In plain English
It's like the worn patches in a carpet. Without asking anyone, you can see where people walk, where they stop, and which corners nobody visits.
Used in a sentence
“The heatmap showed most people never scrolled far enough to see the booking form, so it moved up.”
“People kept clicking a photo that wasn't a link, so we made it one.”
In detail
Heatmap tools, such as Microsoft Clarity and Hotjar, add a small script to your site and gather anonymous data on clicks, taps and scrolling. Click maps show what people try to click, scroll maps show how far down the page they get, and session recordings replay individual visits with personal details hidden.
Heatmaps answer the question analytics can't: why. Analytics may show a page underperforms; a heatmap shows people missing the button, clicking things that aren't links, or stopping before the important part. Like any tracking, they should be mentioned in your privacy policy.
Why it matters for your business
Heatmaps show exactly where a page loses people, so you fix the right thing.
- See what visitors actually notice
- Spot buttons nobody finds
- Learn how far people really scroll
Easy to mix up
A heatmap isn't analytics. Analytics counts what happened across visits; a heatmap shows how people behaved on one page.
Related terms
UX, Bounce rate and Conversion. Or browse the whole glossary.
