iTrace vs RealEye

iTrace is a free, MIT-licensed toolkit for analyzing webcam eye-tracking data, with a scientific core built on NumPy and SciPy. It computes gaze in degrees of visual angle and detects fixations, saccades, and microsaccades using I-VT, I-DT, and Engbert–Kliegl methods. Pupil tools include blink detection and interpolation, preprocessing, and eye-crop segmentation measured in pixels or relative to iris size. Affine screen-space calibration reports calibration error and gaze-quality measures. The command-line tool analyzes gaze CSV files and exports JSON reports. Optional webcam capture uses OpenCV and MediaPipe, and optional interfaces include a local HTML app using FastAPI and WebSockets and a Streamlit dashboard. Live workflows can export derived gaze, pupil, and capture CSVs. By default, the workflow does not save raw eye video or persisted eye-crop images, though live viewing may send a temporary JPEG crop to a browser over a local WebSocket. The project says its checks use synthetic ground truth rather than real eye-tracking data or a reference device. Webcam pupil size is a relative proxy, not a measurement in millimetres.

RealEye is a cloud-based webcam eye-tracking research platform for building online studies, tracking participants, and analyzing results. Researchers can use images, videos, or live websites as stimuli, configure display settings, and add instructions and follow-up questions. The dashboard includes heatmaps, gaze and fixation analysis, Areas of Interest statistics, survey answers, and raw or processed data exports. A facial coding feature analyzes neutral, happy, and surprised expressions. External survey connections can redirect participants to services such as Qualtrics, Google Forms, or SurveyMonkey and pass participant identifiers through URL parameters. RealEye says webcam image and sound processing happens in the browser, and that it stores gaze-point predictions rather than webcam images or sound. It states that it is GDPR compliant and runs on AWS data centers in the United States. Participants using a researcher's own link need a laptop or PC with a webcam; smartphone tests are also offered. Basic costs $325 a month billed annually or $390 a month. Standard costs $825 a month billed annually or $990 a month.