Peony Alternatives (Including When Peony Wins)
Oleh Tsyupa · Founder, PDFTrackr · Updated 2026-08-20
What Peony does better
Peony beats PDFTrackr on three named dimensions — real-time visit notification, e-signature and tracked-link volume — the first and third on its compare grid, the second on its free card. Its compare grid marks real-time visit notifications as included on every tier, Free first, where the real-time open alert on PDFTrackr is a Pro feature and the free plan gathers the same events into the next morning's digest. Its free card lists three e-signatures a month, and PDFTrackr does not sign documents on any tier at any price. And that grid ticks tracked links for the free tier with no number beside it, where PDFTrackr caps active share links.
The first page loses 34.4% of readers before page two — more than pages two through twelve lose combined (32.7 points).
Which is why retention and view history decide more than feature count: if you cannot look back at a reader's session, you cannot see where the document lost them.
Based on 3,017 validated reading sessions · 1,513 readers · 126 documents · extract 2026-07-10
If you would rather see this on a document of your own than read a comparison, create a free tracked link — 50 files, 50 links, 365 days of history, no card — or open the live demo to see the page-by-page readout on sample data first. The rest of this page is the comparison.
Free plans, side by side
These two free plans are unusually close on the things most comparison pages stop at: both report page-by-page reading, both identify readers, both cap documents at the same number, and neither charges for viewers. The differences are further down — how long the reading history survives, whether an automated open was counted as a read, and what happens to the bill when a second person joins your side of the deal.
| PDFTrackr free | Peony free | |
|---|---|---|
| Page-by-page reading analytics | Yes | Yes |
| Analytics retention | 365 days | 30 days |
| Automated-open exclusion | Yes, on the free plan | Not published on its pricing page |
| Shows what the filter removed | Yes, on the free plan | Not published on its pricing page |
| Virus scan on every upload | Yes, on the free plan | Not published on its pricing page |
| Visit notification | One daily digest — real-time on Pro | Real-time, included on every tier |
| E-signature | Not offered at any tier | Three a month |
| Documents | 50 | Up to 50 |
| Tracked links | 50 active | Ticked, with no published cap |
| Storage · largest file | 500MB · 50MB | 500 MB · 50 MB |
| Viewers | No cap on any plan | Unlimited |
| Cheapest paid tier | $9/mo · $84/yr, one flat account | $30 per admin per month, billed annually |
| What the bill scales with | Nothing — one account, one price | The number of admins |
When Peony is still the right choice
Three cases, one per dimension — visit notification, e-signature and tracked-link volume — and each one is a thing PDFTrackr reserves for Pro, does not build at all, or caps. A comparison page that finds no real reason to choose the other product is not a comparison.
- You want to know a document was opened the moment it happens, without paying. The compare grid at Peony marks real-time visit notifications as included across all five of its tiers, Free first. On PDFTrackr that alert is a Pro feature and the free plan collects the day's opens into the next morning's digest, so if same-hour notice at zero cost is the deciding factor, Peony wins it outright and this page will not argue otherwise.
- Something has to come back signed. The free card at Peony lists three e-signatures a month. PDFTrackr does not sign documents on any tier at any price and is not building toward it — it measures reading and stops there — so a workflow that ends in a signature needs a second tool alongside it or a different tool instead of it.
- You need more tracked links than a cap allows. Peony's compare grid ticks tracked links for its free tier with no number beside it, while capping documents and storage on the same column. PDFTrackr caps active share links on its free plan, so anyone who wants a separate link per recipient meets that ceiling before they meet any other one.
FAQ
Frequently asked questions
Is PDFTrackr a free alternative to Peony?
Yes, and on the free tier they are closer than most pairs in this category: both report page-by-page reading, both cap documents at the same number, and neither charges for viewers. The separation is retention — a full year of history against the 30 days published for the free tier at Peony — and automated-open exclusion, which PDFTrackr applies at no cost.
What does Peony do on its free tier that PDFTrackr does not?
Three things, and they are real. Real-time visit notifications, which its compare grid marks as included on every tier while PDFTrackr reserves that alert for Pro. Three e-signatures a month, a category PDFTrackr does not build at any price. And tracked links with no published cap, where PDFTrackr caps active share links on free.
Which one keeps reading history longer?
PDFTrackr, by a wide margin on both tiers. Its free plan keeps every view for 365 days and Pro keeps 730, against the 30 days published for the free tier at Peony. That matters when a deal runs longer than a month: a reader who comes back in week six is only visible if week one is still on file.
When is PDFTrackr Pro worth $9 rather than staying free?
Not for the analytics — page-by-page reading, de-botted counts and twelve months of history are all included free and are the same data, not a preview. Pro is worth it once you pass 50 documents or 50 active links, or once the same reader starts coming back and you want one row per person instead of one row per visit: on free the viewers list counts visits, and Pro groups them into readers, adds a real-time open alert and emails you when someone returns.
How do the paid tiers compare?
PDFTrackr Pro is $9/mo or $84/yr for one flat account, and the bill does not move when a colleague needs access — there are no seats to buy, because there is no team concept to buy them for. The published rates on the other side are per admin per month: $30 billed annually for Business, which is also the tier where the allow and block visitor lists arrive, and $52 billed annually for the Data Room tier. Two admins there cost more in a month than PDFTrackr Pro costs in half a year.
For the wider ranking of every tool in this category, see the free PDF tracking tools we compared, and for how the free plan works in practice, PDFTrackr's free tracking plan.
Sources
- Peony — Pricing (tier cards, prices and free-tier feature list) (accessed 2026-08-12)
- Peony — Pricing, 'Compare plans' grid (retention and notification rows, per tier) (accessed 2026-08-13)
- Peony — Pricing, 'Sharing & storage' grid (tracked links, documents, storage) (accessed 2026-08-14)
Oleh Tsyupa
Founder, PDFTrackr
Has analysed over 3,000 tracked document-viewing sessions on PDFTrackr.
See the reading data on your own document before you choose
Upload a PDF, send a tracked link, and read it page by page — who opened it, how far each reader got, and what the automated-open filter removed. Free: 50 files, 50 links, 365 days of history, no card. Running your own document through both is a faster answer than any Peony comparison.
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