Analytics · checked 2026-10-19

Can I vibecode Lucky Orange?

KINDA· weekend project

For one site, a recorder plus a player is within reach: an open-source library called rrweb already captures page changes and replays them, so an agent can wrap it in a collector, a SQLite store and a sessions list over a weekend, and add click and scroll heatmaps drawn over a stored page snapshot. The rough edges are what you pay Lucky Orange for: replays that hold together on pages with odd CSS, shadow DOM or canvas, heatmaps that stay sensible across screen sizes and changing pages, masking of form fields, and the chat, surveys and funnels in the same snippet. Recording visitors also brings consent duties that don't go away when you self-host.

$39/moprice

$468you'd save a year

weekendbuild time

—people replaced it

Before you start

What you need on hand.

DifficultyIntermediate · Some system setup or keys.

TimeA weekend; making replays and heatmaps look right on a real site takes the longest

Claude Code, Codex or CursorAny of them can run the prompt.
Node.js 22better-sqlite3 compiles a native module, so build tools must be installed.
A public HTTPS addressA small VPS or tunnel; browsers block pages served over HTTPS from posting to plain HTTP.
Edit access to your site's HTMLYou add one script tag; Shopify themes take it in theme.liquid.
A consent bannerVisitors in the EU and UK must agree before you record them, whoever hosts the data.

Before you buildLucky Orange's free plan allows 100 sessions a month on one site, and Microsoft Clarity records without a traffic cap for free. Try one before building a collector of your own.

1. Install one agent: Claude Code, Codex, Cursor.
2. Make an empty folder and open it in the agent.
3. Paste the prompt below, press enter, and answer its questions as it builds.

The prompt

Build me a self-hosted heatmap and session-recording tool for my own site to replace Lucky Orange. Requirements:

- Node.js 22 + TypeScript: Fastify and better-sqlite3 at ./data/lo.db. `npm start` serves http://localhost:4900
  (dashboard at /, collector at /collect, snippet at /t.js).
- Snippet: one `<script src="/t.js" data-site="...">`, built with esbuild around `rrweb` record(). Inputs and
  textareas are masked, elements with [data-private] are blocked, Do Not Track and a localStorage opt-out are
  honoured, and events go out in 5-second gzipped batches with sendBeacon on pagehide.
- Collector: checks the site key from .env and an allow-list of origins, caps a session at 60 minutes or
  5 MB, and stores sessions (id, first URL, user agent, viewport, start, duration) with event chunks as gzipped blobs.
- Player: a Sessions page with filters (URL contains, device width, rage clicks, JS errors, duration) and a
  replay page using `rrweb-player` with 1x, 2x and 4x speed and skipping of idle time.
- Heatmaps: per URL path and device class (under 600 px, 600-1024, over 1024), click, move and scroll-depth
  maps from stored events, drawn with `heatmap.js` over a snapshot rebuilt from that path's latest rrweb
  full snapshot.
- Retention: sessions older than RETENTION_DAYS (.env) are deleted nightly, and the admin can delete any session by id.
- Admin: one password in .env (signed cookie). One site first, with the site key and origins in .env.
- Single user. No accounts, no telemetry, local-first; the dashboard makes no outbound calls.
- Out of scope: live chat, surveys, funnels, form analytics, AI summaries, mobile SDKs, identifying visitors across sites.
- README: adding the snippet to a Shopify or static site, a consent warning (in the EU and UK, load /t.js only
  after consent), megabytes stored per 1,000 sessions measured on this machine, and that replays of pages with
  cross-origin CSS may look broken.

Opens your agent with the prompt filled in, you press enter. Or copy it and paste it into an empty folder.

Share on X

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Then keep going

Next prompts, same folder.

The first prompt builds the core. Run these one at a time in the same folder to grow it into your own Lucky Orange.

Add frustration signals to the session tool in this folder. Requirements:

- Detect rage clicks (3 or more clicks within 700 ms inside a 30 px radius) and dead clicks (a click on an
  element that causes no DOM change or navigation within 1 second), computed when a session is finalised.
- Store counts per session and show them as badges and filters on the Sessions page.
- On the replay page, mark each frustration moment on the timeline so a click jumps to it.
- Add tests with a synthetic event stream for each case.
- Update the README.

Add per-page reports to the session tool in this folder. Requirements:

- A Pages view lists URL paths with sessions, median scroll depth, share of sessions reaching 50% and
  100% of the page, and the 10 most-clicked elements by CSS selector.
- Clicking a path opens its heatmap with the same date range and device filter.
- Merge query strings by default, with a setting to keep named parameters.
- Add a CSV export of the table.
- Update the README.

Add funnels to the session tool in this folder. Requirements:

- Define a funnel in the dashboard as 2 to 6 steps, each a URL path pattern or a custom event sent with
  window.lo.event('name').
- Count sessions that reach each step in order within one session and show the drop-off between steps.
- From any step, list the sessions that dropped off there with a link to each replay.
- Save funnels in SQLite and cache results for 10 minutes.
- Update the README.

What you lose

Live chat, surveys and announcements in the same snippet
Conversion funnels and form analytics
Heatmaps that hold up across devices and changing pages, and a live visitor view
Discovery AI summaries of what visitors did
Shopify and other platform apps, plus storage and retention handled for you

Why people still pay

A store owner or marketer gets one snippet and, within the hour, recordings and heatmaps, with chat and surveys in the same dashboard. Nobody has to host session storage, fix replays that break on odd pages, or wire up a Shopify app.

Moatexecution polish integrations

Do the math

Lucky Orange or your own copy?

Over

Your usage

Count my time12h ×$/h

Lucky Orange, 1 yr$468

Your own copy, 1 yr$70running + build session

You keep$398pays for itself in the first month

Estimate · Free on a machine you already run; a small VPS is about $5 a month, and disk use grows with how many sessions you keep. The build is token usage on your agent plan.

Leaving Lucky Orange

Take your data, then cancel.

1 · Take your data out of Lucky Orange

1Recordings: a product update mentions an Export Rows button on the recordings table. We found no description of its columns or limits.
2Replays and heatmaps themselves live in the dashboard and we found no export for them: screenshot the heatmaps you want to keep and save the replays you need before the retention window ends.
3Surveys and announcements: open Communicate > Surveys (or Announcements) > View Results > Visitors, then Export CSV. The cap was raised from 1,000 to 10,000 rows.
4Invoices: Settings > Plan & Billing > View Invoices, then download each as a PDF.

2 · Cancel Lucky Orange

1The account owner opens Settings > Plan & Billing and clicks Cancel Plan, under Remaining Sessions.
2Say why you're cancelling when asked, then press Cancel My Plan.
3Removing the tracking code does not cancel a paid plan; it only cancels plans created through Shopify, where you uninstall the app instead.
4You keep access to the end of the billing cycle, and tracking continues until then or until you hit the session limit.

Moving to the Free plan is the alternative to cancelling: 100 sessions a month, one site, no add-ons.
Recordings are deleted after the storage window (60 days to start) and a deleted recording can't be recovered, so export or save what matters before you leave or downgrade storage.
Shopify merchants are billed by Shopify: cancel in Shopify and expect one last charge for the cycle you already used.
Remove the Lucky Orange snippet from your site after the billing cycle ends, so visitors stop loading it.

Checked 2026-10-19 against Lucky Orange's docs: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

The escape hatch

Don't feel like building it? These are already free.

Microsoft ClarityFreeHosted heatmaps and session recordings that its homepage calls free forever with no limits on traffic; the data sits in Microsoft's cloud.they host it
WebVisit ↗PostHogOpen sourceProduct analytics with session replay and heatmaps, feature flags and error tracking in one tool; MIT core with an enterprise folder, also offered hosted.★ 40k · active Oct 2026 · docker to self-host
WebVisit ↗OpenReplayOpen sourceSelf-hostable session replay with co-browsing and analytics; AGPL-3.0 by default, with MIT parts and a separately licensed enterprise folder.★ 13k · active Oct 2026 · docker to self-host
WebVisit ↗

All 5 free alternatives to Lucky Orange ›

The numbers

Lucky Orange pricing

Plan	Monthly	Annual, per month	What you get
Free	$0	$0	100 tracked sessions a month, one site, no add-ons.
Build	$39	$32	3,500 tracked sessions a month; heatmaps, recordings, surveys, live chat, funnels, form analytics and unlimited team members are in every plan.
Grow	—	$72	10,000 tracked sessions a month.
Expand	$249	$199	Starts at 50,000 tracked sessions a month.
Scale	$1,049	$839	Starts at 300,000 tracked sessions a month.

Free tier: 100 sessions a month and one tracked site; Discovery AI and extended storage need a paid plan.
Billing: Monthly or yearly (the page shows yearly at 20% off). The trial lasts 7 days with every feature. Pay by card, PayPal or Apple Pay; invoices are for annual and enterprise plans. Cancel on the Plan & Billing page, not by removing the tracking code; you keep access until the billing cycle ends.
Hidden costs: Each additional website costs $5 a month. Storage upgrades to 90, 180 or 365 days are paid extras; the base is 60 days, and deleted recordings can't be recovered. Discovery AI is listed as an add-on in the comparison table, although the page's trial banner says it's included. Shopify merchants are billed through Shopify.
Source: www.luckyorange.com

Also on the list

LogRocket$83/mo · MonitoringKINDA

Umami Cloud$20/mo · AnalyticsYES

Mixpanel$140/mo · AnalyticsKINDA

Questions

Lucky Orange, briefly

Not answered here? Tell us and we'll add it.

Ask a question ›

A free plan covers 100 sessions a month on one site with no add-ons, per the help center; the pricing page itself advertises only a 7-day trial.

Kinda. The core is a weekend build with the prompt on this page, but real gaps remain: Live chat, surveys and announcements in the same snippet, Conversion funnels and form analytics.

About $39 a month on the Build plan, $468 a year (checked 2026-10-19).

Live chat, surveys and announcements in the same snippet; Conversion funnels and form analytics; Heatmaps that hold up across devices and changing pages, and a live visitor view; Discovery AI summaries of what visitors did; Shopify and other platform apps, plus storage and retention handled for you. If any of those matter to you, keep paying.