5 Alternatives to Chaperone App for User Training

I have good news and bad news.

The bad news is, Chaperon is down. Probably since around 2018. Shame.

But the good news is, I gathered up some good alternatives to Chaperone, just for you.

What a good tool it was, it could never be replaced. Well, up until right now 😏

So now today, let's take a look at:

• What Chaperone was, its reviews and pricing,
• Why it needs an alternative,
• Some really good alternatives and our experience with them, and
• Use cases, reviews, and pricing info for each alternative

Let's get to it, no need to wait around for another four years.

What is Chaperone?

Chaperon is - or was - a user onboarding solution that gave customization and simplicity great importance.

The tool was an easy-to-use platform that helped users create interactive tours using a Google extension, get self-support in-app, and track user behavior.

Though all these features were rather mediocre, at least Chaperone's UX seemed nice and simple with a toolbar docked to a side of the screen, a simple interactive guide creator in it, and inside the creator, very capable editing options.

However, according to a G2 user's review of the product, some core features were intentionally kept to the more advanced plans, almost to force users to upgrade.

Well, can't say they didn't deserve to go down 😬

Chaperone Pricing

Chaperone not only had a free trial but also was quite affordable, with plans like:

• Basic - $19/month
• Pro - $199/month
• Enterprise - custom

Chaperone Reviews

👍 Pros:

“Tours are very easy to make and deliver to a wide audience in a short amount of time. Chrome plugin takes the guess work out of making a traditional jquery tour. The inbrowser editor means that you get the right div every time and can make sure that it displays properly before moving to the next step.”

👎 Cons:

“No low cost option for autostart tours. Basic plan also forces users to have the Chrome Application installed while higher priced plans let users integrate the tour.”

Why you need a Chaperone Alternative

Well, to avoid the already obvious, there are other reasons to be looking for a Chaperone alternative.

Here's some:

1- Limited onboarding UX elements

Though looking and functioning alright, it is clear to see that Chaperone didn't have many other UX elements than interactive guides.

And that is a major problem if you want to go by "digital adoption platform."

From important digital adoption elements like onboarding checklists to tooltips and hotspots, announcement bars, and welcome modals, Chaperone looks unarmed.

2- Fishy pricing plan management

There are things that aren't actually a crime but sure do feel like it.

When Chaperone designs its onboarding plans in such a way that makes anyone who buys the basic plan to upgrade eventually, or when they make the enterprise plan especially "VIP-ish", it all kinda feels like... a scam.

Who knows, maybe they couldn't make sales because their tricky plans were too out in the open 🤷‍♀️

3- It is quite literally, dead

Our very last reason to look for a Chaperone alternative is, of course, the fact that Chaperone is inactive now.

Although the website is sometimes accessible, the pages deeper inside are not. And that is our cue to give up and find better alternatives.

Let's just go.

Top Chaperone Alternatives

Every tool has its alternatives, even inactive ones.

Though Chaperone didn't have a distinctive feature or a quality that made it especially good or bad, the alternatives I'm introducing today are ones you can use to make an interactive guide. And here we go.

Here are the top 5 alternatives to Chaperone:

1. UserGuiding
2. Userlane
3. Helppier
4. Whatfix
5. Chameleon

I'll go over each tool, compare it to Chaperone, and talk about which cases they should be preferred. So, without further ado, let’s start with our first product:

1- UserGuiding – No-code Interactive User Onboarding

UserGuiding is a no-code digital adoption platform that is focused on user, customer, and employee onboarding and is currently one of the most prominent tools on the market.

It is a powerful tool with a powerful set of features and functions like:

• Interactive guides and walkthroughs,
• Various UX elements and customizable templates,
• Onboarding checklists and resource centers,
• NPS surveys and feedback collection,
• Built-in analytics and analytics integrations,
• Segmentation and targeting, and more

Along with all these features, UserGuiding also makes sure to distribute plan management in a way that will make all customers happy until they decide to upgrade by their own decision.

What makes UserGuiding better than Chaperone?

• UserGuiding is easily a more established tool with a better set of features and a wider variety of UX elements when compared to Chaperone.
• While Chaperon's UI might get a bit clunky, UserGuiding has a smooth running UI and a well-organized dashboard.
• Though Chaperone's base pricing is cheaper, customers can buy more features and functions by buying UserGuiding's cheapest plan than with Chaperone's second or third plan.

UserGuiding Pricing

• 14-day free trial (no credit card required)
• Basic Plan: $69/month when billed annually for up to 2500 MAU
• Professional Plan: $299/month when billed annually for up to 20000 MAU with unlimited guides
• Custom Quotation Available for Larger Companies

UserGuiding Reviews

👍 Pros:

“Codeless integration and the overall UI and setup experience. The browser plugin is an excellent idea for implementing guides and checklists.”

👎 Cons:

“Nothing in particular. The system is fluid and adequately tested. The Userguiding team quickly addressed any issues encountered in the past.”

UserGuiding vs Chaperone

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2- Userlane

Offering user onboarding and product adoption, as well as automated employee training, Userlane is among the top choices for many use cases. 

Userlane's working mechanism is quite simple: it records in-app action to later turn it into a guide.

So, if Chaperone was too basic for you, such a sophisticated yet simple process can be refreshing for your digital adoption.

Of course, it is good to keep in mind that Userlane might not be a good fit for a large number of end-users or employees.

Userlane Pricing

Userlane does not offer public pricing since they believe in custom prices for each customer according to their specific use case.

However, Userlane is known for being not so cheap.

Userlane Reviews

👍 Pros:

“For us, Userlane helped us to make user onboarding and education after updates very easy. Creating the experiences is very easy and intuitive. From user side we also get a lot of good feedback, the software really helps them understand things fast, and they can learn with real cases (no dry onboarding) - you can show users live with real data inputs what to do."

👎 Cons:

“The only thing I would like is to be able to choose the speed of the "Autofill" text, but I have already spoken to the team and they are looking into it."

3- Helppier

Helppier is a single use-case website/tool, its main function is making interactive guides.

Because of this main function, Helppier is quite similar to Chaperone and it has a fairly simple and fun UI. There is, of course, a lack of more advanced features, but if you are a customer looking for a Chaperone alternative after using it, then this is as close as it gets.

Fun fact, there are actually NPS surveys available.

Especially if it's your first time working with digital adoption platforms, Helppier can be great practice with its high customizability. But of course, it does not come for free.

Helppier Pricing

• Free Trial available for 14 days, no credit card information required.
• Standard plan: $39/month for up to 1000 MAU, $99/month for up to 10.000 MAU, two months for free if paid annually.
• Tailor-made plan: custom quote

Helppier Reviews

👍 Pros:

“The multipage guiding flow helped me achieve exactly what I was looking for. With some unique features like video export of onboarding flow is really helpful in teaching the stubborn users. Moreover, Net Promoter Score is something that I really like and doesn't get offered on other similar platforms on top of user onboarding tool.”

👎 Cons:

“I have a mixed feeling with the current UI of the app. Though the founder who is really a nice guy assured me that he is listening to all the feedback and working on improving as per the suggestions.”

4- Whatfix

Whatfix is a leading digital adoption platform on the onbaording market and is among the most popular tools of its caliber.

 But of course, this popularity doesn't guarantee quality. As such, although Whatfix has interactive guides and good customization options, it is quite hard to use as it requires some amount of technical knowledge, and even coding.

And while it is no Pendo, Whatfix can be a pricey option.

Whatfix Pricing

Whatfix does not provide a pricing list publicly as they prefer custom pricing for each customer and their specific use case.

Whatfix Reviews

👍 Pros:

“Customer Support is excellent, very responsive and helpful. The Whatfix tool is very flexible and can handle many complex scenarios. The Whatfix tool is continuing to evolve with new features.”

👎 Cons:

“Some of our more complex flows required engineering support to build and while we we were successfully able to achieve our objective it was not 100% clear how it was done.”

5- Chameleon

Chameleon is a product engagement tool that is focused mainly on customization.

Though it takes some amount of coding skill to actually be able to try your hand at customization, the amount of UX element types that TryChameleon brings to the table is amazing. 

It is also possible to have Chameleon's own onboarding team code and customize your interactive onboarding flow.

However, this comes at a price, of course. And the beginning price already being so high, the team's design is a delicacy only enterprises can afford.

Chameleon Pricing

• Free trial available for 14 days
• Startup plan: $279/month for 2000 MAU, $753/month for 15.000 MAU, including 3 surveys, 3 launchers, and no A/B testing
• Growth plan: $599/month for 2000 MAU, $999/month for 15.000 MAU, including unlimited experiences and A/B testing

Chameleon Reviews

👍 Pros:

“I love the variety of formats we can build in Chameleon, from interactive tooltips to progressive tours and launchers! It's also really easy to the track performance of each of these and adjust accordingly.”

👎 Cons:

“The interface still feels quite clunky whenever I'm in build mode. For instance, I don't like that I have to use markdown and CSS when formatting text instead of having an inline styling menu to select from. Then there's also the issue of surveys or tour steps appearing where they're not supposed to, apparently mistaking an element in another page for the anchor.”

Conclusion

To wrap it up, it really is sad that Chaperone went down so early, with all the potential it had.

But it is not time to look for what's already gone now. Let's remember once again the use cases for each of our alternatives:

1. UserGuiding, for when you want an affordable no-code tool you can create not only interactive guides but also other UX elements and be able to customize, personalize, and track them.
2. Userlane, for when you want a tool that has great analytics and has a more sophisticated onboarding creation process.
3. Helppier, for when you are new to onboarding and need a simple and affordable solution you can create interactive guides with.
4. Whatfix, for when you are okay with coding and slightly higher prices for your interactive onboarding. 
5. Chameleon, for when you want to have fun coding highly customized interactive onboarding flows are if you can afford a custom-made onboarding flow.

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