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Marketing · head to head

Roxhill vs Umami

Roxhill logo

Roxhill

Marketing

UK-focused journalist database and media monitoring, founder-owned and annual only

From
On request
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Umami logo

Umami

Marketing

Open source, cookie-free web analytics you can self-host for the cost of a database

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Only Umami has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
  • Each has a real cost: Roxhill the database is UK-centric by reviewers’ own account, with weak US, Australian and broader Asian journalist coverage, so any multi-market programme needs a second vendor and the single-vendor cost case disappears.; Umami there is no cohort analysis, retention curve, session replay or multi-touch attribution, so a marketing team that needs to justify channel spend will still buy a second tool and Umami becomes a supplementary dashboard.
  • They diverge on capability: Roxhill covers Journalist database, Umami covers Cookie-free tracking.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Roxhill and Umami actually diverge.

Attributes where Roxhill and Umami differ
AttributeRoxhillUmami
Starting priceOn requestFree
Pricing modelquotePer month by event count
Free tierNoYes
PlatformsWeb, iOS, AndroidWeb, Linux

Identical on both: user rating (Not yet rated), category (Marketing).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Roxhill

  • Journalist database
  • Journalist profiles
  • Media lists and distribution
  • Media requests and alerts
  • Media monitoring
  • Bespoke newsletters
  • Historical search
  • Journalist Assistant

Only in Umami

  • Cookie-free tracking
  • Self-hosting
  • Small tracking script
  • Custom events
  • Funnels and goals
  • Multi-site and teams
  • Public dashboards
  • API access

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Roxhill

  • A UK in-house press office that needs journalist contacts with current pitching preferences rather than a scraped byline list.not Umami
  • An agency tracking forward features across UK trade and consumer titles to place clients into planned coverage months ahead.not Umami
  • A communications team monitoring named spokespeople and measuring their share of voice against competitors in UK media.not Umami
  • A UK public sector body procuring through G-Cloud that needs EEA-hosted media monitoring with a published framework price band.not Umami

Umami

  • A developer who wants traffic numbers on a personal or client site without adding a consent bannernot Roxhill
  • An organisation whose legal or procurement team has ruled out sending visitor data to a US advertising companynot Roxhill
  • A high-traffic site where hosted analytics priced by pageview band has become expensive and self-hosting removes the ceiling entirelynot Roxhill
  • A team that wants analytics data in a database they already control so they can query and join it themselvesnot Roxhill

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Roxhill

  • The database is UK-centric by reviewers’ own account, with weak US, Australian and broader Asian journalist coverage, so any multi-market programme needs a second vendor and the single-vendor cost case disappears.
  • Contact records go stale: reviewers report old email addresses and phone numbers, distribution bounces, and there is no self-serve verification step before you send.
  • At roughly 200,000 to 300,000 journalists it is far smaller than the million-plus figures Cision and Prowly claim, with repeated complaints about thin trade, academic and journal coverage.
  • Selling is annual only with no monthly plan and a trial functionally restricted to around two weeks, so you cannot genuinely pilot before a twelve-month commitment, which is a poor fit for project or retainer agency work.
  • Licence bands are 1, 3 and 5 seats, and extra logins, workspaces, smart folders, historical search, share of voice and the spokespeople platform are all chargeable add-ons, so a team of eight to fifteen pays well above any headline band.
  • Search behaviour is described as counter-intuitive and sometimes returns implausibly few results, which means a null result cannot be trusted and lists need manual cross-checking.
  • Monitoring accuracy takes time to settle after switching, so coverage is missed in the first weeks after a cutover, which is a real gap risk if you time the migration badly.

Umami

  • There is no cohort analysis, retention curve, session replay or multi-touch attribution, so a marketing team that needs to justify channel spend will still buy a second tool and Umami becomes a supplementary dashboard.
  • Self-hosting is only free in licence terms; you own the database, the upgrades, the backups and the query performance at scale, and a busy site's events table grows quickly enough to need real attention.
  • Because it stores no persistent identifier, it cannot follow a user across devices or sessions in any meaningful way, which makes returning-visitor and lifetime-value questions unanswerable by design rather than by omission.
  • Cloud overage is billed per event beyond the plan allowance, so a traffic spike or a badly instrumented custom event can produce a bill materially above the $20 or $200 headline before anyone notices.
  • It is maintained by a small team, so the pace of new capability is modest and enterprise expectations such as SSO, granular role permissions and formal support agreements are limited compared with commercial analytics vendors.

Pricing, plan by plan

Roxhill

On request
  • Core$undefined/year
    • 1 licence
    • Standard database access
    • Journalist Assistant
  • Boutique$undefined/year
    • 3 licences
    • Adds press release distribution
    • 3 workspaces, 6 smart folders, 10 spokespeople, 3 newsletters
  • Enterprise$undefined/year
    • 5 licences
    • 5 workspaces, 10 smart folders, 5 newsletters
    • Spokespeople platform
  • Premium$undefined/year
    • Everything in Enterprise
    • Insights analysis and bespoke reporting
    • Competitor share of voice

Umami

Free
  • Self-hostedFree
    • MIT licensed, no licence fee
    • No event limit imposed by the software
    • Unlimited websites and users
  • Cloud HobbyFree
    • Up to 100,000 events per month
    • 3 websites
    • 6 months data retention
  • Cloud Pro$20/month
    • Up to 1,000,000 events per month
    • Unlimited websites
    • Unlimited team members
  • Cloud Business$200/month
    • Up to 10,000,000 events per month
    • All Pro features
    • Higher volume overage rate

Which should you pick?

Choose Roxhill if

  • You need journalist database.
  • You work on Web, iOS, Android.
  • You also want journalist profiles.
Roxhill review

Choose Umami if

  • You need cookie-free tracking.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Web, Linux.
  • You also want self-hosting.
Umami review

Questions people ask

Is Roxhill or Umami better?
Neither clearly leads. Roxhill starts at On request and Umami at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Roxhill or Umami?
Umami has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at On request for Roxhill and Free for Umami.
Does Roxhill or Umami run on more platforms?
Roxhill runs on Web, iOS, Android. Umami runs on Web, Linux.
Can I use Umami for free?
Yes. Umami has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Roxhill starts at On request.
What is Roxhill best used for?
Roxhill is most often used for a uk in-house press office that needs journalist contacts with current pitching preferences rather than a scraped byline list., an agency tracking forward features across uk trade and consumer titles to place clients into planned coverage months ahead., a communications team monitoring named spokespeople and measuring their share of voice against competitors in uk media., a uk public sector body procuring through g-cloud that needs eea-hosted media monitoring with a published framework price band.. Of those, a uk in-house press office that needs journalist contacts with current pitching preferences rather than a scraped byline list. and an agency tracking forward features across uk trade and consumer titles to place clients into planned coverage months ahead. are not what Umami is typically brought in for.
What can Roxhill do that Umami cannot?
Roxhill covers Journalist database, Journalist profiles, Media lists and distribution, Media requests and alerts. Umami covers Cookie-free tracking, Self-hosting, Small tracking script, Custom events.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Roxhill: How much does Roxhill cost?

Not published on the vendor site, but the UK G-Cloud 14 listing discloses £6,450 to £25,000 per instance per year. Use that as your anchor.

Umami: Is Umami really free?

Self-hosted, yes; it is MIT licensed with no event cap. You pay for the server and database. Umami Cloud has a free tier at 100,000 events a month and paid tiers from $20.

Roxhill: Is Roxhill owned by Cision or Access Intelligence?

No. Companies House shows a single individual holding over 75% of shares and no corporate PSC. It is founder-controlled and unfunded. Note the founder previously sold Gorkana to Cision, so ask for a change-of-control clause.

Umami: Do I need a cookie consent banner?

For Umami analytics specifically, generally no, because it sets no cookies and stores no personal data. Other tags on your site may still require one.

Roxhill: Is it usable for US or APAC media relations?

Not well. Reviewers describe US, Australian and Asian coverage as materially weaker than UK. Budget for a second database.

Umami: Can it replace Google Analytics?

For traffic, referrers and event counts, yes. For attribution modelling, audiences and advertising integration, no.

Roxhill: Can I buy monthly?

No. Contracts are annual, sales-gated, with a trial of around two weeks.

Umami: What does it need to run?

A container and a PostgreSQL or MySQL database. Most people deploy it on infrastructure they already pay for.

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