Where Shake's free tier stops
Shake Shake's free tier stops when your app needs more than one dashboard app, more than 20 bug reports in a month, or more than 3 teammates. It also stays limited to 10,000 app installs, 1 month of data retention, and 1,000 logs in activity history. Unlimited crash reports, app users, AI debugging, MCP server, screen recording, and custom forms are included, but the plan still leaves some meaningful operational ceilings in place for teams that are growing or running multiple products.
Switch table
| Shake | Bugfender | BugBug | BugSnag | Embrace | Inspector | Rollbar | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| bug reports or occurrences per month | 20 bug reports per month | 100,000 log lines per day | 15 tests | 7.5K events per month | Not specified | 30K transactions per month | 5,000 occurrences per month |
| crash or error volume | Unlimited crash reports | Errors and crashes included in remote logs | Not applicable to crash reporting | Performance monitoring with 1M spans per month | Errors, exceptions, and crashes | Not specified | Not specified |
| apps on dashboard | 1 app | Unlimited apps | 1 project | Not specified | Not specified | Unlimited hosts and apps | Not specified |
| team members | Up to 3 team members | Unlimited team members | 1 user | 1 user | Up to 5 users | Up to 3 team members | Not specified |
| retention | 1 month of data retention | 24-hour log retention | 7 days of test history | 7 days of data retention | 3 days of events data retention | Not specified | Not specified |
| device or session coverage | Up to 10,000 app installs | Up to 2,000 customer devices | Local testing only | Access to 50+ platforms | Up to 1 million sessions per year | Unlimited events | 1,000 sessions per month |
| Card required | - | No | No | Yes | Yes | No | Yes |
| First paid tier | - | Team from $39/month | Core $99 per month, billed annually | Select Starting at $0/month | Pro $0.80/1,000 sessions (minimum spend of $80/month) | Beginner €15 / month | Essentials varies by usage |
The alternatives
Bugfender
FTV 60 / 100Bugfender's free plan is built around remote logging rather than bug ticketing, and it gives you up to 100,000 log lines per day, 24-hour retention, 2,000 customer devices, unlimited apps, and unlimited team members. That makes it a strong free option when you need more device coverage and much higher daily log volume than Shake's bug report limit. It also includes daily summary email and native SDK support for mobile and web. It falls short on Shake's bug-report workflow, AI debugging, and longer retention. Switch to Bugfender if your main pain is collecting lots of client-side logs across many apps and teammates.
- Beats Shake: Much higher daily volume and unlimited apps/team members.
- Falls short: Shorter retention and less bug-report workflow depth.
- Who should switch: Choose this if you want free remote logging across many apps and devices rather than a bug-ticking workflow.
BugBug
FTV 60 / 100BugBug's free plan is for web test automation, not crash reporting. It includes local test runs, 15 tests, 4 test suites, 1 user, 1 project, AI Test Recorder, Components, Edit & Rewind, screenshots, and 7 days of test history. The main advantage over Shake is that it is purpose-built for recording and rerunning browser tests, which is a better fit when your problem is validating a web flow rather than tracking mobile or app bugs. It falls short on Shake's always-on bug and crash reporting, team size, and app installs. Switch if you need a free way to maintain a small automated regression suite.
- Beats Shake: Web test automation instead of issue reporting.
- Falls short: Very limited to 1 user, 1 project, and local runs only.
- Who should switch: Pick this if your free-tier need is browser testing, not product error tracking.
BugSnag
FTV 40 / 100BugSnag's free plan includes 7.5K error events per month, 1M performance spans per month, 1 user, 7 days of retention, support for 50+ platforms, and 30+ third-party integrations. It beats Shake when you want a broader observability footprint, especially across performance monitoring and platform coverage. It falls short on Shake's included team size, unlimited crash reports, and mobile app reporting workflow, since the free tier is centered on event and span quotas instead of bug-report intake. Switch to BugSnag if you need a cross-platform monitoring layer and can live inside relatively small monthly error volume limits.
- Beats Shake: Broader observability with performance monitoring and platform coverage.
- Falls short: Only 1 user and tighter event limits than Shake's crash side.
- Who should switch: Use this if you need performance and error monitoring across many platforms on a free plan.
Embrace
FTV 62 / 100Embrace's free plan gives you up to 1 million sessions per year, up to 5 users, errors, exceptions, crashes, basic performance monitoring, basic dashboards and alerting, and 3 days of events retention. It beats Shake on session-based observability and collaborative use, especially if your team wants basic dashboards and alerting around real user data. It falls short on Shake's longer retention, unlimited crash reports, screen recording, custom forms, and mobile bug-report workflow. Switch if you care more about session monitoring and app health visibility than about collecting structured bug tickets.
- Beats Shake: Far more session coverage and more users.
- Falls short: Shorter retention and less bug-ticket detail than Shake.
- Who should switch: Choose this if your priority is user-session observability with a small team on the free plan.
Inspector
FTV 56 / 100Inspector's free plan includes 30K transactions per month, unlimited events, unlimited hosts and apps, up to 3 team members, live chat support, and AI Bug Fixer. It beats Shake on host and app coverage, and it gives you a cleaner fit if you monitor PHP apps rather than mobile crash workflows. It falls short on Shake's bug-report focus, unlimited crash reports, and mobile SDK coverage for iOS, Android, React Native, and Flutter. Switch to Inspector if you want a free monitoring tool for PHP applications with room to grow across many apps and hosts.
- Beats Shake: Unlimited hosts and apps with PHP-focused monitoring.
- Falls short: It is PHP-centric and not a bug-reporting tool like Shake.
- Who should switch: Pick this if your stack is PHP and you want free app monitoring rather than ticket-based bug reporting.
Rollbar
FTV 41 / 100Rollbar's free plan includes 5,000 occurrences per month, 1,000 replays per month, 1,000 sessions per month, real-time error alerts, intelligent error grouping, stack traces and telemetry, and deploy and version tracking. It beats Shake when you want replay-style debugging and core incident triage in one place. It falls short on Shake's 20 bug reports per month limit only in a narrow sense, but it also does not offer Shake's mobile app dashboard, custom forms, live chat, or screen recording on the free tier. Switch if your main job is catching runtime errors quickly and reviewing replays.
- Beats Shake: Replay-based debugging and incident triage features.
- Falls short: Less focused on mobile bug intake and structured ticket fields.
- Who should switch: Use this if you want free error monitoring with replays and deploy tracking.
Two quick picks
Inspector
Inspector is the closest fit for teams that want a similar always-on monitoring workflow with a small free plan, live chat, AI assistance, and a comparable team cap. It is less mobile-crash specific than Shake, but the usage pattern is the nearest among the options.
Bugfender
Bugfender offers the most free headroom by a wide margin on daily volume, unlimited apps, and unlimited team members. If your main constraint is scaling usage before paying, it leaves the most room.
Frequently asked questions
Which alternative gives the most free volume overall?
Bugfender does, because its free plan allows up to 100,000 log lines per day and unlimited apps and team members.
Which alternative is best if I need bug reporting specifically, not logging or testing?
Bugsnag is the closest pure monitoring alternative in this set, but it is still more observability-oriented than Shake's structured bug-report workflow.
Which alternative is best for a small team with more than 3 people?
Embrace and Bugfender both give more free seats than Shake, with Embrace at up to 5 users and Bugfender at unlimited team members.
Do any of these free plans require a credit card?
Bugfender, BugBug, and Inspector say no card is required. For BugSnag, Embrace, and Rollbar, card_required is Unknown or Yes depending on the field provided.
Bottom line
For the most common case, Bugfender is the best alternative to try first. It gives the most free breathing room on volume and team size, which matters most when Shake's 20 bug reports per month or 3-member cap becomes tight. If you need a closer monitoring workflow rather than logging, Inspector is the nearest drop-in, but Bugfender is the better default for builders who mainly want to stay free while collecting a lot more signal.
Read the full listing for Shake. Scores use the FTV methodology at /ftv. Browse more alternatives on /alternatives, or head-to-head comparisons on /compare.