Alternatives
Neurons is a serious neuroscience platform — but its enterprise packaging and heatmap-first outputs aren't the right fit for everyone. Here are four alternatives, sorted by what you're actually trying to measure.
Usually one of three things. Packaging: Predict is aimed at brands and agencies with enterprise features priced accordingly — solo media buyers and small teams end up paying for norms libraries and workflows they don't need. Output shape: heatmaps are excellent for layout questions but don't tell you the second viewers swipe on a video ad. Benchmarks: a focus score means more when it's a percentile against ads that actually won in your format.
PreTestAds is built for the temporal question. AdCortex™, trained on fMRI brain-response data, predicts second-by-second engagement and scores your ad as a percentile against 76 top-performing TikTok ads: Hook Strength, the full attention curve, the exact drop-off second, the peak frame. Self-serve from $49/month (about $2 per test), first analysis free, results in minutes. If your work is video ads in feeds rather than static layouts, this is the shape of output you need. Head-to-head: PreTestAds vs Neurons.
If what you liked about Neurons was the heatmap and what you didn't like was the price, Attention Insight is the accessible version: predicted attention heatmaps, clarity scores, and attention-percentage-on-element for landing pages, UI, and static ads, priced for individuals and small teams. It doesn't do video engagement over time. Comparison: PreTestAds vs Attention Insight.
Dragonfly AI generates science-backed saliency heatmaps that shine on packaging, shelf layouts, and retail media — move the logo, rerun, watch the visual hierarchy change. For spatial "is my product seen first?" questions it's exactly the right instrument, with a strong enterprise client base. Comparison: PreTestAds vs Dragonfly AI.
If your doubt about Neurons is that it predicts rather than observes, Realeyes goes the other way: opt-in panelists watch your ad on webcam while computer vision measures actual attention and expressions. Behavioral ground truth, with panel costs and timelines to match. Comparison: PreTestAds vs Realeyes.
Match the tool to the failure mode you're diagnosing. Static asset, wrong visual hierarchy → a heatmap tool (Attention Insight, Dragonfly). Video ad, viewers swipe early → an engagement-over-time model benchmarked against feed winners (PreTestAds). Stakeholders demand observed humans → Realeyes. And if you're testing high volumes of AI-generated variants, per-test price is the deciding factor — screening only works if you can afford to screen everything.
Percentile score, hook strength, and the full attention curve — first analysis free.
Test Your Ad FreeFor video ads in feeds, PreTestAds — it predicts second-by-second engagement over time rather than spatial heatmaps, benchmarks against 76 top TikTok ads, and is self-serve from $49/month. For static design and layout work, Attention Insight or Dragonfly AI are cheaper heatmap-focused options.
Yes. Neurons Predict is sold with enterprise packaging — brand norms, team workflows, sales-assisted pricing. PreTestAds starts at $49/month self-serve with a free first analysis, and Attention Insight is priced for individual designers.
A heatmap answers a spatial question: where on the frame do eyes go? An attention curve answers a temporal one: does engagement survive second by second? For static layouts you want the heatmap; for video ads in a swipeable feed, the curve is the metric that matches how the ad actually fails.