Netwarden Apps vs PostHog
Netwarden Apps is a PostHog alternative for teams that want errors-first tracking, dependency-update CVE alerts across 8 ecosystems, and fixed monthly pricing — and don’t need session replay, feature flags, A/B tests, or cohort analytics. PostHog, founded 2020, remains the more complete tool for product analytics depth and experimentation.
By Netwarden Team · · PostHog data verified at posthog.com/pricing and posthog.com/docs
PostHog vs Netwarden Apps at a glance
Definition pairs you can quote. Numbers from the public PostHog pricing page and Netwarden’s pricing page, both verified 2026-05-09.
- Pricing model
- PostHog: 1M product analytics events free, then $0.00005/event tiered for analytics; replay, flags, surveys each metered separately. Netwarden Apps: fixed monthly tier ($0 / $9 / $29 / $79).
- Primary product
- PostHog: product analytics with errors added in 2024 as a sidecar. Netwarden Apps: error tracking built errors-first with lite analytics added on top.
- Self-hosted
- PostHog: Helm chart on Postgres + ClickHouse + Kafka + Zookeeper + MinIO + Redis. Netwarden Apps: a single Bun-compiled binary plus SQLite or Postgres.
- Session replay
- PostHog: yes (DOM playback, console, network, rage-click detection). Netwarden Apps: no, not on the roadmap.
- Feature flags + A/B tests
- PostHog: multivariate flags, gradual rollouts, statistical-significance reporting. Netwarden Apps: not offered, not planned.
- Cohorts and retention
- PostHog: cohort builders, retention curves, paths analysis, SQL access to events. Netwarden Apps: pageviews, top events, one funnel per project (5 steps).
- Dependency-update CVE alerts
- PostHog: not offered. Netwarden Apps: daily OSV.dev cross-reference across 8 ecosystems (npm, PyPI, RubyGems, Go, Cargo, Maven, NuGet, Composer).
- Mobile SDKs
- PostHog: iOS, Android, Flutter, React Native, plus Ruby/Go/Rust/PHP/Java/.NET. Netwarden Apps: JavaScript / Node and Python (alpha) only.
- 10M-event-month bill
- PostHog: ~$470/month at 10M analytics events plus error add-on. Netwarden Apps Studio: $29/month flat (errors plus lite analytics included).
- Founded
- PostHog: 2020, well-funded YC scale-up. Netwarden Apps: 2026, alpha.
If you already know what you need
Two cards. Pick the side that lists what you actually need.
Replay, feature flags, A/B tests, deep analytics
- Session replay with autocapture (DOM, console, network)
- Feature flags + A/B tests + multivariate experiments
- Cohorts, retention curves, paths analysis, unlimited funnel steps
- Heatmaps and inline surveys
- SQL access to your raw event stream
- Mobile SDKs: iOS, Android, Flutter, React Native
Errors-first, dependency alerts, fixed pricing
- Errors-first: fingerprint dedup + auto-reopen on regression
- Dependency-update CVE alerts across 8 ecosystems
- Fixed monthly pricing: $0 / $9 / $29 / $79. No per-event meter.
- Single-binary self-host (no ClickHouse, no Kafka)
- Bundled with server monitoring (Hosts module)
- Simpler product surface: fewer screens to learn
Side-by-side, by category
PostHog data taken from public docs and pricing as of May 2026. Where the row says partial, footnotes explain what’s present.
| Feature | PostHog | Netwarden |
|---|---|---|
| Errors (the thing PostHog half-does) | ||
| Error tracking + fingerprint dedup | Partialadded 2024, sidecar to product analytics | Yes |
| Source-map symbolication on deploy | Partial | Yes |
| Auto-reopen on release regression | No | Yes |
| Stack-trace context lines (5 above / 5 below) | Yes | Yes |
| Product analytics | ||
| Pageviews + top events | Yes | Yes |
| Funnels | Yesunlimited steps + breakdowns | Partial1 funnel × 5 steps |
| Cohorts / retention curves | Yes | No |
| Heatmaps (DOM-level click tracking) | Yes | No |
| SQL access to raw events | Yes | No |
| Frontend / experimentation | ||
| Session replay (DOM playback) | Yes | No |
| Feature flags (multivariate, gradual rollout) | Yes | No |
| A/B tests with significance reporting | Yes | No |
| In-app surveys | Yes | No |
| Dependency security | ||
| Dependency-update alerts (OSV.dev) | No | Yes8 ecosystems |
| SDKs | ||
| JavaScript / Node | Yes | Yes |
| Python | Yes | Partialalpha |
| Ruby / Go / Rust / PHP | Yes | No |
| iOS / Android / Flutter | Yes | No |
| Pricing | ||
| Per-event billing | Yes1M events free, then $0.00005/event for product analytics | Nofixed price |
| Free tier | Yes | Yes |
| Predictable monthly bill | No | Yes |
| Self-hosting | ||
| Self-hostable | PartialHelm + Postgres + ClickHouse + Kafka | Yessingle Bun binary |
| Bundled with infra monitoring | ||
| Server / host monitoring | No | Yes |
| CVE matching against installed packages | No | Yes |
| Compliance + maturity | ||
| SOC 2 / HIPAA | Yes | No |
| Years in market | Yesfounded 2020 | Noalpha, 2026 |
Different job, different shape
We didn’t build an analytics platform that does errors. We built an errors platform that does enough analytics to ship a 5-step funnel and call it a day.
Errors are a first-class product, not a tab
PostHog added error tracking in 2024 as a sidecar to product analytics. It captures stack traces, but the workflow is bolted on. Netwarden Apps was built errors-first: fingerprinted dedup, source-map symbolication on ingest, auto-reopen when a fixed error fires again, and triage states (open / resolved / ignored) you actually use. If errors are the main thing you track, the dedicated tool wins.
Dependency-update alerts (the wedge)
Netwarden Apps cross-references your runtime dependencies against OSV.dev across 8 ecosystems: npm, PyPI, RubyGems, Go, Cargo, Maven, NuGet, and Composer. When a vulnerable version of a package you ship gets a fix released upstream, you get an alert with the affected lockfile, the safe version range, and the advisory ID. PostHog tracks user behavior, not your dependencies.
advisory: GHSA-3xq5-7g69-7qrf lockfile: requirements.txt (worker) current: requests 2.28.1 → fix: 2.31.0
Fixed pricing, no per-event surprise
PostHog gives you 1M product analytics events free, then meters at $0.00005 per event. A successful product can blow past that quickly: 50M events/month is $2,500. Replay, feature flags, surveys, and error tracking each have their own quotas with their own meters. Netwarden Apps Studio is $29/mo, flat. Errors plus our lite analytics are bundled.
50M analytics events / month PostHog: ~$2,500 Netwarden Studio: $29
Self-host that one person can operate
PostHog's self-hosted edition runs on Helm with Postgres, ClickHouse, Kafka, Zookeeper, MinIO, Redis. It is a serious operations job. Netwarden's self-hosted build is one Bun binary plus a SQLite or Postgres pointer. It runs on a Raspberry Pi. If your scale is small but your tolerance for ops is zero, this matters.
$ ./netwarden serve --db ./data.db netwarden ready on :8080
What you give up coming to us
PostHog has built the broadest open-source product-analytics platform on the market. There are real, important things they do that we don’t.
Session replay
PostHog ships a polished session replay: DOM playback, console output, network panel, rage-click detection. It's a flagship feature for them. Netwarden Apps does not have replay and does not have a roadmap commitment for it.
Feature flags + experiments
PostHog has a real feature-flag and experimentation platform: multivariate flags, gradual rollouts, statistical-significance reporting. If you ship behind flags and run A/B tests as part of your dev loop, this is decisive. Netwarden Apps doesn't ship feature flags, and we won't.
Heatmaps, cohorts, retention
PostHog's product-analytics surface is broad and deep: funnels with breakdowns, cohort builders, retention curves, paths analysis, SQL access to the raw event store. Our analytics is intentionally lite: pageviews, top events, one funnel. If product-led growth analysis is your core workflow, PostHog wins this.
Mobile SDKs and a bigger SDK matrix
PostHog has SDKs for iOS, Android, Flutter, React Native, Ruby, Go, Rust, PHP, Java, .NET. A much wider matrix than ours. If you need analytics in a mobile app, or you're working in a language we don't yet support, PostHog covers ground we don't.
10M events a month, side by side
Real numbers from PostHog’s public pricing page. PostHog’s tiered model is fairer than flat-rate per-event but still scales with traffic.
Scenario: 10M analytics events / month + error tracking
PostHog (paid)
≈ $470- Product analytics: 1M free$0
- 9M extra events (tiered)≈ $450
- Error tracking add-on≈ $20
Numbers from posthog.com/pricing as of May 2026. Replay, feature flags, and surveys each have their own meters and would add to this if used. PostHog's tiered pricing is fairer than flat per-event but still scales linearly with your traffic.
Netwarden Apps Studio
$29- Base plan$29
- Errors + lite analyticsIncluded
- Overage$0
Studio bundles errors with our lite analytics: pageviews, top events, one 5-step funnel. If you need cohorts or retention curves, we are the wrong tool. Go to PostHog.
Coming from PostHog
Most teams don’t leave PostHog wholesale — they keep PostHog for analytics and add Netwarden alongside for errors and dependency-update alerts. If you do want to swap, the SDK shape is similar enough that the change is mostly mechanical search-and-replace and takes about 30 minutes for a typical web app.
For PostHog’s error-tracking captureException call, the swap is mechanical:
// before import posthog from "posthog-js"; posthog.captureException(err); // after import { captureException } from "@netwarden/sdk"; captureException(err);
Pageviews and event tracking move to track(). Replay, feature flags, and experiments do not have a Netwarden equivalent. We recommend running both during a transition window if you have non-trivial PostHog data and only swap fully if and when you decide you no longer need analytics depth. For PostHog’s official feature list and pricing, see https://posthog.com/pricing and https://posthog.com/docs.
PostHog vs Netwarden Apps FAQ
Five direct answers we get asked most. Real numbers, no hedging.
Is Netwarden a drop-in PostHog replacement?
No. Netwarden Apps replaces PostHog only for error tracking, basic pageviews, top-event tracking, and a single 5-step funnel per project. It does not replace PostHog for session replay, feature flags, A/B tests, cohort builders, retention curves, heatmaps, surveys, or SQL access to events. Most teams run both side by side.
Does Netwarden have feature flags or A/B tests?
No, and we do not plan to add them. Feature flags are a different product category (LaunchDarkly, Statsig, PostHog Flags, OpenFeature). Netwarden Apps focuses on errors, dependency-update CVE alerts, and lite analytics. If feature flags are core to your dev loop, keep PostHog or pick a dedicated flag platform.
Can I run PostHog and Netwarden side by side?
Yes — this is the recommended pattern. Keep PostHog for product analytics, replay, and experimentation; add Netwarden Apps for errors and dependency-update CVE alerts. Both SDKs co-exist in the same browser bundle without conflict. Netwarden Apps Solo at $9/month covers the errors-and-dependencies surface independently.
What’s cheaper at 10M events/month: PostHog or Netwarden?
Netwarden Apps Studio is $29/month flat at 10M events. PostHog is roughly $470/month for the same volume on product analytics alone (1M free, 9M tiered, plus an error-tracking add-on). PostHog’s tiered model is fairer than flat per-event but still scales linearly with traffic. Numbers verified at posthog.com/pricing on 2026-05-09.
Can I self-host Netwarden the way I self-host PostHog?
Yes — Netwarden Apps ships as a single Bun-compiled binary plus a SQLite or Postgres pointer. PostHog self-hosted runs on a Helm chart with Postgres, ClickHouse, Kafka, Zookeeper, MinIO, and Redis — a serious operations job. If your scale is small but your tolerance for ops is zero, the single-binary deployment is the decisive difference.
Try Netwarden Apps free for 1 project
Free tier covers 1 project, 10K errors/month, and the dependency-update alerts that PostHog doesn’t do. No card. Run alongside PostHog if that suits you.