Switchy is a French link tool built around two jobs: putting retargeting pixels on short links and rewriting the preview card a link shows on social networks. Elido is a hosted shortener with its primary data in the EU that also fires retargeting pixels, behind a consent card, and costs far less per click. So Elido vs Switchy comes down to one question. Do you need the custom preview card? If yes, Switchy wins, because Elido doesn't do it. If you mostly need pixels, branded domains and seats, Elido gets you there for a fraction of the price.
I work on the Elido team, so weigh my verdict accordingly. Switchy's prices and features below come from Switchy's pricing page and its homepage, accessed 2026-11-11. Elido's come from our own plan catalogue and product code on the same day. For the hosted field as a whole, the cornerstone on URL shorteners for marketers is the wider map.
Switchy and Elido Side by Side
Both tools are retargeting link platforms, and both are run from France or the EU rather than the US. Switchy's terms name OBY SAS in Neuilly-sur-Seine as the operator, and its about page says the product was built at Station F in Paris. The overlap is real, which makes the differences easier to see.
| Question | Elido | Switchy |
|---|---|---|
| Free plan | Yes: 50 links, 500 clicks a month, no pixels | None listed; plans start at $47 a month |
| Retargeting pixels | Meta, Google, LinkedIn, TikTok on Pro and Business | Facebook, Instagram, X, LinkedIn, Google Ads, Quora, Pinterest, unlimited on every plan |
| Consent before pixels fire | Yes, a consent card by default; GPC and DNT count as no | Yes, an optional privacy opt-in pop-up |
| Custom social preview card | No | Yes: title, description and picture per link |
| Links included | Capped per plan (250 to 5,000 on Pro) | Unlimited on every plan |
| 10,000 clicks a month | 10 EUR (Pro 1K, 5 seats, 3 domains) | $47 (Team, 1 user, 2 domains) |
| Bio pages and QR codes | Yes, on every plan | Not on its pricing page |
| SSO and SCIM | Business plan | Not on its pricing page |
Two rows belong to Switchy without argument: the preview card and the pixel list.
The price rows belong to us.
How Retargeting Links Work in Each Tool
A retargeting link can't add anyone to an ad audience with a plain redirect, because a 302 response never runs JavaScript. So both tools show a brief page of their own that loads the pixel, then send the visitor on. Our link retargeting guide walks through the mechanics, and the reason this matters in Europe is in Schrems II and tracking pixels.
In Elido that page is opt-in per link. You save your pixel IDs once per workspace (one per platform), tick the pixel page on the links that need it, and leave the rest as fast plain redirects. What the visitor sees depends on what they've told us before:
On a first visit there's a small card that names your brand and offers Allow and Decline. Decline redirects at once. Allow fires the pixels and redirects. The choice sits in a first-party cookie on your short domain for six months, so a returning visitor doesn't get asked again. A browser sending Global Privacy Control or Do Not Track gets treated as a no, and the page doesn't even contain the pixel code. You can't switch that off.
Switchy describes its version as a privacy opt-in pop-up you add to retargeting links, with your company name, your website and a link to your privacy policy, after which visitors accept or decline the pixels. That's the same idea. Its public pages don't say whether it's on by default or how it treats browser privacy signals, so ask them before you rely on it for EU traffic.
Where Switchy Is the Better Pick
Some of what Switchy does, Elido just doesn't.
The big one is the preview card. When you paste a Switchy link into LinkedIn or a messaging app, you decide which title, description and image appear. That's useful when you share a page you don't own, or one whose Open Graph image is ugly, and our post on fixing a broken link preview explains why the card is normally out of your hands. Elido can't override it: crawlers follow our redirect and read the destination's Open Graph tags. If that card is what your social team cares about, buy Switchy.
The pixel list is longer too. Switchy's homepage names Facebook, Instagram, X, LinkedIn, Google Ads, Quora and Pinterest, and every plan says unlimited pixels. We support four platforms and one ID per platform per workspace, so an agency running ten Meta ad accounts from one workspace hits a wall with us that it won't hit with Switchy.
Links are unlimited on every Switchy plan. A newsletter that creates a new link for every story, thousands a month with a few clicks each, fits Switchy's model better than our per-link tiers.
Switchy Pricing Against Elido's Click Tiers
Switchy prices on clicks. Its plans run from Team at $47 a month for up to 10,000 clicks through Pro at $83 for 50,000 and Business at $119 for 100,000, up to a Company plan at $1,399 for 3.5 million (accessed 2026-11-11). The yearly toggle says two months free.
Elido prices on links, and each Pro link brings 10 tracked clicks a month. That makes the comparison lopsided at the volumes most teams run:
At 10,000 clicks, Elido Pro 1K is 10 EUR a month with 1,000 links, three branded domains and five seats. Switchy Team is $47 for one user and two domains. At 50,000 clicks, Elido Pro 5K is 35 EUR with ten seats against $83 and five users. Past that, Elido Business starts at 70 EUR with a million clicks a month included. If a campaign overshoots on Pro, extra clicks are billed at 0.50 EUR per thousand rather than switching your links off.
The catch is the link cap.
Pro 1K means a thousand active links. If you need unlimited links at low click volume, Switchy's pricing shape suits you better, whatever the headline numbers say. You can line our tiers up against your own traffic on the pricing page; the Pro 1K, 2K and 5K tiers come with a 14-day trial.
What Elido Adds Beyond the Pixel
Switchy's public pages are about retargeting, previews, A/B tests and analytics. Elido spreads wider, and some of it matters for a marketing team that's tired of juggling four tools.
- Smart links on Pro and Business: rules by country, device, operating system, browser and language, plus weighted A/B variants on one short link. See smart links.
- Bio pages on every plan (one on Free, five on Pro), QR codes on every plan, branded QR on Pro.
- Deep links into your own iOS and Android app on your branded domain, plus webhooks and an audit log from Pro.
- SSO and SCIM provisioning on Business, so the retargeting tool sits inside your identity provider like everything else.
None of that changes the preview-card gap. It changes how many separate subscriptions you need around it. The pixel side has its own page under retargeting.
Verdict: Which Retargeting Link Tool Fits You
Pick Switchy if the preview card is the job: you share third-party content and want your own title and image on it, or your ad accounts include X, Pinterest or Quora. Pick it too if you create a flood of low-traffic links and want no link cap. It's an established, focused tool and those features are the reason to pay its price.
Pick Elido if you want pixels on links with consent handled for you, more seats and domains per euro, and bio pages, QR codes and smart links in the same workspace. Our data sits in the EU, and the EU-hosted shorteners roundup covers what else is on that shortlist.
If what you actually want is a message laid over the page you link to, Switchy is not the answer. Paid Elido plans have a basic bar for that, and Sniply and Replug go much further, as Elido vs Replug explains.
Related on the Blog
Frequently asked questions
Does Switchy have a free plan?
Its pricing page doesn't list one. On 2026-11-11 the cheapest plan was Team at $47 a month for up to 10,000 clicks, one user and two custom domains, with a yearly toggle that gives two months free. Elido has a Free plan with 50 links and 500 clicks a month, but retargeting pixels start on Pro.
How much does Switchy cost?
From $47 a month (Team, 10,000 clicks) to $83 (Pro, 50,000 clicks, 5 users) and $119 (Business, 100,000 clicks, 10 users). Larger plans run up to $1,399 a month for 3.5 million clicks. Every plan lists unlimited links and unlimited pixels. Prices accessed 2026-11-11 on switchy.io/pricing.
Can Elido change the link preview image like Switchy?
No. Switchy lets you edit the title, description and picture a social network shows for your link. Elido has no per-link preview override today: social networks follow the redirect and build the card from the destination's own Open Graph tags. If custom preview cards are the main reason you're shopping, Switchy is the better fit.
Which retargeting pixels does Elido support?
Four: the Meta Pixel, a Google tag (Google Ads or a GA4 measurement ID), the LinkedIn Insight Tag and the TikTok Pixel, on Pro and Business. You save one ID per platform for the workspace and switch the pixel page on per link. Switchy's homepage also lists X, Pinterest and Quora, which Elido doesn't support.
Is Switchy GDPR compliant?
Switchy is run by a French company and says it offers a privacy opt-in pop-up for retargeting links, where visitors accept or decline the pixels. Whether your setup is compliant depends on how you configure that pop-up and your legal basis, so check it with your DPO. Elido shows a consent card by default and treats Global Privacy Control or Do Not Track as a decline.
Is Elido a good Switchy alternative?
For retargeting on a budget, yes: 10,000 clicks a month cost 10 EUR on Elido Pro against $47 on Switchy Team, with more seats. It's a weaker pick if you need custom social previews, pixels for X, Pinterest or Quora, or thousands of links on a low click volume, since Switchy doesn't cap links.
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