5+ Best reCAPTCHA Alternatives For Your Contact Forms
Are you looking for a reCAPTCHA alternative to protect your contact forms? You are in the right place!
Google reCAPTCHA is widely used in millions of websites and online forms. They are used to protect your online forms from spam bots yet these aren’t perfect.
Let’s agree we all are actually tired of selecting all images with bridges, and chimneys. And how can we forget about those select all squares with motorcycles or crosswalks. I bet none of us were able to clear it in one go.
Just like you and me, your users who fill your contact form might be feeling the same way. Every time a user fills a form online, A reCAPTCHA takes more than 20s of its time. This can lead to less form submissions and low conversion rates yet no worries.
In this blog, we’ll explore 5+ best reCAPTCHA Alternatives to protect your contact forms from spammy bots. Now without further ado, let’s dive in.
A Google reCAPTCHA works by analyzing a user’s behavior, IP address and many other factors to tell computers and humans apart. Moreover, in most cases it shows a bunch of image collections and asks your site visitors or users to identify them.
Sounds so simple, right?
Well, we wish we could say so. Many times, only filling a Google reCAPTCHA takes more than 20s of a user. Not only it affects the user experience but also increases the count of abandoned websites and forms.
Just put yourself in the shoes of your users. Imagine a potential customer was surfing through multiple websites. Now when they landed on your business WordPress site, it caught the customer’s attention. Now they decided to contact you using your contact form; the first step towards generating leads. But suddenly they encountered a Google reCAPTCHA.
The study shows more than 8.66% of users failed to clear Google reCAPTCHA in their first attempt. Also this stats increases to around 30% when the reCAPTCHA is case sensitive.
Let’s say by chance that potential customer fell under this 30% of people and failed to clear the Google reCAPTCHA even after 2 attempts. Now what will happen? The users who fail two reCAPTCHA straight in a row are most likely to abandon the whole form and website.
Because let’s agree, there are going to be 100 other options for that potential customer in this competitive era of digitalization.
And for a lead generation form, every lead matters.
Moreover, there are other reasons too. – why we need to look for Google reCAPTCHA alternatives. Here take a look:
Overall, looking for the best reCAPTCHA alternatives is necessary to protect your user experience and prevent contact form spam. Yet no worries! We have got you covered by searching for the best reCAPTCHA alternatives.
Looking for reCAPTCHA alternatives to prevent contact form spam? Then why not create your forms spam-free from the beginning with ARForms.
ARForms is a powerful WordPress form builder plugin that comes with an in-built intelligent spam protection.
Yes, you heard it right. No need to add Google reCAPTCHA or any other Captchas. You can build any form smart and protected with ARForms. Whether it be a simple contact form or a complex multi-step registration form, you can turn any form into a spam protected form.
ARForms invisible spam protection tracks suspicious click events to identify spam bots and protect your forms from harmful submissions and malwares. This in-built intelligent spam protection mechanism protects your forms from the spam of fake form entries.
Plus, this setting is enabled for every single form you create using ARForms friendly drag and drop form builder. If you want, you can also disable this hidden captcha with just a simple tick. More interestingly, this feature is enabled by default in all versions of ARForms.
ARForms Price:
ARForms understands how important it is to protect your online forms from spam and maintain user experience. Thus, ARForms in-built spam protection comes in both versions for free.
Cloudflare Turnstile is a type of Captcha itself yet more advanced and unique. We all know how annoying CAPTCHAs are, but this one will prove you wrong. Cloudflare Turnstile protects your contact forms from spam bots without interrupting your users’ experience.
Unlike Google reCAPTCHA, Cloudflare Turnstile protects your forms without troubling your users with any puzzles, images or questions. All it takes is one click from the user and that’s it.
No more frustrating experience of CAPTCHAs! No more headaches of solving traditional puzzles!
Cloudflare Turnstile is a modern alternative of reCAPTCHA that tells apart between humans and bots by analyzing browser signals and user behavior in the background. Thus, in most cases it doesn’t require any direct user interaction. The main goal of it is to ensure a smooth and hassle free experience for all users.
Cloudflare Turnstile Price:
Cloudflare Turnstile is absolutely free to use for everyone.
hCaptcha is one of the best reCAPTCHA alternatives around here. It protects your websites and online forms such as contact forms from spam bots and other automated abuses. It protects your websites and online forms such as contact forms from spam bots and other automated abuses. hCaptcha has its current focus on protecting users’ privacy and website’s security.
We can say hCaptcha is a privacy first online security that takes way less time to solve compared to our Google reCAPTCHA. Plus, it uses very simple tasks to identify between humans and bots.
Also, hCaptcha is offers extra layer of security with AI bot detection, advanced fraud protection, account defence and private learning.
hCaptcha Price:
hCaptcha offers a basic free plan that fully complies with GDPR, CCPA, LGPD, PIPL, and more. Furthermore, world class bot protection is guaranteed.
Friendly Captcha is another great reCAPTCHA alternative for protecting your contact forms from spam bots.
It is a type of CAPTCHA itself that uses proof-of-work to identify humans. Furthermore, It uses an invisible proof-of-work system that works in the background unlike Google reCAPTCHA, making sure not to interrupt the user’s experience.
It generates a complex cryptographic puzzle itself and also solves it automatically while users fill out the online form. Thus, Friendly Captcha offers a user friendly and barrier free experience for real users alongside advanced spam protection.
Friendly Captcha Price:
Friendly Captcha offers a free plan for non-commercial use that comes with basic protection and up to 1000 requests per month. For commercial use and advanced protection, here are its paid plans:
ALTCHA is the other best privacy-first alternative of Google reCAPTCHA. It also uses a proof-of-work mechanism to protect your contact forms and websites from bots and spams. It offers a seamless experience with zero cookies and user tracking.
ALTCHA is a self-hosted, open-source solution for protecting your online forms and websites while letting users have full control over their data. Also, ALTCHA’s widget is more lightweight compared to other Captchas like Google reCAPTCHA. Thus, it doesn’t impact your website’s performance.
It is known for offering automated, adaptive spam protection with its adaptive captchas. ALTCHA will offer a frictionless verification with no puzzle or challenges yet the second it senses high risk, it’ll protect your form using a secure code challenge.
Price:
ALTCHA is completely free to use and self-hosted and open-source too.
The honeypot method is also the best reCAPTCHA alternative security mechanism. It is a simple method that is meant to misguide the simple spam bots.
This method is perfect for developers and tech-savvy people. In this technique, you have to include an extra field in your forms that is hidden for humans but can be seen by bots. You have to hide the extra field using CSS or JavaScript and code it in such a way that anyone who fills that extra field won’t get to submit the form.
However, compared to other methods we have mentioned, this method is easy to tackle. The honeypot method is good and effective for simple spam bots yet not for advanced bots.
Now after going through each and every one of the reCAPTCHA alternatives, it’s time to make a decision.
Now you might be wondering,” How to choose the right reCAPTCHA alternatives?”
No need to wrack your brain. Here are the things to keep in mind when choosing your right reCAPTCHA alternatives:
So what are you waiting for? Protect your WordPress contact form and start generating leads!
Google reCAPTCHA is widely used in millions of websites and online forms. They are used to protect your online forms from spam bots yet these aren’t perfect.
Let’s agree we all are actually tired of selecting all images with bridges, and chimneys. And how can we forget about those select all squares with motorcycles or crosswalks. I bet none of us were able to clear it in one go.
Just like you and me, your users who fill your contact form might be feeling the same way. Every time a user fills a form online, A reCAPTCHA takes more than 20s of its time. This can lead to less form submissions and low conversion rates yet no worries.
In this blog, we’ll explore 5+ best reCAPTCHA Alternatives to protect your contact forms from spammy bots. Now without further ado, let’s dive in.
What is reCAPTCHA and Why Look for Alternatives?
reCAPTCHA was introduced by none other than Google to protect your online forms and websites from spam bots. It is a service by Google that uses multiple advanced techniques and is different between a human and a bot.A Google reCAPTCHA works by analyzing a user’s behavior, IP address and many other factors to tell computers and humans apart. Moreover, in most cases it shows a bunch of image collections and asks your site visitors or users to identify them.
Sounds so simple, right?
Well, we wish we could say so. Many times, only filling a Google reCAPTCHA takes more than 20s of a user. Not only it affects the user experience but also increases the count of abandoned websites and forms.
Just put yourself in the shoes of your users. Imagine a potential customer was surfing through multiple websites. Now when they landed on your business WordPress site, it caught the customer’s attention. Now they decided to contact you using your contact form; the first step towards generating leads. But suddenly they encountered a Google reCAPTCHA.
The study shows more than 8.66% of users failed to clear Google reCAPTCHA in their first attempt. Also this stats increases to around 30% when the reCAPTCHA is case sensitive.
Let’s say by chance that potential customer fell under this 30% of people and failed to clear the Google reCAPTCHA even after 2 attempts. Now what will happen? The users who fail two reCAPTCHA straight in a row are most likely to abandon the whole form and website.
Because let’s agree, there are going to be 100 other options for that potential customer in this competitive era of digitalization.
And for a lead generation form, every lead matters.
Moreover, there are other reasons too. – why we need to look for Google reCAPTCHA alternatives. Here take a look:
- Google reCAPTCHA collects user data which can raise privacy concerns for users
- Time consuming and effects user experience with confusing puzzles
- May affect your website and forms loading speed and time
- Affects SEO ranking of your website and online forms
- Limited effectiveness against advanced bots
- Some claim reCAPTCHA v3 is better as it replaced puzzles with invisible scoring, yet forgetting about the experience of users who use VPN or protected browsers.
Overall, looking for the best reCAPTCHA alternatives is necessary to protect your user experience and prevent contact form spam. Yet no worries! We have got you covered by searching for the best reCAPTCHA alternatives.
Quick Pick: Best reCAPTCHA Alternatives to Avoid Contact Form Spam
Are you in a hurry? No problem! Let’s explore the best reCAPTCHA alternatives at a glance to make a quick decision.| Alternative | Protection Method | Pricing | Best For |
| ARForms (Built-in Spam Protection) | Intelligent spam detection (no CAPTCHA needed) | Lite – Free Pro – $39 lifetime | WordPress users wanting spam free forms without extra setup |
| Cloudflare Turnstile | Browser signals & user behavior analysis | Free | Businesses needing a free & modern CAPTCHA |
| hCaptcha | AI bot detection, fraud prevention, privacy-first | Free plan Pro – $99/month | Privacy focused sites & enterprises |
| Friendly Captcha | Proof-of-work cryptographic puzzle (auto-solved) | Free (non-commercial), Paid from €9/month | Startups and SMBs needing scalable spam protection |
| ALTCHA | Open source proof-of-work with adaptive captcha | Free | Developers wanting lightweight, open-source security |
| Honeypot Method | Hidden trap fields for bots | Free | Developers seeking a simple DIY spam filter |
5+ Best reCAPTCHA Alternatives to Protect Your Contact Forms
Intelligent Spam Protection in ARForms
Looking for reCAPTCHA alternatives to prevent contact form spam? Then why not create your forms spam-free from the beginning with ARForms.
ARForms is a powerful WordPress form builder plugin that comes with an in-built intelligent spam protection.
Yes, you heard it right. No need to add Google reCAPTCHA or any other Captchas. You can build any form smart and protected with ARForms. Whether it be a simple contact form or a complex multi-step registration form, you can turn any form into a spam protected form.
ARForms invisible spam protection tracks suspicious click events to identify spam bots and protect your forms from harmful submissions and malwares. This in-built intelligent spam protection mechanism protects your forms from the spam of fake form entries.
Plus, this setting is enabled for every single form you create using ARForms friendly drag and drop form builder. If you want, you can also disable this hidden captcha with just a simple tick. More interestingly, this feature is enabled by default in all versions of ARForms.
ARForms Price:
ARForms understands how important it is to protect your online forms from spam and maintain user experience. Thus, ARForms in-built spam protection comes in both versions for free.
- ARForms Lite – Free
- ARForms Pro – $39 only for Lifetime updates
Cloudflare Turnstile
Cloudflare Turnstile is a type of Captcha itself yet more advanced and unique. We all know how annoying CAPTCHAs are, but this one will prove you wrong. Cloudflare Turnstile protects your contact forms from spam bots without interrupting your users’ experience.
Unlike Google reCAPTCHA, Cloudflare Turnstile protects your forms without troubling your users with any puzzles, images or questions. All it takes is one click from the user and that’s it.
No more frustrating experience of CAPTCHAs! No more headaches of solving traditional puzzles!
Cloudflare Turnstile is a modern alternative of reCAPTCHA that tells apart between humans and bots by analyzing browser signals and user behavior in the background. Thus, in most cases it doesn’t require any direct user interaction. The main goal of it is to ensure a smooth and hassle free experience for all users.
Cloudflare Turnstile Price:
Cloudflare Turnstile is absolutely free to use for everyone.
hCaptcha
hCaptcha is one of the best reCAPTCHA alternatives around here. It protects your websites and online forms such as contact forms from spam bots and other automated abuses. It protects your websites and online forms such as contact forms from spam bots and other automated abuses. hCaptcha has its current focus on protecting users’ privacy and website’s security.
We can say hCaptcha is a privacy first online security that takes way less time to solve compared to our Google reCAPTCHA. Plus, it uses very simple tasks to identify between humans and bots.
Also, hCaptcha is offers extra layer of security with AI bot detection, advanced fraud protection, account defence and private learning.
hCaptcha Price:
hCaptcha offers a basic free plan that fully complies with GDPR, CCPA, LGPD, PIPL, and more. Furthermore, world class bot protection is guaranteed.
- Basic (Free) – $0
- Pro – $99 Per month (Billed yearly)
Friendly Captcha
Friendly Captcha is another great reCAPTCHA alternative for protecting your contact forms from spam bots.
It is a type of CAPTCHA itself that uses proof-of-work to identify humans. Furthermore, It uses an invisible proof-of-work system that works in the background unlike Google reCAPTCHA, making sure not to interrupt the user’s experience.
It generates a complex cryptographic puzzle itself and also solves it automatically while users fill out the online form. Thus, Friendly Captcha offers a user friendly and barrier free experience for real users alongside advanced spam protection.
Friendly Captcha Price:
Friendly Captcha offers a free plan for non-commercial use that comes with basic protection and up to 1000 requests per month. For commercial use and advanced protection, here are its paid plans:
- Starter – €9/month
- Growth – €39/month
- Advanced – €200/month
- Enterprise – Custom
ALTCHA
ALTCHA is the other best privacy-first alternative of Google reCAPTCHA. It also uses a proof-of-work mechanism to protect your contact forms and websites from bots and spams. It offers a seamless experience with zero cookies and user tracking.
ALTCHA is a self-hosted, open-source solution for protecting your online forms and websites while letting users have full control over their data. Also, ALTCHA’s widget is more lightweight compared to other Captchas like Google reCAPTCHA. Thus, it doesn’t impact your website’s performance.
It is known for offering automated, adaptive spam protection with its adaptive captchas. ALTCHA will offer a frictionless verification with no puzzle or challenges yet the second it senses high risk, it’ll protect your form using a secure code challenge.
Price:
ALTCHA is completely free to use and self-hosted and open-source too.
Bonus: The Honeypot Method
The honeypot method is also the best reCAPTCHA alternative security mechanism. It is a simple method that is meant to misguide the simple spam bots.
This method is perfect for developers and tech-savvy people. In this technique, you have to include an extra field in your forms that is hidden for humans but can be seen by bots. You have to hide the extra field using CSS or JavaScript and code it in such a way that anyone who fills that extra field won’t get to submit the form.
However, compared to other methods we have mentioned, this method is easy to tackle. The honeypot method is good and effective for simple spam bots yet not for advanced bots.
Final Verdict: How to Choose the Right reCAPTCHA Alternative?
In a nutshell, Google reCAPTCHA is good for protecting your contact forms from spam bots yet ruins the user experience. Thus, we have come up with the best reCAPTCHA alternatives to protect your contact us forms.Now after going through each and every one of the reCAPTCHA alternatives, it’s time to make a decision.
Now you might be wondering,” How to choose the right reCAPTCHA alternatives?”
No need to wrack your brain. Here are the things to keep in mind when choosing your right reCAPTCHA alternatives:
- Think of how much you value your user experience.
- Always go for a privacy-first alternative
- Take a good look at its security layers and the level of protection it offers
- Make sure to choose a reCAPTCHA alternative that is easy to add
So what are you waiting for? Protect your WordPress contact form and start generating leads!
FAQs about reCAPTCHA Alternatives
Is there an alternative to reCAPTCHA?
Yes, There are many reCAPTCHA alternatives which are as follows:- Intelligent in-built spam protection with ARForms
- Cloudflare Turnstile
- hCaptcha
- Friendly Captcha
- ALTCHA
- The Honeypot Method
Is cloudflare reCAPTCHA free?
Yes, Absolutely! Cloudflare reCaptcha which is also known as Cloudflare turnstile is absolutely free to use for everyone.Is cloudflare turnstile better than reCAPTCHA?
Yes, Cloudflare turnstile is better than reCAPTCHA. Cloudflare Turnstile protects your contact forms from spam bots without interrupting your users’ experience. Moreover, it protects your forms without troubling your users with any puzzles, images or questions.Is hCAPTCHA free?
Yes, Absolutely! hCaptcha offers a basic free plan that fully complies with GDPR, CCPA, LGPD, PIPL, and more. Furthermore, world class bot protection is guaranteed.Is reCAPTCHA still effective?
Yes , Of course ! reCAPTCHA is still effective against spam bots. However, it sometimes interrupts the user experience and is not very good against advanced spam bots. That’s why we look for reCAPTCHA alternatives.