VeritaMetrics vs Plausible Analytics
Plausible is a cookieless, EU-owned analytics tool with a strong open-source track record and a script even lighter than ours. It also goes one step further than we do on-device: nothing is stored at all, where our own session id sits in sessionStorage for the tab. VeritaMetrics adds automatic event capture, session replay, and a rule-based site-health score that Plausible does not offer.
Problems we built for, and where we stop
What people run into with analytics tools in general, read from the research, not a pitch against this one.
“decisions about landing pages, content and ad spend are being made from numbers with a messed up denominator”
What we do: Every pageview carries a bot label with a reason code; the dashboard shows the top reasons held back.
Where we stop: We label and do not block. Three reason codes fire today. A label is a statement about a signal, not a verdict. Reason-per-bot is not unique: Swetrix, Rybbit and PostHog show one.
“my tag broke and I found out weeks later”
What we do: An automatic notice when a reliably active site goes quiet.
Where we stop: Total silence only, not a drop or a partial break.
“a ten-minute read counted as a zero-second bounce”
What we do: Bounce needs one pageview and under 10 engaged seconds, and the threshold is shown.
Where we stop: Equals GA4's threshold, so new only against the privacy tools.
“GA4 users dropped after the banner and the modelling never brought them back”
What we do: Runs beside GA4 and counts on our own servers.
Where we stop: The capture rate is an unaudited estimate until capture-audit_plan.md finishes.
“every tool says privacy matters, and very few say anything meaningful about what they actually collect”
What we do: The privacy pages list what is stored and for how long.
Where we stop: The wording is hedged on consent by design, and the visit ID is pseudonymous, not anonymous.
Feature-by-Feature Comparison
| Feature | VeritaMetrics | Plausible Analytics |
|---|---|---|
| Privacy & Compliance | ||
| Cookieless by default | Yes | Yes |
| Consent banner claim (vendor claim) | Usually, see /privacy | Claimed, no caveat |
| GDPR position (vendor claim) | Legitimate interest (Art. 6(1)(f)), see /privacy | Yes |
| Data storage region | London, UK | Yes |
| Tracking & Data | ||
| Script size (gzipped) | ~8KB | ~ 2.5 KB |
| Ad blocker resilience | Yes | Proxy required |
| No-JS fallback (pixel) | Yes | No |
| Automatic event capture | Yes | Outbound, downloads, forms (default on) |
| Rage & dead click detection | Yes | No |
| Bot classification, with a reason per visit | Yes | No |
| Bounce that counts an engaged single-page read | Yes | No |
| Features | ||
| Session replay (DOM recording) | No | No |
| Visit timeline (event list) | Yes | No |
| Automated insights | Rule-based, no LLM | No |
| Core Web Vitals | LCP, INP, CLS (opt-in) | No |
| Funnels | Yes | Business tier |
| Revenue attribution | Tracking only, no attribution | Business tier (manual) |
| Live visitor count | No | Yes |
| Hourly granularity | No | Yes |
| Report time zone | No | Yes |
| Data export | CSV / JSON / XLSX | CSV (API on Business) |
| Pricing & Hosting | ||
| Self-hosting option | On request (contact sales) | Community Edition (AGPL) |
| Open source | No | AGPL |
When to choose Plausible Analytics
- Open-source (AGPL) with a free, self-hostable Community Edition
- Lighter script (~2.5KB versus our ~8KB) for the leanest possible page
- Independent and profitable since 2018, EU-owned and EU-hosted, with a large community
- A clean, minimal dashboard and mature integration guides for most hosting stacks
When to choose VeritaMetrics
- Hosted, no operations, where Plausible’s own self-hosters report ClickHouse idling over 4GB of RAM and a boot health-check loop that restarts for hours under Kubernetes
- Records every button and CTA click with no tagging, where Plausible tracks three named categories and needs a CSS class for anything else
- Funnels from Agency up, and revenue breakdowns on every plan, where Plausible gates both to its Business tier
- Field Core Web Vitals (LCP, INP and CLS) measured in your visitors’ browsers, on every plan including Free, where Plausible collects none at any tier
- Privacy-safe session replay, which Plausible does not offer at any tier
- Rage and dead-click detection to surface broken or slow controls
- Automated, rule-based site-health scoring that flags traffic and engagement issues without you building a dashboard for it, where Plausible’s only automated signal classifies referral traffic from AI assistants
What VeritaMetrics does that Plausible Analytics doesn't
Every item is a row in the table above, ticked in our column and marked No in theirs.
- No-JS fallback (pixel)
- Rage & dead click detection
- Bot classification, with a reason per visit
- Bounce that counts an engaged single-page read
- Visit timeline (event list)
- Automated insights
- Core Web Vitals
What people who use Plausible Analytics say
“ClickHouse needs several containers and idles using over 4 GB of RAM, for a workload that fits in 150 MB elsewhere.”
What we do: Hosted, no operations. The limit: Not open source and not self-hostable.
“A single transient DB error during boot makes the health check fail for hours, causing an infinite restart loop under Kubernetes.”
What we do: Hosted, no operations. The limit: Not open source and not self-hostable.
Pricing
Plausible Analytics: From $9/mo for 10k pageviews (30-day trial). Self-hosting is free under AGPL.
VeritaMetrics: Free plan, then paid from 7 €/mo
See pricing and plansPlausible Analytics vs VeritaMetrics: common questions
- Does Plausible need a cookie banner?
- No. Plausible sets no cookies and stores no persistent identifiers, so it markets itself as banner-free under GDPR and PECR. VeritaMetrics takes the same cookieless approach.
- Is Plausible’s script really under 1KB?
- Not anymore. Plausible’s own current pages say 2.5KB, and a direct measurement puts the bare script near 1.3KB and the full-feature build near 2.4KB. It is still lighter than our ~8KB script, so this is a row we show Plausible winning.
- Does Plausible have session replay or automated insights?
- No to both. Plausible has no session replay or heatmaps, and its only automated signal tags traffic coming from AI assistants as a channel. VeritaMetrics includes session reconstruction and a rule-based site-health score; neither product uses AI for this.
- Can I self-host Plausible?
- Yes. Plausible’s Community Edition is free under AGPL, though you run and maintain the server yourself and lose managed updates and support. That self-host option is a genuine Plausible advantage.
- Does Plausible report Core Web Vitals?
- No. Plausible collects no web vitals at any tier, and Core Web Vitals sits at the top of its public feedback board, still unshipped as of the July 2026 changelog. VeritaMetrics reports LCP, INP and CLS from real visitor sessions on every plan including Free; add data-web-vitals="true" to the snippet to turn collection on.
Switch from Plausible Analytics to VeritaMetrics
Same privacy commitment. More complete data. Deeper reporting.