When comparing Splunk vs Google Universal Analytics, the Slant community recommends Google Universal Analytics for most people. In the question“What are the best cross-platform mobile analytics tools?” Google Universal Analytics is ranked 4th while Splunk is ranked 8th. The most important reason people chose Google Universal Analytics is:
Google Analytics is free unless you need their premium service, which is $150,000 per year. However, it's only necessary for massively large enterprise size data sets.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Easy to use, powerful search
It's human readable, intuitive, fast and with auto-complete to boot. And if you need more advanced functionality out of your queries, 120+ page search manual will give you an insight in how much is actually possible.
Pro Widely used
De facto standard for log aggregation, monitoring, analysis and reporting.
Pro Scales effortlessly
It is built for enterprise use, meaning it scales easily.
Pro Real-time graphs
You can create visualizations that update in real time.
Pro Cross-platform
OS X, Linux & Windows are supported. You can also access Splunk from iOS and Android devices.
Pro Free version
With restrictions on log size and devices a free version is available.
Pro Alerts
Splunk can turn searches into alerts.
Pro Understands data in any format or language
Pro Extendable via a large selection of apps
Additional functionality can be added with over 500 apps.
Pro Free for most use cases
Google Analytics is free unless you need their premium service, which is $150,000 per year. However, it's only necessary for massively large enterprise size data sets.
Pro Provides free training
Google provides free services that train users in each aspect of Google Analytics, especially when used in conjunction with AdWords.
Pro Integrate with adwords
Pro Allows custom dashboards
Depending on the most important information to the user, the dashboard can be customized in order to put emphasis on certain metrics. This feature allows Google Analytics to satisfy users from a broad range of industries.
Pro Google Play analytics
Because it's a Google product, Google Analytics can tell you how users discovered your app through Google Play.
Pro Import data
Google Analytics allows users to update user information from other sources.
Pro Integrates with AdMob
Since Google owns AdMob, they can provide deep integration, and allow you to respond to data with marketing campaigns.
Cons
Con Expensive
Splunk is pretty expensive compared to other solutions.
Con Antiquated
The interface and service are very antiquated
Con Seriously SLOW ingest
Their docs and sales say it will ingest up to 20k EPS, but reality is more like 1k eps per server.
Con Complex set up process
Con Steep learning curve
Con User-based analytics is lacking
Google Analytics tracks visitor actions, their user action tracking is still very basic. It has started supporting user ID, but in a very basic way.
Con Data may only be downloaded in PDF form
If you want to download data in any other format, you're out of luck. Data can only be downloaded in PDF format.