Open Attrib vs Northbeam
Northbeam is seven- and eight-figure brands spending six figures a month on ads, where a dedicated media strategist comes with the tool. Open Attrib is teams that want first-party multi-touch attribution at a flat price, not a five-figure line item that grows with ad spend — hosted, or on a server they control. Both do first-party multi-touch attribution; the difference that decides it is how you are billed — Northbeam scales its price with your revenue, while Open Attrib is one flat price whatever you spend: $499/mo hosted on Cloud, or $997 once on a server you control.
Where the two actually differ.
Eight questions that decide the purchase. The right-hand column is what Northbeam publishes about itself, not this site's opinion of it.
| Open Attrib | Northbeam | |
|---|---|---|
| What it costs | $499/mo flat on Cloud, or $997 once self-hosted. | Starter $1,500 a month, Professional $3,500 a month, Enterprise custom; Growth (under $200k a month of ad spend) is quoted through agency partners |
| How you are billed | One flat price whatever you spend — $499/mo hosted, or $997 once on your box. No seat count, no per-event charge and no share of your revenue. | A subscription sized by annual ad spend: Starter is month-to-month and usage-based for Shopify brands, while Professional and Enterprise run on annual terms. |
| Where it runs | Cloud: on our servers, nothing to run. Licence: your own server or VPS, where Docker Compose brings up Postgres, the API, the worker and TLS together. | Their cloud. You reach it through a browser and they operate it. |
| Where your data lives | Cloud: in our Postgres. Licence: in your Postgres, on your box. Either way the only thing sent on is the conversion you choose to send back to an ad platform, through Zernio if you connected the ad account there. | In their database, under their terms and their retention policy. |
| The source code | Included with the licence: the full tree, yours to read, change and run on your own box, not to pass on. Cloud is that same tree, run for you. | Proprietary. Not provided, not modifiable. |
| If you stop paying | Cloud: the tracker, the conversions API and the dashboard stop once the paid period ends; store webhooks still record sales, and nothing is deleted. Licence: nothing changes — the instance keeps running and your history stays queryable; only new updates stop. | Access ends when the billing period does. |
| Getting it running | Cloud: an account and one line pasted into your site. Licence: install help included — a call working through DNS, TLS, the tracker and a first real conversion on your own site. | Demo-led onboarding, with a media strategist on Professional and above and integrations configured with you. |
| Sending the sale back | Server-side to Meta CAPI, Google Ads and TikTok Events, hashed, with one ledger row per send so a retry cannot double-count. | Northbeam Apex enriches conversions with first-party data to influence ad delivery algorithms. |
Northbeam pricing read from www.northbeam.io/pricing on 2026-10-05. Vendors change plans and prices; check the page before deciding on a number.
Choose on the shape, not the feature list.
Choose Northbeam if
seven- and eight-figure brands spending six figures a month on ads, where a dedicated media strategist comes with the tool. That is a real advantage, and it is the reason these platforms exist.
Choose Open Attrib if
teams that want first-party multi-touch attribution at a flat price, not a five-figure line item that grows with ad spend — hosted, or on a server they control. You get the same first-party tracking at one flat price whatever you spend — hosted on Cloud, or owned outright on your own server.
What Northbeam does better than this.
A comparison that finds nothing in the other column is not a comparison. These are the published advantages of Northbeam.
Media mix modelling and incrementality
Their MMM Plus and incrementality testing answer a question multi-touch attribution cannot: what would have happened without the spend. None of that statistical work is in this repo, and buying it is a legitimate reason to choose them.
Click and deterministic view attribution
Their C+DV work credits an ad that was seen but not clicked. Open Attrib attributes on identified interactions, so a view-through sale is a gap here.
People around the software
A dedicated media strategist, a customer success manager and an agency partner network come with the platform. This product includes an install call and then email support.
Scale the single implementer cannot reach
Granular touchpoint exports, hourly conversion data and ad-platform credits are built for a team running six-figure monthly spend.
Northbeam, answered.
Is Open Attrib a Northbeam alternative?
Not for the same buyer, most of the time. Northbeam is for brands spending six figures a month on ads and wanting media mix modelling, incrementality testing and a strategist. Open Attrib is for a team that wants first-party multi-touch attribution at one flat price — hosted on Cloud or run on its own server — with no statistical modelling of ad spend.
Does Open Attrib do media mix modelling or incrementality testing?
No. It records clicks and conversions, resolves them to a person, scores one conversion with five attribution models side by side and sends the confirmed sale back to Meta, Google and TikTok. MMM and geo-lift are things Northbeam does and this does not — if you need them, that alone decides it.
How do the prices compare?
Northbeam publishes Starter at $1,500 a month and Professional at $3,500 a month, sized by annual ad spend. Open Attrib publishes both of its numbers: $499/mo flat on Cloud, or $997 once self-hosted with install help included. Their figures were read on 2026-10-05; their own FAQ says Starter is month-to-month usage-based for Shopify brands, so the quote that reaches you may differ.
Can I self-host Northbeam?
No. It is a hosted platform. If owning the instance is the requirement, the self-hosted option here is this one: your server, your Postgres, the full source included with the licence. If you want it hosted instead, Cloud runs the same pipeline for one flat price.
Compare it with the others, or with your own stack.
- Open Attrib vs Hyros — Managed attribution with a setup team, sold monthly on tracked revenue.
- Open Attrib vs Triple Whale — Shopify-native analytics and AI budget allocation; free tier, paid plans by quote.
- Open Attrib vs Cometly — B2B SaaS attribution from first touch to closed-won, priced on pageviews.
- Open Attrib vs SegMetrics — Full-funnel analytics and lifetime value for info products, from $57 a month.
- Open Attrib vs Wicked Reports — Lifetime-value attribution for ecommerce and subscriptions, in revenue bands.
Something here wrong about Northbeam, or out of date? [email protected] — corrections ship the same day.