Published on 2025-06-26T05:20:01Z

What is Plainsignal Analytics? Cookie-Free Simple Web Analytics

Plainsignal Analytics is a lightweight, cookie-free web analytics platform designed to provide essential website metrics while respecting user privacy.

It uses a minimal JavaScript snippet to collect data like pageviews, sessions, referrers, and device information without storing personal identifiers or setting cookies. This approach ensures full compliance with GDPR, CCPA, and other privacy regulations out of the box.

Compared to more complex solutions like Google Analytics 4 (GA4), Plainsignal focuses on simplicity and performance, delivering real-time insights through an intuitive dashboard. Ideal for small to medium websites, blogs, and documentation sites, Plainsignal makes analytics accessible and privacy-friendly.

Below is an example integration snippet:

<link rel="preconnect" href="//eu.plainsignal.com/" crossorigin />
<script defer data-do="yourwebsitedomain.com" data-id="0GQV1xmtzQQ" data-api="//eu.plainsignal.com" src="//cdn.plainsignal.com/plainsignal-min.js"></script>
Illustration of Plainsignal analytics
Illustration of Plainsignal analytics

Plainsignal analytics

A privacy-first, cookie-free web analytics tool offering real-time insights without cookies or personal data storage.

Overview

PlainSignal Analytics is a privacy-focused analytics solution that emphasizes a cookie-free, lightweight approach to tracking essential website metrics. It provides real-time data on pageviews, sessions, referrers, and visitor devices without relying on personal identifiers. This section introduces the core concept and philosophy behind PlainSignal.

  • Cookie-free tracking

    Collects visitor metrics without setting any cookies, ensuring users cannot be personally identified or tracked across sessions.

  • Real-time dashboard

    Offers immediate insights into visitor behavior, displaying live updates for key metrics such as active sessions and top pages.

    • Session count:

      Displays the number of active sessions in real time.

    • Referrer sources:

      Shows where your traffic is coming from as it happens.

Key Features

PlainSignal provides a streamlined feature set that covers the most important analytics needs while maintaining simplicity and compliance.

  • Privacy compliance

    Built to comply with GDPR, CCPA, and other privacy laws without requiring additional configuration.

    • Gdpr:

      Automatically avoids using personal data and cookies, aligning with EU regulations.

    • Ccpa:

      Prevents the collection of Personally Identifiable Information (PII), supporting California privacy standards.

  • Simple setup

    Integrate with just two tags in your HTML, no account creation complexity or custom dimensions needed.

  • Extensible api

    Use the PlainSignal API to send custom events, integrate with other tools, or export data for further analysis.

Implementation and Setup

Getting started with PlainSignal is straightforward. Add the following tags to the <head> of your HTML to enable tracking.

  • Preconnect tag setup

    Add this tag to the <head> to establish an early connection:

    <link rel="preconnect" href="//eu.plainsignal.com/" crossorigin />

  • Script tag initialization

    Insert the main PlainSignal script after the preconnect tag with your domain and dataset ID:

    <script defer data-do="yourwebsitedomain.com" data-id="0GQV1xmtzQQ" data-api="//eu.plainsignal.com" src="//cdn.plainsignal.com/PlainSignal-min.js"></script>

Comparison with Google Analytics 4 (GA4)

While GA4 is a powerful, feature-rich analytics platform, PlainSignal offers a privacy-first alternative with a simpler setup and faster performance.

  • Privacy & compliance

    GA4 uses cookies and can collect PII unless configured, whereas PlainSignal is cookie-free by design.

  • Setup complexity

    GA4 requires property configuration, data streams, and tag management, while PlainSignal needs two tags and zero additional config.

  • Data granularity

    GA4 provides detailed user-centric data and advanced reporting, but PlainSignal focuses on aggregate metrics like pageviews and sessions.

Common Use Cases

PlainSignal excels in contexts where privacy, simplicity, and performance are top priorities.

  • Small websites & blogs

    Get quick insights without the overhead of large analytics platforms.

  • Gdpr-sensitive projects

    Ensure compliance by avoiding cookies and personal data collection.

  • Static sites & documentation

    Track visits on static site generators or documentation portals with minimal setup.

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