7 Best Self-Hosted Plausible Alternatives (2026)

Plausible changed how developers think about web tracking: lightweight, cookie-free and privacy-friendly out of the box. Its cloud plans start at $9/month (Starter), $14 (Growth) and $19 (Business) for 10,000 monthly pageviews and rise with traffic (Plausible pricing, October 2026), and the Community Edition is free to self-host under AGPL-3.0. It only does analytics, though: no error tracking, session replay or uptime monitoring.

TL;DR: Plausible Cloud starts at $9/month for 10,000 pageviews and covers analytics only. A typical third-party observability stack of Plausible ($9) + Sentry Team ($26) + LogRocket (from $176) costs $211/month at entry prices (October 2026). Temps bundles analytics, error tracking, session replay and uptime monitoring in one self-hosted install that's free to run on the server you already pay for. If you only need analytics, Umami, GoatCounter and Ackee are strong free, self-hosted picks.

Which Plausible Alternative Should You Choose?

Temps is the answer if you want one self-hosted install that handles analytics, session replay, error tracking, uptime monitoring and deployments together. It is free to self-host on the server you already run. The Temps vs Plausible comparison covers the analytics side head to head.

For a lightweight, cookie-free dashboard: Umami (MIT, with built-in session replay since v3.1), GoatCounter (EUPL-1.2, a single Go binary) or Ackee (MIT, Node.js and MongoDB).

For Google Analytics-style depth: Matomo (free self-hosted, PHP + MySQL, with heatmaps and session recordings as paid plugins).

For product analytics with funnels, flags and replay: PostHog (best on its cloud; self-hosting is hobby-scale) or Rybbit (AGPL-3.0, cookie-free, with session replay).

If session replay is the main requirement rather than analytics, see our guide to privacy-first analytics and session replay and the ranking of self-hosted session replay tools.

Why Are Developers Looking for Plausible Alternatives?

Privacy rules keep spreading (the IAPP's Global Privacy Law and DPA Directory lists the laws and regulators country by country), and GA4's complexity is pushing teams towards simpler tools. Plausible was an early winner in this shift, but it is no longer the only option.

Plausible's Pricing Grows With Traffic

Plausible Cloud charges by monthly pageviews. At 10,000 pageviews it starts at $9/month, and each traffic tier above that costs more. The model creates an odd incentive: the more successful your site becomes, the more you pay for the same dashboard, and teams with several high-traffic sites feel it most. Self-hosting Plausible Community Edition, Umami, GoatCounter or Ackee removes the pageview meter; you pay for the server instead.

Analytics Alone Is Not Enough Anymore

Plausible tells you someone visited /pricing. It does not tell you they hit a JavaScript error on that page or what they clicked before giving up. For that you add Sentry for errors, a replay tool such as FullStory or LogRocket, and an uptime monitor.

Those add up. At entry prices, Plausible ($9) + Sentry Team ($26) + LogRocket (from $176) is $211/month (October 2026), before any uptime tool and before you outgrow the entry tiers.

GA4 Complexity Is Driving Migration

Google Analytics 4 replaced Universal Analytics in July 2023, and many teams found its event-based model and interface harder to use. Because GA4 loads from Google's domains, ad blockers and privacy browsers also block it on many visits. Self-hosted analytics served from your own domain is less likely to be blocked, although filter rules that target known script names or paths can still catch it; the guide to web analytics without third-party scripts explains how first-party serving works.

Self-Hosted Plausible Alternatives: Feature Comparison

Project facts checked on each project's site or GitHub repository, October 2026.

1. Temps — Best All-in-One Self-Hosted Platform

Temps is one self-hosted platform that replaces seven SaaS tools, including PostHog for analytics and session replay, Sentry for error tracking and Pingdom for uptime monitoring, so you can drop Plausible and several other subscriptions at once. Self-hosting is free under MIT / Apache 2.0; the only real cost is the server you already run it on.

What You Get

Temps is not just an analytics tool. It is a self-hosted PaaS that bundles:

• Web analytics: pageviews, referrers, UTM tracking, top pages, device breakdowns, custom events, funnels and Core Web Vitals, set up as described in the analytics docs
• Session replay: rrweb-based recordings, off by default, with input masking on by default (session replay docs)
• Error tracking: a Sentry-compatible DSN, so existing Sentry SDKs work unchanged for error reporting (traces, Replay and profiles are accepted but not stored)
• Uptime monitoring: HTTP checks with alerting and incident history in the dashboard
• Deployment platform: git-push deploys and preview environments
• Managed databases: PostgreSQL, Redis and more, created as services and linked to projects

Because the Temps proxy serves your app, the analytics endpoint lives on your own domain rather than a third-party analytics host, so far fewer blockers stop it. It is not cookie-free: the proxy sets two first-party HttpOnly cookies, _temps_visitor_id (365 days) and _temps_sid (30 minutes), which the data ownership and privacy docs say generally need consent in the EU.

Architecture

Temps routes traffic through a reverse proxy built on Pingora, the proxy framework Cloudflare open-sourced, and joins worker nodes over a private network you provide for multi-node deployments. One install script sets up the platform, Docker and its TimescaleDB storage, with automatic TLS for your domains. See the Temps analytics page for an overview.

Pricing

• Self-hosted: Free. Run it on any VPS.
• Temps Cloud: A hosted control plane for your own servers. $29/month in an invite-only beta.

Quick Start (React/Next.js)

import { TempsAnalyticsProvider } from '@temps-sdk/react-analytics';

export default function RootLayout({ children }: { children: React.ReactNode }) {
  return (
    <html>
      <body>
        <TempsAnalyticsProvider
          basePath="/api/_temps"
          autoTrackPageviews={true}
          enableSessionRecording={true}
          sessionRecordingConfig={{
            maskAllInputs: true,
            sessionSampleRate: 1.0,
          }}
        >
          {children}
        </TempsAnalyticsProvider>
      </body>
    </html>
  );
}

Track custom events anywhere in your app:

import { useTrackEvent } from '@temps-sdk/react-analytics';

function SignupButton() {
  const trackEvent = useTrackEvent();

  return (
    <button
      onClick={() => trackEvent('signup_clicked', { plan: 'free' })}
    >
      Get started
    </button>
  );
}

Control session recording per user (for consent flows):

import { useSessionRecording } from '@temps-sdk/react-analytics';

function ConsentBanner() {
  const { enableRecording, disableRecording } = useSessionRecording();

  return (
    <div>
      <button onClick={enableRecording}>Accept recording</button>
      <button onClick={disableRecording}>Decline</button>
    </div>
  );
}

Where Temps Is Still Growing

Temps is newer than Umami or Plausible, which is precisely why it ships the bundled analytics, session replay, error tracking and uptime stack those older, analytics-first tools were never built around. The trade-offs: it is not cookie-free, it has no heatmaps, it has no dedicated WordPress plugin, and it does not claim SOC 2 or HIPAA compliance. If you need any of those specifically, another tool on this list may fit better.

Who Should Pick Temps

Developers and small teams who want to stop managing several separate SaaS subscriptions. If you already self-host your deployments (or want to start), Temps puts analytics, replay, errors, uptime and deploys on one server. It is the only self-hosted PaaS in this comparison that bundles deployment with analytics, session replay, error tracking and uptime; Coolify, Dokploy, CapRover, Dokku and Kamal focus on deployment.

2. Umami — Best Free Plausible-Style Dashboard

Umami is the most popular open-source Plausible alternative, with about 39,000 GitHub stars (October 2026). It is free to self-host, MIT licensed and polished.

What You Get

Umami gives you a clean, Plausible-like dashboard with pageviews, referrers, browsers, operating systems, countries and custom events. It is cookie-free by default. Of all the alternatives, its interface is closest to Plausible's design philosophy. Since v3.1 (April 2026) the open-source build also records rrweb session replays, and v3.2 (June 2026) added click and scroll heatmaps.

It needs Node.js and a PostgreSQL database, and the project ships a Docker Compose file that runs both.

Where It Falls Short

Umami has no error tracking or uptime monitoring, and its session replay is new (v3.1, April 2026). You are responsible for hosting, backups, updates and security patches. Umami Cloud is the managed option; replays and heatmaps there need the Business plan, so the cost advantage is in self-hosting.

Pricing

• Self-hosted: Free (you pay for the server)
• Umami Cloud: Hobby is free (100,000 events a month), Pro is $20/month (1 million events) and Business is $200/month (10 million events, 5,000 session replays, heatmaps) (Umami pricing, October 2026)

Who Should Pick Umami

Developers comfortable with self-hosting who want a drop-in Plausible replacement without paying for it.

3. Matomo — Best for Google Analytics-Style Depth

Matomo is the veteran. Originally launched as Piwik in 2007, it offers the broadest Google Analytics-style feature set on this list: goals, funnels, e-commerce analytics, custom reports, roll-up reporting, a tag manager, and heatmaps, session recordings and A/B testing as paid plugins.

What You Get

The self-hosted On-Premise edition is free under GPL-3.0. There is a Matomo for WordPress plugin, and a Google Analytics importer lets you bring historical data across, which helps if you are leaving GA.

Where It Falls Short

Complexity. Matomo's feature depth shows in its interface. The self-hosted version requires PHP and MySQL/MariaDB, a stack many modern teams have moved away from, and high-traffic sites need careful database tuning. Premium plugins such as Heatmap & Session Recording are sold as paid yearly subscriptions on the Matomo Marketplace.

Matomo is not cookie-free by default. You can configure it to run without cookies, but it takes explicit setup; out of the box it sets first-party cookies.

Pricing

• Self-hosted (On-Premise): Free (PHP + MySQL)
• Matomo Cloud: See Matomo pricing for current tiers
• Premium plugins: Paid yearly subscriptions; see the Marketplace

Who Should Pick Matomo

Analytics teams leaving Google Analytics who want comparable depth (funnels, e-commerce, custom dimensions) and are comfortable running a PHP application.

4. PostHog — Best for Product Analytics (on Its Cloud)

PostHog is the most ambitious open-source product analytics platform here. It started as product analytics and expanded into session replay, error tracking, feature flags, A/B testing and surveys. See Temps vs PostHog for a head-to-head, and our PostHog alternatives roundup if you are moving off it.

What You Get

PostHog's analytics are product-focused rather than marketing-focused: funnels, user paths, retention analysis, cohorts, and custom events with properties. Its free cloud allowance includes 1 million analytics events, 5,000 session recordings and 100,000 error-tracking exceptions a month (October 2026), with usage-based pricing above that.

Where It Falls Short

Self-hosting is limited. As of October 2026, PostHog's self-host docs offer only a Docker Compose "hobby" deployment, say new Kubernetes deployments are no longer supported, recommend at least 4 vCPU and 16 GB of RAM, and suggest the cloud product above roughly 300k events or 1k recordings a month. As a self-hosted Plausible replacement, that is a low ceiling.

PostHog is not cookie-free by default; its JavaScript SDK sets a cookie for user identification unless you configure cookieless mode. Its learning curve is closer to Mixpanel or Amplitude than to Plausible.

Pricing

• Cloud free tier: 1M events, 5K recordings, 100K exceptions a month
• Paid: Usage-based above the free tier
• Self-hosted: Free, hobby-scale only

Who Should Pick PostHog

Engineering-led product teams that want funnels, feature flags and session replay in one platform and are happy to use PostHog Cloud.

5. Rybbit — Best Open-Source Analytics With Replay

Rybbit is a newer open-source analytics tool, AGPL-3.0 licensed with about 13,000 GitHub stars (October 2026). Its README lists cookie-free tracking, session replays, error tracking, funnels, retention and user journeys alongside the usual web analytics metrics.

What You Get

A modern dashboard that sits between Plausible's simplicity and PostHog's depth, with real-time stats, advanced filtering, custom events with JSON properties and location tracking down to city level. It has a hosted service and a self-hosted option.

Where It Falls Short

Self-hosting runs on Docker Compose with ClickHouse; the self-hosting guide asks for a VPS with at least 2 GB of RAM. It has no uptime monitoring or deployment features, and as a young project it has a shorter track record than Matomo or Umami. AGPL-3.0 obligations apply if you modify and offer it as a service.

Who Should Pick Rybbit

Teams that want cookie-free analytics with replay and funnels in one open-source tool and are comfortable running ClickHouse.

6. GoatCounter — Best Lightweight Single-Binary Option

GoatCounter is open-source web analytics by Martin Tournoij, licensed under a lightly modified EUPL-1.2, with about 6,000 GitHub stars (October 2026). It is available as a hosted service at goatcounter.com or self-hosted.

What You Get

Simple, privacy-aware stats: pages, referrers, campaigns, browsers, locations and screen sizes. It identifies unique visits without cookies using a non-identifiable hash. The tracking script adds about 3.5 KB, and you can also count visits with a no-JavaScript pixel, from your backend through its API, or by importing server log files (nginx, Apache, Caddy, CloudFront).

Self-hosting is a statically compiled binary from the releases page that stores data in SQLite or PostgreSQL, which makes it one of the lightest installs here.

Where It Falls Short

GoatCounter deliberately keeps scope small: no session replay, funnels, error tracking or uptime monitoring, and event tracking is basic.

Who Should Pick GoatCounter

Developers and small sites that want honest, minimal pageview stats with the smallest possible operational footprint.

7. Ackee — Best Minimal Node.js Dashboard

Ackee is a self-hosted, Node.js-based analytics tool, MIT licensed, with about 4,700 GitHub stars (October 2026).

What You Get

A minimal, focused interface for pageviews, referrers, durations and devices. Ackee sets no cookies and anonymises tracked data so visitors are not individually identifiable. It tracks custom events (button clicks, newsletter sign-ups) and exposes everything through a documented GraphQL API, so you can build your own views.

It runs on Node.js with MongoDB and installs with Docker Compose, Docker or Helm, or on platforms such as Render and Railway.

Where It Falls Short

Analytics only, with a narrower feature set than Umami or Matomo, and MongoDB is one more database to operate if the rest of your stack is PostgreSQL.

Who Should Pick Ackee

Developers who want a small, cookie-free dashboard and like the idea of querying their analytics over GraphQL.

What About Highlight.io and OpenReplay?

Earlier versions of this list included two session replay tools. Highlight.io combined replay with error monitoring, but LaunchDarkly acquired it in April 2025 and its hosted service shut down on February 28, 2026; the open-source repository remains public but is unsupported as a standalone product. OpenReplay is a strong self-hosted replay tool, but it is not a web analytics replacement. If replay is what you need, see our guide to privacy-first analytics and session replay.

What Should You Consider When Choosing a Plausible Alternative?

The right tool depends on your priorities. Not every team needs every feature.

Do You Need Just Analytics, or a Full Observability Stack?

If all you need is pageview and referrer data, Umami, GoatCounter and Ackee are the cheapest standalone options. If your app also needs error tracking and session replay, a tool that bundles them saves money and moving parts. Temps is the only option here that bundles analytics, replay, error tracking and uptime monitoring with deployments; the guide to replacing Sentry and Plausible covers that switch.

Are You Comfortable Self-Hosting?

Self-hosting saves money but costs time. Every tool here needs you to manage the server, backups and updates. GoatCounter is the lightest install; Matomo and Rybbit are the heaviest. Temps handles much of the platform side with one install script, automatic TLS and managed database services. Plausible Cloud and Umami Cloud are the zero-maintenance options, at a price.

How Important Is Google Analytics Feature Parity?

If you need funnels, A/B testing, custom dimensions and e-commerce tracking, your real options are Matomo (self-hosted, free core) or PostHog (generous cloud free tier). Rybbit and Temps cover funnels; the simpler tools deliberately leave those features out.

Do Cookies and Consent Matter?

Umami, Rybbit, GoatCounter and Ackee are cookie-free by default, which is why many sites run them without a consent banner. Temps, PostHog and Matomo set first-party cookies by default, so EU sites generally need consent for them (Matomo and PostHog can be configured to run without cookies; Temps cannot).

Does Data Residency Matter?

For EU-based companies, where analytics data lives matters legally. Self-hosted tools give you full control: the data stays on the server you choose, in the jurisdiction you choose, with no third-party processor.

Frequently Asked Questions

What are the best self-hosted alternatives to Plausible for web analytics in 2026?

The best self-hosted Plausible alternatives in 2026 are:

• Temps: analytics plus session replay, error tracking, uptime monitoring and deployments in one install; free to self-host (MIT / Apache 2.0); sets two first-party cookies.
• Umami: the best free, cookie-free analytics replacement, now with session replay and heatmaps (MIT, Node.js + PostgreSQL).
• Matomo: the closest to Google Analytics, with a GA importer (GPL-3.0, PHP + MySQL; replay and heatmaps are paid plugins).
• PostHog: product analytics with funnels, flags and replay; best on its cloud, as self-hosting is hobby-scale only.
• Rybbit: cookie-free analytics with session replay and funnels (AGPL-3.0, Docker Compose with ClickHouse).
• GoatCounter: minimal, cookie-free stats from a single Go binary (EUPL-1.2).
• Ackee: a minimal cookie-free dashboard with a GraphQL API (MIT, Node.js + MongoDB).

Temps is the only one that covers the whole observability bundle on a single self-hosted server.

Is Plausible worth the price in 2026?

Plausible is a solid product that justifies its cost for teams that only need analytics and prefer managed hosting; Starter is $9/month for 10,000 pageviews (October 2026). The cost grows with traffic, and you still need separate tools for errors, replay and uptime. Umami, GoatCounter or Plausible's own Community Edition give you core analytics free on your own server, while Temps adds error tracking, session replay and uptime monitoring on the same server.

Can I migrate from Plausible to a self-hosted tool?

Yes. Plausible lets you export your stats as CSV, so you keep your history even if the new tool can't import it. For Temps, you start fresh with analytics, but you gain error tracking and session replay that Plausible doesn't offer; on React, setup is the single provider shown above, as described in the analytics docs.

Which Plausible alternative is best for WordPress?

Matomo has the strongest WordPress integration, with its Matomo for WordPress plugin. Plausible has an official WordPress plugin, and Umami can be added with a script tag or a community plugin. Temps works with any site, including WordPress, through its JavaScript snippet, but has no dedicated WordPress plugin.

Do privacy-first analytics tools comply with GDPR without a cookie banner?

Tools that store nothing on the visitor's device, such as Umami, GoatCounter, Ackee, Rybbit and Plausible, are commonly run without a consent banner, because the ePrivacy rules target storing or reading information on the device. Check this with your own legal adviser. Temps is different: it sets two first-party cookies (_temps_visitor_id and _temps_sid) that are never shared with a third party, but they still generally need consent in the EU. Matomo and PostHog set cookies by default and need configuration to run cookie-free.

How accurate are privacy-first analytics compared to Google Analytics?

Often more complete, because GA4 loads from Google's domains and many ad blockers and privacy browsers block it. Analytics served from your own domain is blocked less often, though filter rules that target known script names or paths can still catch it. Cookie-free tools trade away precise cross-session user journeys, but for aggregate metrics (top pages, referrers, traffic trends) they hold up well.

How much cheaper is Temps than running Plausible plus separate error tracking and replay tools?

At entry prices, Plausible ($9/month) + Sentry Team ($26/month) + LogRocket (from $176/month) is $211/month (October 2026), before uptime monitoring. Temps covers analytics, error tracking, session replay and uptime monitoring and is free to self-host, so the cost is the server you run it on. The gap widens as traffic grows, because Plausible and LogRocket price by volume.

What makes Temps different from PostHog or Rybbit?

PostHog and Rybbit both combine analytics with session replay and error tracking. PostHog is best on its own cloud because self-hosting is hobby-scale, and Rybbit is a self-hostable analytics product. Temps adds uptime monitoring, git-push deployments and managed databases to analytics, replay and errors, all in one self-hosted install. Temps is not cookie-free; Rybbit is.

The Bottom Line

The decision depends on scope:

• Free, cookie-free analytics: Umami (which also records replays and heatmaps), GoatCounter or Ackee
• Google Analytics-style depth: Matomo
• Product analytics + replay + feature flags, cloud-friendly: PostHog
• Open-source analytics with replay, self-hosted: Rybbit
• Analytics, replay, errors, uptime and deployments in one install: Temps

Temps is the only option here that replaces the whole observability stack, not just Plausible, on a server you host yourself, free and with no per-seat fees or bandwidth bills.

Install Temps on any VPS with curl -fsSL https://temps.sh/deploy.sh | bash, then add the provider from the analytics docs.