Plausible vs GoatCounter: Privacy Analytics Compared

Different Tools for Different Needs

Plausible is a full Google Analytics replacement with goals, funnels, custom events, and team dashboards. GoatCounter is a page view counter that uses 25 MB of RAM and runs on SQLite. Plausible requires ClickHouse + PostgreSQL and at least 2 GB of RAM. If you need marketing analytics, choose Plausible. If you want to know how many people visited your blog, GoatCounter does the job at 1/40th the resource cost.

Overview

Plausible (Community Edition) is a polished, privacy-first analytics platform backed by a funded company. It uses ClickHouse as its analytics database for fast aggregation queries, PostgreSQL for user/site config, and ships a single-page dashboard. The tracking script is ~1 KB. No cookies, GDPR-compliant. plausible.io

GoatCounter is a solo-developer project written in Go. Single binary, SQLite by default, no JavaScript framework in the dashboard. The tracking script is ~3.5 KB (still lightweight). Also cookie-free and GDPR-compliant. No funded company behind it — maintained by one person (Martin Tournoij). goatcounter.com

Feature Comparison

Feature	Plausible CE v3.2.0	GoatCounter v2.7.0
Tracking script size	~1 KB	~3.5 KB
Cookie-free	Yes	Yes
GDPR consent needed	No	No
Page views	Yes	Yes
Unique visitors	Yes (hash-based)	Yes (hash-based)
Referrer tracking	Yes	Yes
UTM campaign tracking	Yes (full)	Yes (basic)
Custom events	Yes (goals, conversions)	Limited (basic events)
Funnels	Yes	No
Revenue tracking	Yes	No
API	Yes (comprehensive)	Yes (v0, simpler)
Multi-site	Yes (team dashboards)	Yes (single-instance multi-vhost)
Team access	Yes (roles, sharing)	No (single-user)
Real-time dashboard	Yes	Yes
Email reports	Yes	No
GeoIP	Built-in	Optional (MaxMind)
Database	ClickHouse + PostgreSQL	SQLite or PostgreSQL
Language	Elixir/Phoenix	Go
License	AGPL v3	EUPL v1.2

Resource Comparison

This is the most dramatic difference between the two:

Resource	Plausible	GoatCounter
RAM (idle)	500–800 MB (app + ClickHouse + PostgreSQL)	25 MB (SQLite), 75 MB (with PostgreSQL)
RAM (under load)	1–2 GB	50–100 MB
CPU	Moderate (ClickHouse queries)	Negligible
Disk (application)	~1 GB (images)	~17 MB (image)
Containers	3 (app, ClickHouse, PostgreSQL)	1 (SQLite) or 2 (with PostgreSQL)
Minimum server	2 GB RAM, SSE 4.2 CPU	256 MB RAM, any CPU

GoatCounter runs on hardware that Plausible’s ClickHouse dependency physically can’t start on. A 512 MB VPS or a Raspberry Pi runs GoatCounter without breaking a sweat.

Setup Comparison

Plausible requires cloning a repository, configuring a .env with a 64-byte secret key and BASE_URL, and running three containers (Plausible app, ClickHouse, PostgreSQL). ClickHouse requires a CPU with SSE 4.2 instruction support. First-time setup includes account creation via the web UI.

GoatCounter needs one container and one volume. No environment variables are strictly required — the Docker image runs goatcounter serve -automigrate with SQLite by default. Create a site from the CLI or the first-time web setup page. Total setup time: under 2 minutes.

# GoatCounter — complete setup
services:
  goatcounter:
    image: arp242/goatcounter:2.7
    ports: ["8080:8080"]
    volumes: [goatcounter-data:/home/goatcounter/goatcounter-data]
    restart: unless-stopped
volumes:
  goatcounter-data:

Dashboard Comparison

Plausible’s dashboard is a polished single page with real-time visitor count, top pages, referrers, countries, devices, and custom goal conversions. You can filter by any dimension, set date ranges, and compare periods. It looks professional — you could share it with non-technical stakeholders.

GoatCounter’s dashboard shows page views, referrers, browsers, screen sizes, and locations in a more utilitarian layout. It’s functional but visually simpler. There’s a chart at the top and tables below. Filtering exists but it’s less intuitive than Plausible’s click-to-filter approach.

Choose Plausible If…

• You need custom event tracking, goals, or funnels
• Multiple team members need dashboard access with different roles
• You want a polished dashboard you can share with clients or stakeholders
• UTM campaign tracking is important for your marketing
• You need email reports or revenue attribution
• Your server has at least 2 GB of RAM

Choose GoatCounter If…

• You just want page view counts and basic referrer data
• You’re running on limited hardware (VPS under 1 GB, Raspberry Pi)
• You want the simplest possible setup (1 container, no database server)
• You run a personal blog or small site where advanced analytics are overkill
• You prefer a single Go binary over a multi-service stack
• You track multiple small sites and don’t want a heavy backend for each

Verdict

For a Google Analytics replacement, Plausible wins. It has the features marketing teams and content creators actually need — funnels, custom events, UTM tracking, team access, email reports. The resource cost is justified by the capability.

For “I just want to know if anyone reads my stuff,” GoatCounter is perfect. It’s not trying to replace Google Analytics — it’s trying to be the simplest useful analytics tool possible. At 25 MB of RAM with zero external dependencies, it succeeds.

They serve different audiences with almost no overlap. The decision is usually obvious within 30 seconds of understanding what each tool does.

FAQ

Can I migrate data between Plausible and GoatCounter?

Not directly. Neither has an import format compatible with the other. Both support CSV export, but the schemas don’t match. If switching, start fresh.

Does GoatCounter support custom events?

Basic event tracking exists — you can send events via the API or JavaScript. But there are no goals, funnels, or conversion tracking. If you need event-driven analytics, Plausible is the right choice.

Which tracking script is faster?

Both are fast. Plausible’s is ~1 KB, GoatCounter’s is ~3.5 KB. Neither blocks page rendering (both use async). The difference is negligible for page load times.

Can GoatCounter handle high-traffic sites?

Yes, with PostgreSQL. SQLite works for sites with up to a few thousand daily page views. For higher traffic, switch to PostgreSQL. GoatCounter has handled the traffic of goatcounter.com (the hosted SaaS version) on modest hardware.

Related

• How to Self-Host Plausible
• How to Self-Host GoatCounter
• How to Self-Host Umami
• How to Self-Host Matomo
• Plausible vs Umami
• Best Self-Hosted Analytics
• Replace Google Analytics