Pendo review
by Pendo.ioProduct analytics
Product analytics with in-app guides, 7 years of event data on paid plans and an EU environment; priced by monthly active users through sales.
- Free plan
- Self-serve
- Custom quote
- Prices hidden
What you're paying for
- Compliance included (main value)
- Saves engineering time
Analytics and in-app guides in one product, with 7 years of event data on paid plans, an EU environment, SOC 2 Type 2 and a BAA.
Pendo pairs product analytics with in-app guides, session replay and surveys, so the team that measures adoption can also act on it inside the product. Paid subscriptions keep raw event data for 7 years by default, customers choose a US, EU, Japan or Australia environment, and the trust center lists SOC 2 Type 2 and HIPAA, with BAAs signed for healthcare customers. Every paid plan is priced by monthly active users through sales.
- Analytics and in-app guides togetherEvery plan, including Free, includes product analytics and in-app guides; Core adds session replay and Ultimate adds surveys, journey orchestration and Data Sync.Evidence: Pricing page (2026-10-15)
- 7 years of event dataRaw event data is kept for 7 years from collection by default, and can be shortened to between 1 and 84 months on request.Evidence: Subscription data retention article (2026-10-15)
- SOC 2 Type 2, HIPAA and an EU environmentThe trust center lists SOC 2 Type 2 and HIPAA; the AI docs refer to customers with a signed BAA; customers choose a US, EU, Japan or Australia environment.Evidence: Trust center, AI and global hosting articles (2026-10-15)
- Best for
- Product teams that want adoption analytics and in-app guidance in one tool, with long history and an EU option, and expect a sales contract.
- Good to know
- Every paid plan is priced through sales, and the free plan stops at 500 monthly active users.
How Pendo compares
Against 3 other products we reviewed in Product analytics: what you pay for with each, the five access facts, the plan limits we recorded and each review's bottom line. The note under the table says how each one was checked.
| Metric | Pendo | PostHog | Mixpanel | Amplitude |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| What you're paying for | Compliance includedAnalytics and in-app guides in one product, with 7 years of event data on paid plans, an EU environment, SOC 2 Type 2 and a BAA. | Saves engineering timePer-event rates published for every volume, 7 years of data on paid usage, priced warehouse exports and a HIPAA BAA without a sales contract. | Compliance includedSAML SSO and SCIM on the self-serve Growth plan, two years of data on every plan, and its own SOC 2 Type II and ISO 27001. | Worth the priceThe largest free tier here at 2 million events a month, and the lowest listed price at 10 million: $720 a month, or $576 billed annually. |
| Overall score | 3.9 | 7.8Best | 7.1 | 6.3 |
| Free option | Free plan | Free plan | Free plan | Free plan |
| Card to start | –Not measured | No card needed | No card needed | No card needed |
| Getting access | Self-serve | Self-serve | Self-serve | Self-serve |
| Starter priceCheapest paid plan | –Not measured | $0 | $0 | $0 |
| Pricing model | Custom quote | Usage-based | Tiered | Tiered |
| Pricing page | Prices hidden | Public prices | Public prices | Public prices |
| Free plan | 500 monthly active users; free events not stated | 1M events/mo, unlimited team members | 1M events/mo, unlimited seats | 2M events/mo, unlimited seats |
| Price for 10M events/mo | Not published; billed by monthly active users | $1,080 identified, $324.40 anonymous (computed) | $1,176 monthly, $840 billed annually (Growth) | $720 monthly, $576 billed annually (Plus) |
| Self-serve prices up to | No price published | No ceiling; rates listed past 250M events | 20M events/mo | 70M events/mo |
| Data retention | 7 years kept; 1 year visible on Free | 1 year (Free), 7 years (paid) | 2 years on every plan | 1 year (Free), 2 years (Plus) |
| SOC 2 / ISO 27001 | SOC 2 Type 2; ISO 27001 not listed | SOC 2 Type II; ISO 27001 not listed | SOC 2 Type II, ISO 27001 and ISO 27701 | SOC 2 Type II and ISO 27001 |
| EU data storage | EU environment, chosen by the customer | EU cloud in Frankfurt | Every plan, chosen at project creation | Frankfurt data center, every plan |
| HIPAA BAA | Signed with customers; plan not stated | Boost package, $250/mo | Enterprise plan | Offered; plan not stated |
| SAML SSO | Included by contract (sales-priced plans) | Scale package, $750/mo | Growth plan (self-serve) | Growth plan (custom price) |
| Warehouse export | Data Sync paid add-on, price not listed | Batch exports; 1M rows/mo free, then per row | Data Pipelines add-on, fee not listed | S3, Snowflake and others documented; plan not stated |
| Self-hosting | Not listed | Open source (MIT), unsupported | Not listed | Not listed |
| Bottom line | From its public pages, Pendo is the option here that adds in-app guides to analytics, with 7 years of data and four hosting regions. Every paid plan is quoted by sales, so its price cannot be compared from the page. | From its public pages, PostHog is the most transparent on price and the most open with your data, with a self-serve HIPAA BAA. Identified events carry a second rate, so estimate your mix of identified and anonymous events before comparing bills. | From its public pages, Mixpanel has the most complete self-serve access controls of the three and the clearest written price table. It has the highest listed price at 10 million events, so compare annual billing before you decide. | From its public pages, Amplitude has the largest free tier and the lowest listed price at 10 million events. SSO, longer history and scheduled syncs sit on the custom-priced Growth plan, so check those against your needs first. |
Evidence: Pendo: facts checked 2026-10-15 from its public sign-up and pricing pages, no completed hands-on run; PostHog: facts checked 2026-10-15 from its public sign-up and pricing pages, no completed hands-on run; Mixpanel: facts checked 2026-10-15 from its public sign-up and pricing pages, no completed hands-on run; Amplitude: facts checked 2026-10-15 from its public sign-up and pricing pages, no completed hands-on run. Prices in USD as listed, excluding tax. "–" means not recorded.
Score
- Pricing clarity
- 6.0 / 10, Good
- no self-serve price published; a mid-tier plan priced by sales
- Free tier
- 0.0 / 10, Fair
- free plan metered in another unit (500 monthly active users); free events not stated
- Price at 10M events
- 0.0 / 10, Fair
- no published price for 10M events: billed by monthly active users; every paid plan is priced by sales
- Data retention
- 7.5 / 10, Good
- 1 year on the free plan, 7 years on the entry paid plan
- Compliance and data residency
- 7.0 / 10, Good
- own SOC 2 Type II, ISO 27001 not listed, EU data storage, HIPAA BAA offered, plan not stated
- Data control
- 3.0 / 10, Fair
- warehouse export as a paid add-on; SAML SSO on a sales-priced plan
Review
Review from public pages
Written from Pendo's public pages (pricing, security or privacy, and docs) as read on Oct 15, 2026. We did not sign up, and no hands-on run is published yet.
What the public pages show
We read Pendo's pricing page, its trust center, its security page and its support articles on Pendo Free, data retention, hosting, SAML and integrations on Oct 15, 2026; we did not sign up for this review. The pricing page lists Base, Core and Ultimate with "Request pricing" and "Custom MAU volume", and a comparison table that adds a Free column with 500 monthly active users. Pendo prices by MAUs, not events or sessions, so we could not place it on the events scale used here.
The Pendo Free page now leads with Novus, a separate AI-native free product in open beta, and links to "Continue to Pendo Free"; its FAQ says Pendo Free is not going away. Free registration needs a business email. On trials the pages differ: the pricing FAQ says to talk to sales for a trial, while the Pendo Free help article describes a 30-day trial you can activate at registration.
The trust center lists SOC 2 Type 2, PCI DSS, HIPAA and GDPR, but not ISO 27001. Its updates page reports that on June 23, 2026 Pendo disclosed a compromise of Klue, a third-party tool it uses, which exposed business and contact data in Pendo's Salesforce CRM; Pendo states its product platform was not affected.
Strengths
- Analytics plus in-app guides
Every plan includes analytics and in-app guides, so measuring and guiding users happen in one tool.
- 7 years of event data
Raw event data is kept for 7 years by default on paid subscriptions.
vs Amplitude: Amplitude Plus and Mixpanel Growth keep 2 years; PostHog pay-as-you-go keeps 7.
- Four hosting environments
Customers choose US, EU, Japan or Australia hosting, and the EU environment keeps personal data in the EU.
- SOC 2 Type 2 and HIPAA listed
The trust center lists both, with a 2026 SOC 3 report and BAAs for healthcare customers.
Things to know
- All paid plans priced by sales
Base, Core and Ultimate say "Request pricing"; the pages publish no price at any volume.
Workaround: Pendo Free covers up to 500 MAUs without a sales call.
- Small free plan
Above 500 MAUs, Free can no longer create guides, surveys or segments, and reports show a sample of 500 visitors.
- API and integrations are paid
Free has no API or third-party integrations; Data Sync, the API and webhooks are paid add-ons without listed prices.
- No ISO 27001 listed
The trust center lists SOC 2 Type 2, PCI DSS and HIPAA, but not ISO 27001.
Pricing reality
Pendo prices by monthly active users and by the bundle you choose; the FAQ says the cost per MAU falls as volume grows. No price is published: Base, Core and Ultimate all route to sales. Exceeding the MAU limit on a paid plan does not interrupt service, and your representative follows up about a contract change.
Session replay, product discovery, sentiment and journey orchestration are add-ons below Ultimate. Data Sync, the API, webhooks and the Salesforce integration are paid add-ons sold through your account representative. Predict and Agent Analytics can be added to any plan.
Exit path
Data Sync, a paid add-on, sends event data to Snowflake or to cloud storage on S3, Azure or Google Cloud. After a contract ends, Pendo says customer data is removed starting 90 days after cancellation.
Compared with
- Pick Pendo when
- You want in-app guides with analytics, or 7 years of event data.
- Pick Amplitude when
- You want published prices and a larger free tier: 2 million events a month and 10 million for $720.
- Pick Pendo when
- You want in-app guides, or Japan or Australia hosting.
- Pick PostHog when
- You want to compute your bill from published rates, or a HIPAA BAA on a priced self-serve package.
- Pick Pendo when
- You want in-app guides, or 7 years of event data.
- Pick Heap when
- You want SAML SSO on the free plan, or ISO 27001.
Choose it if
- You want analytics and in-app guides in one product.
- You need long event history and an EU, Japan or Australia environment.
- You expect to buy through a sales contract anyway.
Look elsewhere if
- You want to see prices before talking to sales.
- Your security review requires ISO 27001.
Bottom line
From its public pages, Pendo is the option here that adds in-app guides to analytics, with 7 years of data and four hosting regions. Every paid plan is quoted by sales, so its price cannot be compared from the page.
Plan limits at a glance
| Limit | As recorded |
|---|---|
| Free plan | 500 monthly active users; free events not stated |
| Price for 10M events/mo | Not published; billed by monthly active users |
| Self-serve prices up to | No price published |
| Data retention | 7 years kept; 1 year visible on Free |
| SOC 2 / ISO 27001 | SOC 2 Type 2; ISO 27001 not listed |
| EU data storage | EU environment, chosen by the customer |
| HIPAA BAA | Signed with customers; plan not stated |
| SAML SSO | Included by contract (sales-priced plans) |
| Warehouse export | Data Sync paid add-on, price not listed |
| Self-hosting | Not listed |
Read from the vendor's public pages on Oct 15, 2026. No hands-on run is published yet. How we check
We have not published a sign-up run for Pendo yet. The access facts above were read from its sign-up and pricing pages on Oct 15, 2026.
We have not published API calls for Pendo yet.
Pendo lists 4 plans. Paid plans are priced by quote only.
- PendoFreeFree$0/moUp to 500 MAUs; business email required
- Analytics and in-app guides
- Pendo-branded NPS surveys and roadmaps
- Unlimited internal users
- 12 months of data in the UI
- PendoBaseRequest pricingCustom MAU volume
- Product analytics
- In-app guides
- Session replay as an add-on
- PendoCoreRequest pricingCustom MAU volume
- Product analytics
- In-app guides
- Session replay
- PendoUltimateRequest pricingCustom MAU volume
- Sentiment (NPS, PMF, CSAT)
- Orchestrate and Listen
- Data Sync
- Session replay
Prices as listed, USD, excluding tax; observed 2026-10-15.
Source: pendo.io pricing page. Prices change; the observed date above is when our agent read them.