Compare·Simple Analytics
It counts visits, not people.
Simple Analytics sets no cookies and stores no IP addresses, and its servers are in the Netherlands. Its own site says it is not a fit for user journeys or cohorts, because it never links one visit to the next.
What Simple Analytics is
A privacy-first web analytics service, owned and hosted in the EU, that works without cookies.
- Licence
- Proprietary (open-source tracking scripts)
- Hosting
- Their cloud, in the Netherlands
- Best at
- Showing clear traffic and campaign numbers while storing nothing personal, not even an IP address.
Where Simple Analytics wins.
If one of these is a must-have for you, go with them.
Nothing personal is stored
Simple Analytics sets no cookie and never stores an IP address, not even a hashed one. It has one mode, so there is nothing to switch on. We default to one first-party cookie, and cookieless is a switch you turn on per project.
No pageview cap on the free plan
Their free plan has no pageview limit, under a fair use policy. It keeps one month of history and asks you to show their badge. Ours covers 100k events a month. For a busy site that only looks at the last few weeks, theirs costs less.
Owned and hosted in the EU
The company is European, and its servers are in the Netherlands. If your legal team asks where the company and the data sit, that is a short answer.
Where Spreelytics wins.
Every line here is a page in the product today.
It sees who comes back
By default we set one first-party cookie, so an anonymous visitor keeps one identity across visits. That identity is what makes retention and person timelines possible. Simple Analytics rules it out by design. With us it is a choice you make per project.
Funnels that follow one person
Their changelog says the steps of a multi-step goal do not always come from the same session. Our funnel steps follow one person, so a path that spans a return visit still completes. A funnel can have up to eight steps.
Revenue traced to its channel
Connect Stripe, Paddle, Polar or Lemon Squeezy, and each sale is credited to the visits that led to it. Last-touch gives the sale to the final visit. Linear splits it across every visit in a window you set. Simple Analytics has no revenue reports.
13 months on the free plan
Our Free plan keeps 13 months of history, so you can compare a month with the same month a year before. Their free plan deletes traffic data once it is 30 days old.
Side by side.
We leave prices out because Simple Analytics can change theirs at any time. Ours are on the pricing page.
| Feature | Spreelytics | |
|---|---|---|
| Free tier | 100k events / month, 13 months of data | Free, keeps 30 days of history |
| Data sampling | Never sampled | Never sampled |
| Cookies | One first-party cookie, or cookieless | None |
| Open source | Not included | Tracking scripts only |
| Self-hosting | Not included | Not included |
| Funnels | Included | Multi-step goals |
| Retention and cohorts | Included | Not included |
| Path analysis / journeys | Included | Not included |
| Person-level timelines | Included | Not included |
| Revenue attribution you control | Last-touch or linear | Not included |
| AI crawler and bot traffic | Included | Not included |
| MCP access for AI agents | Included | Community MCP only |
| Session replay | On Growth | Not included |
| Feature flags and experiments | Not included | Not included |
Moving over.
Every one of these starts by leaving Simple Analytics running.
01
Run both for two weeks
Add our snippet next to theirs and leave Simple Analytics on. Their visitor count is an estimate built from referrers, so expect our visitor numbers to differ from theirs.
02
Pick a cookie mode first
Keep our default cookie if you want retention and person timelines. If you chose Simple Analytics so that nothing is stored in the browser, switch the project to cookieless before you collect.
03
Move your events and goals
Replace each sa_event call with our own event call. Then name the pages and events that count as goals, and put goals in order to build a funnel.
04
Connect your payments
Connect your payment provider in Settings and pass the visitor id at checkout. Each sale is then traced to the visit that led to it.
FAQ
Switching from Simple Analytics.
What people ask before they switch.
Can Spreelytics work without cookies, like Simple Analytics?
Yes, per project. Cookieless mode stores nothing in the browser, and the snippet stays the same.
It comes with the same limits as their design. An anonymous visitor then counts as new every day, and retention counts identified people only. That is why one first-party cookie is our default.
Their free plan has no pageview cap. Why move?
If you only read the last month and your traffic is high, their free plan may suit you better. Ours covers 100k events a month and keeps 13 months of history.
Funnels and retention are part of our Free plan. So are revenue attribution and MCP access.
Simple Analytics has an AI chat. Is yours different?
Both let you ask about your numbers in plain English. Our in-app assistant comes with Growth, and it can build reports and dashboards for you.
MCP is an open standard that lets AI apps such as Claude or Cursor connect to a service. Ours is on every plan, including Free. Your AI app can read your numbers and build what your role allows. Simple Analytics has no MCP server of its own.
Compare something else.
The tools people usually weigh up beside this one.
vs Plausible
Made for privacy, but it has limits.
Simple and cookieless, so it can't tell when someone comes back.
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vs Fathom
Simple on purpose, which only goes so far.
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vs Google Analytics
Everyone already has it.
Free and everywhere, but it samples data and is hard to learn.
Read moreSee your own numbers today.
Free up to 100k events a month · no credit card
