Optimizely Web Experimentation vs. UserTesting

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Optimizely Web Experimentation
Score 8.6 out of 10
N/A
Whether launching a first test or scaling a sophisticated experimentation program, Optimizely Web Experimentation aims to deliver the insights needed to craft high-performing digital experiences that drive engagement, increase conversions, and accelerate growth.N/A
UserTesting
Score 8.1 out of 10
N/A
UserTesting helps UX researchers, designers, product teams, and marketers gather actionable insights through research, testing, and feedback. With a network of real people ready to share their perspectives, UserTesting enables organizations to make customer-first decisions at scale.N/A
Pricing
Optimizely Web ExperimentationUserTesting
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Optimizely Web ExperimentationUserTesting
Free Trial
YesYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
YesNo
Entry-level Setup FeeOptionalNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Optimizely Web ExperimentationUserTesting
Considered Both Products
Optimizely Web Experimentation
Chose Optimizely Web Experimentation
Optimizely is more user-friendly and cost-effective, ideal for experimentation-focused teams, while Adobe Target excels in advanced personalization and seamless integration within the Adobe ecosystem, making it better suited for large enterprises.
Chose Optimizely Web Experimentation
We chose Optimizely specifically for its split testing and advanced audience segmentation capabilities. It makes it way easier to see which option objectively performs better.
Chose Optimizely Web Experimentation
It's more robust and capable.
UserTesting

No answer on this topic

Features
Optimizely Web ExperimentationUserTesting
Testing and Experimentation
Comparison of Testing and Experimentation features of Product A and Product B
Optimizely Web Experimentation
7.9
163 Ratings
5% below category average
UserTesting
-
Ratings
a/b experiment testing9.0163 Ratings00 Ratings
Split URL testing8.5135 Ratings00 Ratings
Multivariate testing8.4139 Ratings00 Ratings
Multi-page/funnel testing7.9126 Ratings00 Ratings
Cross-browser testing8.097 Ratings00 Ratings
Mobile app testing8.075 Ratings00 Ratings
Test significance8.4147 Ratings00 Ratings
Visual / WYSIWYG editor8.0133 Ratings00 Ratings
Advanced code editor7.9125 Ratings00 Ratings
Page surveys6.217 Ratings00 Ratings
Visitor recordings8.418 Ratings00 Ratings
Preview mode7.6145 Ratings00 Ratings
Test duration calculator7.7112 Ratings00 Ratings
Experiment scheduler8.2112 Ratings00 Ratings
Experiment workflow and approval7.890 Ratings00 Ratings
Dynamic experiment activation7.574 Ratings00 Ratings
Client-side tests7.996 Ratings00 Ratings
Server-side tests7.250 Ratings00 Ratings
Mutually exclusive tests8.180 Ratings00 Ratings
Audience Segmentation & Targeting
Comparison of Audience Segmentation & Targeting features of Product A and Product B
Optimizely Web Experimentation
8.3
152 Ratings
5% below category average
UserTesting
-
Ratings
Standard visitor segmentation8.4147 Ratings00 Ratings
Behavioral visitor segmentation7.7122 Ratings00 Ratings
Traffic allocation control9.1144 Ratings00 Ratings
Website personalization7.9111 Ratings00 Ratings
Results and Analysis
Comparison of Results and Analysis features of Product A and Product B
Optimizely Web Experimentation
8.3
149 Ratings
4% below category average
UserTesting
-
Ratings
Heatmap tool9.313 Ratings00 Ratings
Click analytics8.833 Ratings00 Ratings
Scroll maps8.517 Ratings00 Ratings
Form fill analysis8.072 Ratings00 Ratings
Conversion tracking8.744 Ratings00 Ratings
Goal tracking8.2127 Ratings00 Ratings
Test reporting7.9137 Ratings00 Ratings
Results segmentation7.7103 Ratings00 Ratings
CSV export7.9102 Ratings00 Ratings
Experiments results dashboard8.049 Ratings00 Ratings
Best Alternatives
Optimizely Web ExperimentationUserTesting
Small Businesses
Convert Experiences
Convert Experiences
Score 9.9 out of 10
Smartlook
Smartlook
Score 8.5 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Dynamic Yield
Dynamic Yield
Score 8.9 out of 10
Optimal
Optimal
Score 9.1 out of 10
Enterprises
Dynamic Yield
Dynamic Yield
Score 8.9 out of 10
Optimal
Optimal
Score 9.1 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Optimizely Web ExperimentationUserTesting
Likelihood to Recommend
8.7
(254 ratings)
7.9
(188 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
9.5
(51 ratings)
6.2
(8 ratings)
Usability
10.0
(58 ratings)
8.1
(166 ratings)
Availability
10.0
(7 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Performance
7.3
(6 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Support Rating
10.0
(16 ratings)
7.4
(165 ratings)
Online Training
3.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
8.0
(11 ratings)
4.6
(4 ratings)
Configurability
6.0
(1 ratings)
7.3
(1 ratings)
Product Scalability
8.0
(163 ratings)
7.3
(1 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
User Testimonials
Optimizely Web ExperimentationUserTesting
Likelihood to Recommend
Optimizely
I think it can serve the whole spectrum of experiences from people who are just getting used to web experimentation. It's really easy to pick up and use. If you're more experienced then it works well because it just gets out of the way and lets you really focus on the experimentation side of things. So yeah, strongly recommend. I think it is well suited both to small businesses and large enterprises as well. I think it's got a really low barrier to entry. It's very easy to integrate on your website and get results quickly. Likewise, if you are a big business, it's incrementally adoptable, so you can start out with one component of optimizing and you can build there and start to build in things like data CMS to augment experimentation as well. So it's got a really strong a pathway to grow your MarTech platform if you're a small company or a big company.
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UserTesting
Well suited to its original purpose- usability testing and interviews. This can be performed at pace, given the large audience (although our brands are very well known so this should not be a barrier) and there is a decent level of task customisation when conducting unmoderated testing. Its less appropriate for survey where you are looking to capture genuine intent/behaviour, even with screeners the data skews more positively than onsite survey, makes me question the quality of survey respondents.
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Pros
Optimizely
  • The Platform contains drag-and-drop editor options for creating variations, which ease the A/B tests process, as it does not require any coding or development resources.
  • Establishing it is so simple that even a non-technical person can do it perfectly.
  • It provides real-time results and analytics with robust dashboard access through which you can quickly analyze how different variations perform. With this, your team can easily make data-driven decisions Fastly.
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UserTesting
  • Product Manager who follows up on your UserTesting usage and gives advice/support when you need it.
  • UserTesting University is a great platform to learn how to use UT and general information about research.
  • UserTesting can find participants quickly, so you won't need to wait long before you can start the analysis.
Read full review
Cons
Optimizely
  • JavaScript is hard to implement sometimes especially for JQuery elements
  • ROI reporting should be part of the overall experimentation reporting
  • CMP integration: where we can easily show status of test on the HPT request
  • CMS integration
  • More widgets like social proof banners, etc.
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UserTesting
  • Quality of participant pool - many are career testers, and many are untruthful. Since sessions are auto-scheduled if the screener is past, you often don't know until they've completed the test. Allow double screening or be more stringent in removing users from the platform.
  • Unfinished products - focus on making one product the best it can be before moving on to a new one. Unmoderated testing is still missing features (randomization of 3 or more prototypes, etc.)
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Likelihood to Renew
Optimizely
I rated this question because at this stage, Optimizely does most everything we need so I don't foresee a need to migrate to a new tool. We have the infrastructure already in place and it is a sizeable lift to pivot to another tool with no guarantee that it will work as good or even better than Optimizely
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UserTesting
I'm very happy with my experience of the product and the level of service and learning resources they provide. If the service becomes more expensive than it currently is then we might not be able to justify additional cost - but this is theoretical. I would recommend UserTesting and would ideally renew our contract.
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Usability
Optimizely
Optimizely Web Experimentation's visual editor is handy for non-technical or quick iterative testing. When it comes to content changes it's as easy as going into wordpress, clicking around, and then seeing your changes live--what you see is what you get. The preview and approval process for sharing built experiments is also handy for sharing experiments across teams for QA purposes or otherwise.
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UserTesting
It can be difficult to organize our tests and go back and find information. I think the AI tools are helping and will help with this, but for now it is time consuming to sort through all of the tests and information and then synthesize it and share it with others. It just takes a lot of time.
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Reliability and Availability
Optimizely
I would rate Optimizely Web Experimentation's availability as a 10 out of 10. The software is reliable and does not experience any application errors or unplanned outages. Additionally, the customer service and technical support teams are always available to help with any issues or questions.
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UserTesting
Never encountered any problems
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Performance
Optimizely
I would rate Optimizely Web Experimentation's performance as a 9 out of 10. Pages load quickly, reports are complete in a reasonable time frame, and the software does not slow down any other software or systems that it integrates with. Additionally, the customer service and technical support teams are always available to help with any issues or questions.
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UserTesting
Perfectly fine. Never had any problems.
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Support Rating
Optimizely
They always are quick to respond, and are so friendly and helpful. They always answer the phone right away. And [they are] always willing to not only help you with your problem, but if you need ideas they have suggestions as well.
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UserTesting
I have contacted UserTesting's customer service online, by email, or by phone a few times, and each time, I have encountered the same professionalism and expertise. Even in person during a work event, they were there, and it was the same experience.
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Online Training
Optimizely
The tool itself is not very difficult to use so training was not very useful in my opinion. It did not also account for success events more complex than a click (which my company being ecommerce is looking to examine more than a mere click).
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UserTesting
No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
Optimizely
In retrospect: - I think I should have stressed more demo's / workshopping with the Optimizely team at the start. I felt too confident during demo stages, and when came time to actually start, I was a bit lost. (The answer is likely I should have had them on-hand for our first install.. they offered but I thought I was OK.) - Really getting an understanding / asking them prior to install of how to make it really work for checkout pages / one that uses dynamic content or user interaction to determine what the UI does. Could have saved some time by addressing this at the beginning, as some things we needed to create on our site for Optimizely to "use" as a trigger for the variation test. - Having a number of planned/hoped-for tests already in-hand before working with Optimizely team. Sharing those thoughts with them would likely have started conversations on additional things we needed to do to make them work (rather than figuring that out during the actual builds). Since I had development time available, I could have added more things to the baseline installation since my developers were already "looking under the hood" of the site.
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UserTesting
From a technical perspective, the implementation was extremely smooth. Most of the change management / implementation hurdles were clearing use of the tool through our various security, legal, and information privacy teams. Once these concerns were addressed (UserTesting.com was very helpful in providing all the needed documentation), the implementation process was very simple and we were able to get going right away.
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Alternatives Considered
Optimizely
The ability to do A/B testing in Optimizely along with the associated statistical modelling and audience segmentation means it is a much better solution than using something like Google Analytics were a lot more effort is required to identify and isolate the specific data you need to confidently make changes
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UserTesting
The quality of the participants: they usually have good feedback and act like "professional" users. Which is good when we want a few insights in a short amount of time. Also, the interface is good. I miss having more features, like a good transcription tool like we have in Condens
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Scalability
Optimizely
We can use it flexibly across lines of business and have it in use across two departments. We have different use cases and slightly different outcomes, but can unify our results based on impact to the bottom line. Finally, we can generate value from anywhere in the org for any stakeholders as needed.
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UserTesting
The package we have limits the number of people who can set up tests. This prevents us from scaling the use of the platform.
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Return on Investment
Optimizely
  • We're able to share definitive annualized revenue projections with our team, showing what would happen if we put a test into Production
  • Showing the results of a test on a new page or feature prior to full implementation on a site saves developer time (if a test proves the new element doesn't deliver a significant improvement.
  • Making a change via the WYSIWYG interface allows us to see multiple changes without developer intervention.
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UserTesting
  • Content is key to the sign up journey and UserTesting helps me improve that.
  • UserTesting has helped me improve the Cashier on our site, making it easier for users to deposit money.
  • UserTesting is helping me iterate all our content decisions, helping us improve the UX across all platforms.
Read full review
ScreenShots

Optimizely Web Experimentation Screenshots

Screenshot of AI-Powered Experimentation with Opal:

- Instant Test Ideas: Generates high-quality A/B test ideas based on any goals and audience insights.
- Smarter Experimentation: The AI can suggest impactful variations, reducing guesswork and increasing test velocity.
- More Than Just Ideas: From hypothesis generation to analyzing results, Opal helps optimize every stage of the experimentation process.Screenshot of the Web Experimentation Visual Editor :

- Tweak experiments using the visual editor or dive into custom code when needed.
- Modify elements, update styling, or add dynamic behaviors.
- Ensure perfect variations while keeping control over every detail of the experiment.Screenshot of AI Content Suggestions:

- Generates copy variations to supercharge experiments.
- The AI suggests high-impact messaging for tests when hovering over a field.
- AI-powered content suggestions help skip the brainstorming process.Screenshot of Advanced Audience Targeting:

- Delivers personalized experiences by targeting users based on behaviors, attributes, and real-time conditions.
- Defines precise audience segments using first-party data, geolocation, and device type.
- Can test and optimize for different audience groups to maximize impact and engagement.Screenshot of Custom Templates in the Visual Editor:

- Offers pre-built templates for common test setups.
- Standardized variations and maintains brand integrity with reusable templates.
- Templates can be customized visually or tweak them with code for full flexibility.Screenshot of the Web Experimentation Results Page:

- Data visualizations help interpret experiment performance.
- Displays which variations are winning with built-in statistical significance calculations.
- Results can be filtered by audience segments, events, and conversions to uncover key trends.

UserTesting Screenshots

Screenshot of UserTesting's several solutions for gathering rich customer experience narratives.Screenshot of Interactive Path Flows
Built on recent research in data mining, the Interactive Path Flow aggregates interaction data across multiple participant sessions to visualize the customer journey, surface unexpected behaviors, and locate key moments in the customer journey.Screenshot of Keyword Mapping
Similar keywords are automatically grouped based on overall sentiment (positive, negative, or neutral) to identify themes. Highlight reels associated with each keyword are grouped together, to discover the why behind each sentiment.Screenshot of Video capture and live streaming
Digital and real-world customer experiences are recorded on desktop and mobile devices or live streamed for in-platform viewing.Screenshot of Audience targeting
Audiences are specified by screening contributors from UserTesting’s global network of contributors or connecting to any preferred network.