Pendo.io vs. UserTesting

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Pendo.io
Score 8.5 out of 10
N/A
Pendo.io is a product engagement platform with features for in-app analytics, surveys and feedback, and guidance.N/A
UserTesting
Score 8.4 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
Pendo.ioUserTesting
Editions & Modules
*Free
Free
Base
Contact sales team
Core
Contact sales team
Pulse
Contact sales team
Ultimate
Contact sales team
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Pendo.ioUserTesting
Free Trial
YesYes
Free/Freemium Version
YesNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
YesNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Pendo.ioUserTesting
Considered Both Products
Pendo.io
Chose Pendo.io
Pendo.io seems to be more commonly known and already integrated with other parts of our business, so that's why we've stuck with them as a vendor. It often takes a good chunk of work to set up product analytics tools, so there is a reason of current stickiness with the tool if …
UserTesting
Chose UserTesting
Userlytics is probably the best alternative to UserTesting. It has a large panel, a similar tool for creating tests, [but] their pricing model is much more favorable for our company. They don't charge per seat license, but only per test that you conduct. That would allow my …
Chose UserTesting
Prior to purchasing UT we were using a collection of pretty standard tools for recording (like WebEx) and MS Excel for notes and analysis. The UT platform is light years better than these alternatives from a tool perspective, as it's much easier to record/edit/share with the …
Best Alternatives
Pendo.ioUserTesting
Small Businesses
ChurnZero
ChurnZero
Score 8.4 out of 10
Smartlook
Smartlook
Score 8.6 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
ChurnZero
ChurnZero
Score 8.4 out of 10
Optimal
Optimal
Score 9.1 out of 10
Enterprises
Nexthink
Nexthink
Score 7.4 out of 10
Optimal
Optimal
Score 9.1 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Pendo.ioUserTesting
Likelihood to Recommend
8.5
(130 ratings)
7.6
(189 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
8.2
(6 ratings)
7.5
(8 ratings)
Usability
7.8
(43 ratings)
8.0
(167 ratings)
Availability
9.1
(1 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Performance
9.1
(1 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Support Rating
8.2
(5 ratings)
6.6
(166 ratings)
Online Training
9.1
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
9.1
(2 ratings)
4.6
(4 ratings)
Configurability
7.3
(1 ratings)
7.3
(1 ratings)
Product Scalability
9.1
(1 ratings)
7.3
(1 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
9.1
(1 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
User Testimonials
Pendo.ioUserTesting
Likelihood to Recommend
Pendo.io
Pendo.io is useful in generating great dashboards that present user analytics in the best possible view that could be used for analysis & derive key insights on what could be done if there's a feature that's not being recognized by end users or if there are any pain points where users are struggling more around a workflow which is technically not that difficult. Pendo.io also can be used to create impactful guides where intercatoin of a user with the Guide can be created in less steps & have relevant information about that workflow that the user is completing. Pendo.io's resource center can act as a one stop hub to present any sidewide updates which could be information of Prod releases, New KB Articles, Register to any event, & much more. Segments can be created in as many variation as one can. In fact, Segments are the ruling property or feature that works so handy, which reduces a lot of iterative work.
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UserTesting
UserTesting has been great for moderated customer interviews/usability testing as well as for unmoderated testing of messaging, imagery, prototypes and live experiences. I would say that the scope of what you want needs to be limited, as the participants are only paid so much and tests are supposed to not exceed a certain amount of time. For customer interviews, I think it can be difficult to onboard customers to UserTesting if they have never used it before. If I set up interviews, I don't even have them use the UserTesting scheduling tool, I actually set up all the interviews with the customers myself through the tool (being mindful of time zones!). When we run the meeting, they really don't even know UserTesting is involved. Might be nice for UserTesting to allow the upload/connecting to of a Zoom interview and let it do the transcription/analysis from there.
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Pros
Pendo.io
  • NPS Surveys
  • Feature usage insights
  • Identifying user behaviors using Replay feature
  • Clearly segmenting users in a way we want it to be
  • Identifying time spent on a feature/product to better understand what customers actually use
  • Documentation, in-app guides and help section
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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.
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Cons
Pendo.io
  • Dashboard is sometimes very slow to load
  • Preview is problematic if the Pendo.io user doesn't have access to the target environment or application where the guide is going to display
  • It would be ideal to have a gallery of thumbnail images of previously used guides to select from, either to pull a screen capture or to use as a template. It's cumbersome to go to the guides, find the one you want, click on Preview, etc.
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UserTesting
  • Sometimes there are restrictions around types of research that can be used for moderated user-testing with our own users.
  • For tests on relatively small areas of a website or app, the AI analysis seems rather overblown, like it's trying too hard to come up with something insightful when the test is actually about something quite small (e.g. structure of a mobile app menu).
  • It's difficult to invite our own users to unmoderated user-testing because they wouldn't know how the UserTesting interface works - this is particularly an issue for mobile research.
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Likelihood to Renew
Pendo.io
We have had an excellent experience with Pendo. When we've had questions or concerns, Pendo is very quick to respond and communicate with us. We have experienced top-notch customer support and customer engagement. We have actually modeled some of our implementation and product processes after Pendo's examples.
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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
Pendo.io
It is intuitive for core tasks like tracking feature usage, building Guides, and viewing dashboards. The interface is clean and well structured, making it easy for product managers and operational teams to get value quickly without heavy technical support. However, there is a noticeable learning curve when setting up advanced custom events, reports, or integrations, which can take some time and internal knowledge-sharing to master.
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UserTesting
It's very good, I have used other tools in the past and this is by far the most intuitive and user friendly. Testament to this is the ease with which other non researchers who have been onboarded to the tool with our additional seat have found it easy to use
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Reliability and Availability
Pendo.io
Every time I have logged into Pendo, the service has been available for me to use. The page has never been down when I am trying to get info from there.
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UserTesting
Never encountered any problems
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Performance
Pendo.io
Everything loads fairly quickly and it's not slow. I don't use an integration, I log in straight in the webpage.
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UserTesting
Perfectly fine. Never had any problems.
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Support Rating
Pendo.io
They've been great anytime that we have needed help with something. They also have some really great help articles. We're able to figure most things out through their articles, but when we've had to call in they've been very helpful and we haven't had any problems. I'd highly recommend working with them.
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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
Pendo.io
The training schedule was well thought out and tailored to meet our needs. Chantelle stayed with us through the whole implementation and made sure that we were good to go.
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UserTesting
No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
Pendo.io
Use Segment to install and cut developers out of the work cycle!
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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
Pendo.io
I have just very superficial experience with Google Analytics but I do believe that Pendo.io is a much much better tool in pretty much all aspects of it. It has a ton more features and capabilities and even for the capabilities where there is overlap, Pendo seems to come out ahead easily. There are aspects that Pendo could improve for sure such as what metadata it captures from the users; an example of this is screen resolution which Google Analytics captures but Pendo does not.
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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
Pendo.io
The system is pretty flexible and scalable, I have used it in different browsers and devices without issues.
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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
Pendo.io
  • Reducing development time with in-app guides and resource center, with product management being able to agilely create guides in real time, this could be as much as 1 full time developer in savings.
  • Reducing business time scoping "rock fetches" than are proven to be invaluable based on analytics, each time 1 single piece of analtical data saves around ~20 hours across multiple resources.
  • Increasing user satisfaction with in-app guides and resource center
  • Increasing usage of key features through targetted messaging, those key features either drive costs ou of our business or add value to customers business.
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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.
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ScreenShots

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.