free plan, includes status pages, and costs $9 for the same 10,000 pageviews. If you need both sets of answers, the two scripts coexist happily.

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Pulsetic vs Pirsch: the breakdown

Credit where due: Pirsch is a developer’s analytics tool done properly. It is API-first with server-side tracking through Go, JavaScript and PHP SDKs, the script is about 4 KB, it is cookieless with IP addresses never stored, the breakdowns are generous, and every plan keeps unlimited data retention.

But Pirsch answers one question: where traffic came from and what it did. There is no performance data: no load times, no Core Web Vitals, no error tracking beyond 404s via events. And its traffic alerts warn when data stops flowing, which is not the same as knowing your site is down.

That’s why people searching for a Pirsch alternative land on Pulsetic: the same lightweight, cookieless, developer-minded approach, spent on measuring real load times, Core Web Vitals and downtime, with status pages included even on the free plan.

Let’s compare the two.

The 4 KB you budgeted, spent on speed

Pirsch’s script and Pulsetic’s are both around 4 KB and cookieless. The difference is what comes back: Pulsetic returns LCP, CLS, INP and FCP with p50, p75 and p95 percentiles from every real visit, on every plan.
Uptime is not a traffic alert

Pirsch’s traffic alerts warn you when data stops flowing in. Pulsetic checks your site from the outside every 30 seconds from up to 15 regions and pages you by Slack, email, SMS or phone call the moment it goes down.
Status pages from the free plan

Pulsetic includes customizable status pages with subscriber emails, incident updates and maintenance windows, starting on the free plan. With Pirsch you would still need a second tool for the whole uptime side of the job.

“Pulsetic has transformed my website monitoring experience with its intuitive interface and real-time tracking capabilities. I love how effortlessly I can keep tabs on my site’s performance, ensuring everything runs smoothly!”
Koen Kanters

Senior Software Engineer at ASML

Pricing: Pulsetic vs Pirsch

Free plans

Pirsch has no free tier: a 30-day trial with no credit card, capped at 100,000 pageviews, then a paid plan. Pulsetic keeps a real free plan with 10 monitors, status pages and 1,000 RUM pageviews a month, commercial use allowed.
Paid plans

Pirsch starts at $6 for 10,000 pageviews (Standard), with funnels, A/B tests and segments from $12. Pulsetic’s alternative to Pirsch is $9 for 10,000 RUM pageviews plus 10 uptime monitors, with whitelabel and 30-second checks from $19.
Data retention

Pirsch keeps your data with unlimited retention on every plan, a genuinely strong deal. Pulsetic keeps RUM data 3 months on Free, 1 year on Solo and Team and 5 years on Organization, with uptime history alongside.

Feature comparison

Pirsch

Free plan / trial

Free Plan

30-day trial

Price (USD/mo)

$9

$6

Monitoring

Check time

30 sec

n/a

Real User Monitoring (RUM)

✕

Choice of regional data centers

n/a

SSL monitoring

✕

Keyword monitoring

✕

Ping / ICMP monitoring

✕

Port monitoring

✕

TCP monitoring

✕

Domain monitoring

✕

Cron / heartbeat monitoring

✕

Custom HTTP requests

✕

Customized responses

✕

API

MCP server

✕

n8n integration

✕

Cloudflare IP allowlisting

n/a

Monitoring data retention

Up to 5 yr

n/a

Status Pages

Incident updates

✕

Status updates for subscribers via email

✕

Maintenance windows

✕

Status badges

✕

Customized domain

✕

Customized colors

✕

Customized logo

✕

Remove branding

✕

Customized status page layout

✕

CSS customization

✕

Custom email sender & templates

✕

AI writing assistant

✕

Page translations

✕

Password-protected status page

✕

Notifications

Email alerts

Traffic alerts only

SMS alerts

✕

Phone call alerts

✕

Slack alerts

✕

MS teams alerts

✕

Discord alerts

✕

Telegram alerts

✕

Mattermost alerts

✕

Webhooks alerts

✕

Zapier alerts

✕

Twilio alerts

✕

Datadog integration

✕

Integration with SIGNL4

✕

Analytics

See response times

n/a

Response time by location

n/a

Custom date range reports

Scheduled email reports

Not documented

Web Analytics & RUM

Cookieless tracking

Tracking script size

Under 4 KB

4 KB

Core Web Vitals (field data)

✕

Load time percentiles (p50/p75/p95)

✕

JS error tracking

✕

Realtime visitors

Traffic breakdowns (pages, geo, devices)

Goals / custom events

✕

Analytics data retention

3 mo - 5 yr by plan

Unlimited

Self-hostable

✕

Enterprise only

Security

Two-factor authentication

Not documented

Single Sign-On (SAML)

✕

Role-based access

Not documented

Support

Chat

✕

Human Support

AI Support

✕

Helpdesk Articles

Email Support

Comparison based on publicly available information as of July 2026. Features and pricing change frequently, so please verify current details on each provider’s website.

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And there’s more in Pulsetic’s free plan…

See where your website is loading slowly

We’ll check your website response times from different locations around the world, so you know if there’s an issue in a particular region.
Alerts wherever you want them

Pulsetic lets you know the moment your website is down, through Slack, Telegram groups, Webhooks, email, SMS or voice call.
Never let your SSL expire again

We’ll let you know when it’s time to update your SSL certificate - so you can renew it before customers are seeing error messages.

Pirsch counts and segments your traffic. Pulsetic measures how it felt and watches your uptime.

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Frequently asked questions

What is Pirsch best at?

Developer-focused, privacy-friendly analytics. It is API-first with server-side tracking through Go, JavaScript and PHP SDKs, the breakdowns are generous (pages, entry and exit pages, channels, UTM, geo down to city level), every plan keeps unlimited data retention, and it starts at just $6 a month. Pulsetic asks a different question: not where traffic came from, but how fast the site was and whether it was up at all.
How much does Pirsch cost?

$6 per month for 10,000 pageviews (Standard) and $12 for Plus, which adds unlimited pageviews, funnels, A/B tests and segments. There is a 30-day trial with no credit card required, capped at 100,000 pageviews, but no free tier. Pulsetic starts free, and its $9 Solo plan includes 10,000 RUM pageviews a month plus 10 uptime monitors and status pages.
Does Pirsch measure page speed or Core Web Vitals?

No. Pirsch has no performance reporting: no load times, no Core Web Vitals, and no error tracking beyond 404s captured via events. It measures traffic, not experience. Pulsetic records LCP, CLS, INP, FCP and load time percentiles (p50, p75, p95) from every real visit, on every plan.
Can Pirsch tell me when my website is down?

No. Pirsch offers traffic alerts, but those are data-gap warnings: they fire when analytics data stops flowing, not when an external check fails, and there are no status pages. Pulsetic checks your site every 30 seconds from up to 15 regions and alerts you via Slack, Microsoft Teams, Discord, Telegram, email, SMS or phone call.
Is Pulsetic a drop-in replacement for Pirsch?

No. Pulsetic does not track goals, custom events, funnels or UTM campaigns, and it does not count unique visitors. If your work depends on that reporting, keep Pirsch for it. Both scripts are around 4 KB and cookieless, so many teams run the two side by side: Pirsch for traffic, Pulsetic for performance and uptime.
Does Pulsetic's tracking script use cookies?

No. Like Pirsch, Pulsetic sets no cookies; it also keeps no client-side visitor identifier at all, because it does not need to count unique visitors. Nothing is written to localStorage. The script is under 4 KB and sends a single beacon per pageview, with no sampling.
How does data retention compare?

Pirsch wins this one outright: unlimited retention on every plan, which is rare at its price. Pulsetic keeps RUM data for 3 months on Free, 1 year on Solo and Team and 5 years on Organization, alongside your uptime history. For most performance work recent percentiles matter more than old ones, but if you need years of raw analytics, Pirsch has the stronger offer.
When should I switch from Pirsch to Pulsetic?

When the questions you are asking change: you care less about channels and campaigns and more about why the site felt slow, whether Core Web Vitals pass, and who tells you when it goes down. Pulsetic answers those from its free plan, includes status pages, and costs $9 for the same 10,000 pageviews. If you need both sets of answers, the two scripts coexist happily.