# GoatCounter review (2026): is it any good? > Open source web analytics, free and donation-supported Checked Nov 12, 2026 ยท graded Nov 12, 2026 by ToolGPA. GoatCounter is an open source web analytics tool offered as a free, donation-supported hosted service or as an app you host yourself. It counts visits without unique identifiers, adds about 3.5KB to a page, and can also take data from a tracking pixel, middleware or log files. - **Category:** Website & Product Analytics - **Made by:** GoatCounter - **Website:** https://www.goatcounter.com - **Runs on:** Web - **Who should skip it:** Too light for funnels, heatmaps or recordings. - **Facts last checked:** Nov 12, 2026 ## Pricing As of Nov 12, 2026, GoatCounter is free to use. - **Pricing model:** Free - **Free plan:** None. - **Free trial:** None listed. | Plan | Price | What you get | | --- | --- | --- | | Hosted service | $0 | Free for reasonable public usage, such as a personal site or a small-to-medium business. Millions of pageviews a day are out of scope. | | Self-hosted | $0 | Run the open source app on your own server for any purpose; you pay only for your own hosting. | Read from https://www.goatcounter.com/ on Nov 12, 2026. Prices change, so confirm with GoatCounter before buying. ## Key features - **No personal-data tracking:** Visits are told apart without cookies or persistently stored personal data. The vendor says no GDPR notice is needed and lets you control what is collected. - **Light script:** The tracking script adds about 3.5KB to a page. A JavaScript-free tracking pixel is also offered. - **Several ways to send data:** Use the script tag, an image-based tracker, your application's middleware, or import server log files. - **Basic visitor statistics:** Reports show browser, location, screen size, referring sites and campaigns. - **Exports and an API:** All data can be exported, and the documentation lists CSV and JSON exports and a JSON API. - **Accessible interface:** The vendor lists accessibility as a high-priority feature, and says the interface works with screen readers. ## Good for - Personal sites and blogs that want counts without a consent notice - People who prefer to read the code and host their own analytics ## Worth knowing - The hosted service is meant for reasonable public use; heavy traffic is pointed to self-hosting. - Funded by donations through GitHub Sponsors, so there is no paid plan or published support commitment. - A deliberately small feature set; the vendor presents it as a simpler alternative to Google Analytics and Matomo. ## ToolGPA grades **GPA: 2.8 out of 4**, graded Nov 12, 2026. GoatCounter is open-source web analytics with a free hosted service and a self-hosted version, and it doesn't track personal data. It's free for reasonable public use. The feature set is deliberately small, and heavy traffic gets pointed to self-hosting. - **Value for money: A.** Free for personal sites and small-to-medium businesses, or free to self-host. It's donation-supported, with no paid plan. - **Free plan and trial: A.** Free outright, with no cap a normal site would reach. Millions of pageviews a day are out of scope. - **Features: C.** Pageviews, referrers, browsers, locations, screen sizes and campaigns, plus exports and an API. It does that job fully, a smaller job than most analytics tools. - **Ease of use: C.** No store rating on record. You sign up and add one script, or self-host. - **Platforms and integrations: C.** Web only, with an API and a couple of static-site tools (Gatsby, Publii). These are ToolGPA's own grades. Graded from this listing, whose facts were read from GoatCounter's own pages on 12 November 2026. Not based on using the product, and shorter than our full reviews. ## Where it stands among website and product analytics tools - GoatCounter's GPA of 2.8 is higher than 49 of the 58 other website and product analytics tools we grade, and level with 3. - It stands best on free plan and trial (A, above 55 of 58) and worst on platforms and integrations (C, above 0). - GoatCounter has no paid plan. - On features, ease of use and platforms it scores 2.0 out of 4. Nothing scores higher for less, though at least one tool matches that score at a lower price. The category's chart of price against score: https://toolgpa.com/charts/analytics ## Keep it, or make your own? **Keep it.** GoatCounter is free, so making your own would save you nothing. And it is not the kind of software a weekend replaces. It is one of the better ones too: its GPA of 2.8 is higher than 49 of the 58 other website and product analytics tools we grade. - You could not: A tracking script and a database that counts every visit. - You could not: It plugs into other products, Gatsby and Publii among them, and has an API. A judgement by ToolGPA from this listing, by rules that are the same for every tool. Nothing was built to test it. ## Works with Gatsby, Publii **Tags:** Web analytics, Open source, Self-hostable, Public API ## Alternatives - [Umami](https://toolgpa.com/tools/umami): Open-source, cookieless web and product analytics. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/goatcounter-vs-umami) - [Plausible](https://toolgpa.com/tools/plausible): Cookie-free, privacy-first website analytics made and hosted in the EU. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/goatcounter-vs-plausible) - [Ackee](https://toolgpa.com/tools/ackee): Self-hosted, cookie-free analytics you run on your own server. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/ackee-vs-goatcounter) - [Counter.dev](https://toolgpa.com/tools/counterdev): Free, open-source, cookie-free web analytics for small sites. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/counterdev-vs-goatcounter) - [Koko Analytics](https://toolgpa.com/tools/koko-analytics): Privacy-friendly analytics plugin for WordPress. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/goatcounter-vs-koko-analytics) ## Sources The prices, plans, platforms and features above were read from these pages on Nov 12, 2026: - https://www.goatcounter.com/ - https://www.goatcounter.com/help/start - https://www.goatcounter.com/contact Page: https://toolgpa.com/tools/goatcounter Listed by ToolGPA (toolgpa.com).