| Criterion | Amplitude | GA4 |
|---|---|---|
| Cost to start | Free plan with 2 million events a month. Paid plans are priced on events or monthly tracked users Source: amplitude.com | Standard GA4 is free. GA4 360 is priced through Google's sales team Source: marketingplatform.google.com |
| Funnels | Funnel charts on every plan, including Free Source: amplitude.com | Funnel exploration, up to 10 steps Source: support.google.com |
| Retention and cohorts | Retention charts on every plan. Custom behavioural cohorts on paid plans Source: amplitude.com | Cohort exploration, up to 60 cohorts Source: support.google.com |
| How far back you can analyse | 1 year of data access on Free, 2 years on Plus, unlimited on Growth and Enterprise Source: amplitude.com | 2 or 14 months of event data in explorations (up to 50 on GA4 360). Standard reports aren't affected Source: support.google.com |
| Raw data in your warehouse | Warehouse destinations on every plan, including Snowflake and BigQuery Source: amplitude.com | BigQuery export, up to 1 million events a day on standard GA4. BigQuery's own costs apply past its free sandbox Source: support.google.com |
| Google Ads | Sync cohorts to Google Ads Customer Match, and send conversions Source: amplitude.com | Native linking, and key events imported as Google Ads conversions Source: support.google.com |
Checked against each product's own documentation on 14 October 2026. Products change; tell us if something here is out of date.
We set up the one you need, and if that's both, we make sure they agree with each other.
One list of events and properties, named so people understand them, feeding both tools the same way.
SDKs, identity, and the first dashboards your product team will actually open.
Fix the property you already have: key events, Google Ads links, filters and consent.
Send cohorts to your engagement platform and ad accounts, and attribution data into both.
Amplitude is a partner of ours. We also set up and fix GA4, and if GA4 is all you need, we'll tell you.
Yes, and many teams do. GA4 handles acquisition and Google Ads; Amplitude handles product behaviour. The trick is one tracking plan, so both tools count the same things the same way.
Not usually, and we wouldn't push it. GA4 does acquisition reporting and Google Ads well, for free. Amplitude adds the product view GA4 isn't built for.
There's a free plan with 2 million events a month. Paid plans are priced on events or monthly tracked users, depending on the plan. Amplitude's pricing page has the current details, and we can help you estimate your volume.
Standard GA4 is. GA4 360, the enterprise version, is priced through Google's sales team. Exporting raw data to BigQuery is free to switch on, but BigQuery's own storage and query costs apply once you go past its free sandbox.
GA4 applies data thresholds that withhold some data in reports and explorations, for example ones that include demographics, and you can't adjust them. If that's getting in the way of decisions, it's worth a conversation.
Tell us what you're trying to answer. We'll tell you which tool answers it, even if that's the one you already have.
