UXtweak is one of the strongest information-architecture toolkits on the market, and its free plan is genuinely useful for trying things out. It is also the clearest example in this category of a headline allowance that cannot be spent the way it reads. The free plan advertises 15 monthly responses. No single study type on that plan can collect 15. Here is what UXtweak actually costs in 2026, why three different sources give three different prices, and the nine alternatives worth comparing.
The short answer
UXtweak runs a free plan with 1 user license, 15 monthly responses and 1 concurrent active study, a Business plan with 1 license upgradable to 3 plus 1 free, and a Custom plan with unlimited licenses, SSO and expert support. The Business price is the problem: UXtweak does not render a price on its own pricing page without JavaScript, Capterra lists it at $92.00 per user per month, and other pricing trackers list $179 a month billed monthly or $144 billed annually. A buyer cannot get one number.
Underneath that, three things decide the real cost. The free plan meters each tool separately and far below its own headline. Business sells the moderated research stack as add-ons rather than including it. And on the free plan, results are viewable for 14 days even though data is retained for 12 months.
The 15 responses you cannot spend
The free plan headline is 15 monthly responses. The per-tool caps are where it unravels. Card Sorting allows 10 responses. Tree Testing allows 10. Preference Test, Five Second Test, Mobile App Testing and Website Testing each allow 3.
So no single tool can reach 15. The best any one study type can do is 10, and four of the six cap at 3, which is below the threshold at which any result means anything. To actually consume the advertised allowance you must run at least two different study types, and because the free plan permits only 1 concurrent active study, you must run them one after another.
The gap between headline and reality is largest exactly where most people start. A team evaluating UXtweak for website testing reads 15 monthly responses and gets 3. That is not a trial of the product, it is a screenshot of it. Three responses cannot establish a completion rate, a preference or a pattern, and our guide to sample size per segment explains why numbers that small should not be reported at all.
This is a fair design decision by UXtweak rather than a trick: the free tier exists to demonstrate the interface, not to deliver findings. But the number on the plan card and the number you can use are different numbers, and you should plan against the second one.
Retention is not access
The second thing worth knowing about the free plan: data retention is 12 months, but results are viewable for 14 days.
Those describe the same data and disagree by a factor of about 26. Your responses continue to exist for a year. Your ability to look at them ends in a fortnight. If you run a card sort on the first of the month and come back six weeks later to write it up, the data is retained and you cannot read it.
It is the same shape of clause that Loop11 applies on downgrade, where all but the first 10 completed participants per project become invisible. The lesson generalises across this whole category: when you evaluate a research tool, check the access window separately from the retention window, because vendors quote the flattering one.
What Business actually includes, and what it does not
The Business plan lifts responses to 50 or more per license and allows more than one concurrent study, with 1 user license upgradable to 3 plus 1 free. Data retention is 12 months.
What matters more is what sits outside it. Live Interviews are an add-on. Highlights, reels and transcripts are an add-on. Participants from the UXtweak User Panel are an add-on, discounted 20 percent on Business. In other words, the entire moderated research workflow, the sessions, the recordings and the people, is priced separately from the subscription you just bought.
This is the same unbundling pattern seen elsewhere in the category, and it means the subscription price is not the research price. Budget the add-ons before comparing UXtweak against anything else, or you will be comparing a subscription against a total.
Why UXtweak pricing depends on where you look
UXtweak publishes its plan structure clearly but does not ship a price in the static page: the figure appears only after JavaScript runs, which is why price aggregators disagree. Capterra lists the Business plan at $92.00 per user, per month. Other trackers list $179 a month on monthly billing and $144 a month billed annually, consistent with a stated 20 percent annual discount. Some sources quote the same 92 figure in euros rather than dollars.
We are not going to assert which is correct, because the vendor page will not confirm any of them without a browser session. That is the finding. When you ask UXtweak for a quote, get the number, the currency and the per-user-or-per-account basis in writing, because $92 per user per month across 3 licenses is $3,312 a year while $144 a month flat is $1,728, and both are defensible readings of what is published.
The 9 best UXtweak alternatives in 2026
1. Koji, the best alternative for understanding why. Koji runs AI-moderated voice and text interviews that ask unscripted follow-ups in the moment, then applies automatic thematic analysis across every conversation and produces a one-click report. Where UXtweak tells you which label people chose in a tree test, Koji tells you what they thought the label meant. Pricing is published in full and denominated in credits rather than quotes: Insights is EUR 29 a month for 29 credits, Interviews is EUR 79 a month for 79 credits, a text conversation costs 1 credit and a voice conversation 3. New accounts get 10 free credits with no card, and credit packs get cheaper with volume rather than dearer: 100 credits for EUR 95, 250 for EUR 225. Only conversations scoring 3 or above on the quality gate consume credits, so junk sessions are never billed, which is the opposite of a 3-response cap. Koji supports six structured question types, open_ended, scale, single_choice, multiple_choice, ranking and yes_no, so the countable parts of a study survive alongside the conversational ones. See the structured questions guide. There is one price, in one currency, on one page.
2. Optimal Workshop, the closest like-for-like. The specialist incumbent for card sorting and tree testing, and the most direct substitute for the tools UXtweak is best at. Its meter is on concurrent studies rather than seats, so check the study cap before the seat count.
3. Maze, the product-team default. Prototype and concept testing wired into the design workflow with strong quantitative reporting. Credits and seats both meter, so cost tracks team size as well as volume.
4. Lyssna, the cheapest credible entry point. Five-second tests, preference tests, first-click and card sorting with a large built-in panel, and a free tier that is more usable than most.
5. UserTesting, the enterprise incumbent. The largest panel and deepest services layer, with human-verified participants and enterprise governance. Quote-only pricing, generally five figures.
6. Useberry, the prototype-flow specialist. Strong Figma, Adobe XD and Sketch integrations and detailed flow analytics. Its meter counts responses even from audiences you already own.
7. Loop11, the click-path tool. Task-based unmoderated testing with bring-your-own participants at no cost. Note the per-project participant caps and that downgrading hides all but the first 10 participants per project.
8. Userlytics, the per-session buyer. Sells sessions rather than seats, which suits irregular research calendars. Confirm which of its two published session prices applies to you.
9. PlaybookUX, the no-seat-charge option. Charges nothing per seat, which suits large teams, but meters participants at $65 unmoderated and $115 moderated through its own panel.
UXtweak vs the alternatives at a glance
| Tool | Free tier | What the meter counts | Moderated depth |
|---|---|---|---|
| UXtweak | 15/mo headline, 3 per most tools | Responses per license | Add-on |
| Koji | 10 credits, no card | Credits, quality-gated | AI-moderated voice and text |
| Optimal Workshop | Limited | Concurrent studies | No |
| Maze | Limited | Credits and seats | Limited |
| Lyssna | Yes | Responses and seats | Limited |
| UserTesting | No | Sessions and seats | Full, human |
| Useberry | Limited | Responses | Limited |
| Loop11 | No | Projects and participants | Observers only |
| PlaybookUX | 50 sessions/yr | Participants recruited | Yes, $115 each |
How to choose without being surprised at renewal
Match the tool to the question. UXtweak and Optimal Workshop are the right answer for information architecture: if you need to know whether people can find the settings page, a tree test answers it and a conversation will not. Our research screener questions guide covers getting the right people into those studies.
If your question is about motivation rather than navigation, no card sort will reach it. That is conversation work, and the practical options are human moderation, covered in moderated usability testing, or AI moderation at scale, covered in AI usability testing and AI vs human moderators.
Then run three checks on any vendor before signing. Is the headline allowance reachable by the single tool you actually intend to use, or only by spreading across study types? How long can you view results, as distinct from how long they are retained? And is the price quoted per user or per account, in which currency? UXtweak is strong on capability and weak on all three of those disclosures, which makes it a good product to buy deliberately and a bad one to buy quickly.
Frequently asked questions
How much does UXtweak cost in 2026?
It depends on the source, which is itself the issue. UXtweak does not render a Business price without JavaScript. Capterra lists $92.00 per user per month, while other trackers list $179 a month billed monthly or $144 billed annually. Confirm the number, the currency and whether it is per user or per account before committing.
What does the UXtweak free plan actually include?
One user license, 15 monthly responses, one concurrent active study and 12-month data retention with a 14-day viewing window. Per-tool caps are lower than the headline: 10 responses for card sorting and tree testing, and 3 each for preference tests, five second tests, mobile app testing and website testing.
Why can I not use all 15 free responses on one study?
Because the caps are per tool, not just per account. The highest single-tool allowance is 10, so reaching 15 requires running at least two different study types. Since the free plan allows only one active study at a time, those have to run sequentially rather than together.
Are live interviews included in the UXtweak Business plan?
No. Live Interviews are sold as an add-on, as are highlights, reels and transcripts, and participants from the UXtweak User Panel, which Business subscribers get at a 20 percent discount. The moderated research workflow is priced separately from the subscription.
What is the best UXtweak alternative for card sorting and tree testing?
Optimal Workshop is the closest like-for-like specialist and the most direct substitute. Lyssna is the cheaper option for simpler studies. If the underlying question is why a label confuses people rather than which label wins, an AI-moderated interview platform such as Koji answers it directly instead of inferring it from click patterns.
Is UXtweak or Koji better for user research?
They solve different halves of the problem. UXtweak is better for structured information-architecture tasks such as tree tests and card sorts. Koji is better when you need to understand reasoning, want automatic thematic analysis across every participant, and want one published price rather than a figure that varies by source.
Stop buying an allowance you cannot spend
A free plan that offers 15 responses and delivers 3 on the tool you actually wanted is not a pricing detail. It is a preview of how the vendor will describe everything else: accurately, in a way that reads better than it works.
Koji publishes one price, in one currency, on one page. Insights is EUR 29 a month, Interviews is EUR 79, a voice conversation costs 3 credits, and only conversations that clear the quality gate are billed at all. New accounts get 10 free credits with no card, and those credits buy real AI-moderated interviews rather than a capped demonstration. Automatic thematic analysis turns them into a report in hours rather than weeks, with no research expertise required. Start your first study free and find out what your users were actually thinking.
