A session is the period of time that a user visits your website. A single session can consist of multiple pageviews and tracks how a user interacts with each page from the start to the end of the session.
Hotjar Recordings and Heatmaps are based on sessions. You can learn more on How to Set Up Recordings and How to Set Up Heatmaps.
- When does a session start?
- When does a session end?
- How many sessions do I have on my plan?
- What if my site gets more traffic than my daily plan allows?
When does a session start?
A session starts when a user lands on a page of your site with the Hotjar tracking code installed. There are some exceptions, such as:
- If you have certain Event-based or URL-based targeting rules enabled, the session will begin after a matching event occurs or when a targeted page is visited.
- If a user has Do Not Track enabled in their browser or if their IP address is blocked in Site Settings, Hotjar will not track anything in their session. Feedback and Surveys will still appear depending on the widget targeting criteria.
When does a session end?
A session ends when a user takes one of the following actions:
- Closes their browser
- Closes all tabs with a session on your site
- Moves to a page on a different site
- Moves to a page on your site without the Hotjar tracking code installed
- Moves to a page on your site with a different tracking code installed
- Close the page and does not return within 60 seconds
- Does not interact with your site for 30 minutes
The maximum length for a session is four hours.
When a user returns to an open tab on your site after 30 minutes
Provided sampling doesn't apply, if a user is inactive on your site for 30 minutes but hasn't closed the browser tab, a new session will be started when they resume activity.
How many sessions does my plan have?
Each Site in your Account has its own daily session rate that is based on the chosen Hotjar Observe plan. You can find your current daily session rate by clicking on the traffic coverage widget found on the top right of Hotjar. Inside the traffic coverage widget, you'll find your daily session rate listed next to Coverage on current plan.
Check the Hotjar pricing page for current pricing information and visit our Hotjar Plans article to find a comparison of plan features.
What if my site gets more traffic than my daily plan allows?
If the daily number of sessions to your site exceeds the number of sessions in your Hotjar plan, your data will be sampled.
To better understand why Hotjar might sample your site's daily traffic, check out our article: How does sampling work?
Feedback and Surveys are not tied to sessions
Feedback and Surveys are not tied to sessions as they are part of Hotjar's Ask plan. Ask plan response allowances reset on the first of each month. For more information check out our dedicated article on How the Ask Plan Response Allowance Works.