Simple Analytics
No-cookie analytics with AI-powered insights
- HQ🇳🇱 Netherlands
- Founded2018
- LicenseProprietary (closed-source SaaS)
- ReferenceRead full review
Simple Analytics vs Umami
Two privacy-first web analytics tools, compared side-by-side on the same axes. Data is descriptive — no rankings, no editorial winners.
Updated May 1, 2026
11 of 34 verified checks differ
Source: vendor docs & pricing pages
Umami
Open-source self-hosted privacy analytics
- HQ🇺🇸 USA
- Founded2020
- LicenseMIT
- ReferenceRead full review
Which one is for you
Three concrete frames to decide. Not a winner — a fit check.
Pick Simple Analytics if
You want a managed SaaS that works without infrastructure on your side. NL-hosted, $19/mo entry, no Postgres to operate.
You want AI Insights for natural-language queries. Umami doesn't ship this.
You're a marketing site or content publication where the dashboard is the whole product.
Pick Umami if
You self-host. Umami runs on a $5 VPS with Postgres; Simple Analytics has no self-host option.
You want MIT licensing — fork freely, embed in a closed product, no copyleft constraints.
You want Postgres-level data access. Direct SQL queries against your event store unlock custom analytics that no SaaS API supports.
Pick neither if
You need real attribution depth. Both are flat counters by design. See Matomo.
You need cross-session user stitching. Both are pure cookieless and lose this.
Real cost on 100k pageviews/month
Simple Analytics is fixed SaaS; Umami's cost is your hosting + ops time.
| Line item | Simple Analytics | Umami |
|---|---|---|
| Base plan / hosting | +$19/mo Simple Analytics Business | +$5/mo $5 VPS for Umami self-host |
| Database | Included Included | Included Postgres on same VPS |
| AI Insights | Included Included | — Not available |
| Time / ops | Included Vendor-managed | — ~2 hr/mo |
| All-in monthly | $19/mo Vendor handles ops | $5/mo Cash only — your time is extra |
Umami SaaS at umami.is starts at $9/mo if you skip self-hosting. Simple Analytics has no self-host.
Three things each tool quietly can't do
Limits the marketing pages won't list. Each tool has them — knowing which kills the deal saves a migration.
Simple Analytics can't…
Self-host. SaaS-only.
Direct database access. Data is yours by API only.
Free tier. No free path; $19/mo entry.
Umami can't…
Vendor-managed simplicity. You operate it.
AI-driven insights. Not a feature.
Compliance certifications. Self-attested only.
At-a-glance
Five facts that most often qualify or disqualify a tool early.
| Simple Analytics | Umami | |
|---|---|---|
| Price floor | Free | Free |
| Free tier | Yes | Yes |
| Hosting model | SaaS only | SaaS + self-host |
| Data residency | EU | US |
| Cookieless | Yes | Yes |
Privacy posture
Frameworks claimed and sub-processors disclosed under DPA.
Frameworks claimed
| Framework | Simple Analytics | Umami |
|---|---|---|
| GDPR | Held | Held |
| CCPA | Held | Held |
| UK PECR | Held | Not held |
| SOC 2 Type II | Not held | Not held |
| ISO 27001 | Not held | Not held |
| HIPAA | Not held | Not held |
Sub-processors
Simple Analytics (4)
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Simple Analytics B.V. Legal entity (data processor for customer's site visitors) 🇳🇱 Netherlands
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Hetzner Online GmbH Cloud hosting (servers, database) 🇩🇪 Germany
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Stripe Payment processing 🇮🇪 Ireland
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Postmark Transactional email 🇺🇸 United States
Umami (6)
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Umami Software, Inc Legal entity (data processor for Cloud customers) 🇺🇸 United States
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Vercel Inc Cloud hosting (Next.js app, edge functions) 🇺🇸 United States
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ClickHouse Cloud Analytics database (US/EU regions) 🇺🇸 United States
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-
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Cloudflare DNS, CDN, DDoS protection 🇺🇸 United States
Pricing at common traffic levels
Cheapest published plan from each vendor that covers the listed pageview volume. Retrieved May 1, 2026.
| Traffic | Simple Analytics | Umami |
|---|---|---|
| 10k pv/mo | $15/moSimple | $0/moHobby |
| 100k pv/mo | Custom — contact sales | $0/moHobby |
| 500k pv/mo | Custom — contact sales | $20/moPro |
| 1M pv/mo | Custom — contact sales | $20/moPro |
Volumes between tiers follow each vendor's published pricing model. "Custom" indicates the vendor does not publish a price for that volume on their pricing page.
Feature matrix
All 38 verified checks across 4 categories.
Tracking & Reporting (15)
| Feature | Simple Analytics | Umami |
|---|---|---|
| Pageviews & visitors | Yes Pageviews + visitors |
Yes Pageviews + visitors |
| Live visitor count | No Last 5-min view instead |
No Cloud only feature |
| Top pages report | Yes By visitors/views |
Yes By pageviews/visitors |
| Top referrers | Yes Referrer + UTM |
Yes Referrer + UTM breakdown |
| UTM campaign tracking | Yes Source/medium/campaign |
Yes Auto-detected from referrer |
| Country & city breakdown | Partial Country-level only; city-level not exposed (privacy by design) |
Yes Country + city |
| Device, browser, OS | Yes Device + browser |
Yes Device + browser |
| Bounce / engagement | No By design |
Yes Bounce rate |
| Time on site | No By design |
Yes Avg session duration |
| Custom events | Yes sa_event() JS API + auto-events.js for downloads/outbound/mailto |
Yes Custom events with property tracking; v3.1 added Custom Boards |
| Goals / conversions | Yes Goals dashboard with histograms; URL pattern + custom event matching |
Yes Cloud goals; self-host via SQL |
| Funnels | No No funnel feature; goals dashboard but no multi-step funnel reports |
Yes Custom Boards (v3.1+); flat funnel reports |
| Outbound link tracking | Yes Auto via data-attribute |
Yes Via custom events |
| File download tracking | Yes Auto via data-attribute |
Yes Via custom events |
| 404 / error tracking | No No native 404 report |
No Manual events |
Privacy & Compliance (9)
| Feature | Simple Analytics | Umami |
|---|---|---|
| Cookieless by default | Yes Truly cookieless: no cookies, no localStorage, no fingerprinting; referrer-based unique-visit detection (no salted hash) |
Yes Cookieless tracking; visitor hash with salt rotation (monthly default, configurable) |
| No personal data collected | Yes IPs are dropped entirely (not just anonymized); no fingerprinting, no User-Agent stored verbatim |
Yes IP not stored; used in-memory for geo + salted hash |
| GDPR-compliant out of the box | Yes Vendor claims "no cookie banner needed" — argues GDPR scope does not apply (no PII collected) |
Partial Vendor claims no banner needed (cookieless + no PII); not a legal opinion, EU DPAs may differ on Schrems-II/US infra |
| Data hosted in EU | Yes Worldstream + Leaseweb (NL) + Bunny CDN (Slovenia) — encrypted at rest, only SA holds keys |
Partial Mixed: Vercel + Cloudflare (US), ClickHouse (US/EU), Hetzner (EU) |
| Data hosted in US | No EU-only — no US data residency option |
Yes Vercel + Cloudflare US primary; control plane US-hosted |
| Self-hostable | No SaaS only |
Yes Free, Docker |
| Open source | No Closed-source SaaS |
Yes MIT |
| Data retention period | Configurable Simple plan: 3 yr · Team: 5 yr · 90-day permanent purge after account deletion |
Configurable Hobby 6 mo · Pro 2 yr · Business 5 yr · Self-host: indefinite |
| Bot & spam filtering | Yes Honored by default; opt-out via data-collect-dnt="true" attribute |
Yes Bot detection |
Setup & Integrations (10)
| Feature | Simple Analytics | Umami |
|---|---|---|
| Script weight (KB) | 3 Async, "heavily compressed"; vendor states 3 KB |
2 ~2 KB gzipped (4.5 KB uncompressed); same gzipped basis as peers |
| Single-snippet install | Yes Single async <script> tag in <head>; SPA-aware auto-detection |
Yes data-website-id attribute |
| WordPress plugin | Yes Official WP plugin documented under Integrations |
No No official plugin; community "Integrate Umami" by Ancocodet (2k+ installs) |
| Proxy / first-party domain | Yes Custom domain proxy via CNAME (scripts. + queue.) bypasses ad-blockers |
Yes Configurable via TRACKER_SCRIPT_NAME env (rename to dodge adblockers) |
| Public API | Yes Stats API + Export API (raw rows) + Admin API |
Yes Full REST API (websites, stats, events, sessions, reports, realtime) |
| Data export (CSV/JSON) | Yes CSV |
Yes CSV |
| Google Search Console connector | No No native GSC connector; export to Looker Studio + Power BI available |
No No native GSC connector |
| Email digests | Yes Email reports (daily/weekly/monthly) |
Yes Cloud |
| Slack / webhook alerts | Partial Webhook configurable; no native Slack integration documented |
No No native Slack |
| Public shareable dashboard | Yes Mini-websites + embeddable charts |
Yes Share-link toggle |
Pricing & Plans (4)
| Feature | Simple Analytics | Umami |
|---|---|---|
| Free tier exists | Yes Free tier (5 sites, 1 user, fair-use cap) + 14-day trial on paid plans |
Yes Hobby plan = permanent free (100k events/mo, 3 sites, 6mo retention) |
| Entry price ($/mo) | 15 Simple plan: 20k datapoints/mo, 10 sites, 1 user, 3-yr retention |
20 Cloud Pro tier (1M events/mo, 20 sites, 2yr retention) |
| Price at 100k pageviews | — Datapoint-based pricing — vendor doesn't publish a 100k-pageview tier benchmark |
20 Pro covers 1M events/mo (well over 100k benchmark) |
| Unlimited sites on entry plan | Partial 5 sites Free · 10 sites Simple · 20 sites Team |
Partial 3 sites Hobby · 20 sites Pro · unlimited Business · unlimited Self-host |
Continue exploring
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