Plausible nailed the simple, privacy-first dashboard. We took the same approach and added the one thing it deliberately leaves out: per-visitor logs.
Plausible is great if you only want aggregate numbers. But if you ever wonder "who was that visitor from Berlin who read three articles?", you need per-session detail. HitCounters gives you both: clean aggregates and the visitor activity log.
| Feature | HitCounters | Plausible | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Privacy-friendly (no third-party cookies) | Both compliant | ||
| No cookie banner required | Both use first-party storage | ||
| Per-visitor session log | Plausible is aggregate-only by design | ||
| Page-by-page session detail | See exactly which pages a visitor read | ||
| AI assistant traffic detection | partial | We track ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, Gemini, Copilot | |
| Real-time visitor map | Both have it | ||
| Custom events / goals | hcEvent() in our case | ||
| Bot scoring per visit | Quality score 0-100 | ||
| Free plan | Plausible has 30-day trial only | ||
| Open-source | Plausible wins this one |
Plausible gives you "47 sessions from Germany." We let you click into each one: pages viewed, time on page, referrer, device, scroll depth.
No third-party cookies, no cross-site tracking, visitor opt-out, scoped localStorage. We don't sacrifice privacy for visibility.
Surfaces visits from ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, Gemini, Copilot, and more — broken out as a separate traffic source.
Plausible asks for $9/month after a trial. We have an actual free tier. You only pay if your traffic justifies it.
Define a thank-you page once. We track conversions automatically — no event code required.
Every page renders cleanly on phones. Built for actually checking your stats from your couch.
Free plan, no credit card. Setup takes 2 minutes.
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