# A cookie-free Google Analytics alternative for startups > Opser Analytics counts website visits without cookies, includes 250,000 pageviews a month in every workspace, and lets your AI agent answer traffic questions. By Simone Zamparini (Founder ยท Senior Software Engineer). Published 2026-10-03, updated 2026-10-05. Source: https://opser.com/blog/google-analytics-alternative-for-startups ## Key takeaways - Most startups need simple answers from their analytics: is anyone visiting, where do they come from, which pages work, and did the launch move anything. - Opser Analytics counts visits without cookies or anything stored in the browser, using a visitor ID that resets every day. - Every Opser workspace includes 250,000 pageviews per billing cycle across all its websites. Beyond that, pageviews cost $5 per million in credits. - Websites built in Opser connect in one click. Any other site, on WordPress, Webflow, Shopify, or your own code, connects with one line in its head. - Your Opser agent can read the reports, so you can ask how last week compared with the week before instead of building the report yourself. The landing page is live and the link is out. Then someone asks the obvious question: is anyone actually looking at it? For a lot of startups, answering that starts a second project. Google Analytics is free, but it's built for marketing teams with time to learn it. Getting a straight answer to "where did yesterday's visitors come from?" means finding the right report, and because it uses cookies, many sites in Europe and the UK put a consent banner in front of it. Most small teams need far less. Who visited, from where, which pages they read, and whether the launch post or the newsletter brought anyone. That's what we built [Opser Analytics](https://opser.com/apps/analytics) for: cookie-free website analytics that lives in your Opser workspace, connects in one click for websites built in Opser, and answers your questions through your AI agent. ## Why do startups look for a Google Analytics alternative? Three reasons come up again and again. * **Too much tool for the job.** Google Analytics 4 is powerful and free, and most of its power goes unused at a ten-person company. The questions a founder asks on Monday morning shouldn't need a course. * **Cookies and consent.** Google Analytics sets cookies. If you serve visitors in Europe or the UK, that usually means a consent banner, and visitors who decline are missing from your reports or only estimated. * **Another place to check.** Analytics ends up as one more login, separate from the CRM, the website builder, and the team chat where decisions about the website get made. A good alternative for a small team counts visits without cookies, answers the common questions on one screen, and sits close to where the rest of the work happens. ## How does cookie-free website analytics count visitors? Opser Analytics doesn't set cookies or store anything in the visitor's browser. When a page loads, the visit is counted under an ID built from a salt that changes every day, the website, the connection, and the browser. Visits from the same browser and connection on the same day count as one visitor, and the next day the same person counts as a new one. That trade-off is deliberate. You get accurate daily traffic numbers without tracking anyone across days. Read "visitors" as a measure of traffic, and use campaigns and events, covered below, when you need to know what visitors did. The script is small, about 1.3 KB, and pageviews are counted automatically, including page changes in single-page apps. ## How do you add analytics to your website? **If you built the website in Opser,** open the published site in Opser and switch on **Count visits**, or install Analytics from your workspace's App Store and add the site. Opser adds the tracking to the site's pages as they're served, so there's no code to paste and nothing to republish. **If your website lives anywhere else,** on WordPress, Webflow, Shopify, or your own code, choose **Add website** and then **Any website** in Analytics. You get one line to paste into the `` of every page, and a ready-made prompt to hand to the coding agent that works on your site. Open a page afterwards, and the visit shows up within a minute. Either way, all your websites report into the same app, with a dashboard for each and an overview of all of them. ## What can you see in Opser Analytics? Start with the questions you'd ask on a Monday morning: | Your question | Where to look | | ---------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------ | | Is anyone visiting? | Visitors, visits, and pageviews over time | | Is traffic growing? | Any period compared with the one before it | | Where do visitors come from? | Sources, referrers, and tagged campaigns | | Which pages work? | Top pages, entry pages, and exit pages | | Do visitors stay? | Views per visit, bounce rate, and visit duration | | Who's on the site now? | Visitors in the last five minutes | | Which countries and devices? | Country, device, browser, and operating system | Pick a period from today to the last 12 months, and click any source, page, or country to filter the whole dashboard by it. The numbers are there to point at the next question. If traffic jumps after a launch, check where it came from. If a page draws visits, check whether those visitors go any further. ## How do you track campaigns and conversions? Tag the links you share with UTM parameters, and Analytics separates the newsletter from the launch post and the ad you tried last week, by source, medium, and campaign. For actions that matter to your business, add a custom event with one line of code, such as `opser.track("demo_request", { plan: "starter" })` when someone books a demo. Events appear in the dashboard by name, and properties like the plan let you break them down. Pageviews are counted for you. Clicks, form submissions, and signups count once you add an event for them, so decide which actions matter and instrument those. ## Can an AI agent answer questions about your website traffic? Yes, and it's the part we use most. Your Opser agent has read-only access to the reports, so you can ask instead of clicking through them: * "Compare this week's visitors with last week's. Which sources grew?" * "Which pages did the newsletter campaign send people to this month?" * "How many demo\_request events did we get in September, by plan?" The agent can answer for any date range you name, not just the dashboard's presets, and it can pull monthly history going back further than the detailed reports. It reports on what you've collected, so the campaign question needs tagged links and the event question needs the event in place. Because Analytics lives in the same workspace as your website and your other apps, the conversation can keep going: from "which page lost visitors this week?" to asking the agent to draft a better headline for it. ## How does Opser Analytics compare with Google Analytics, Plausible, and Fathom? | Tool | Price and cookies | Best for | | ---------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------- | | Google Analytics | Free, uses cookies | Advanced marketing reports and ad integrations | | Plausible | From $9 a month for 10,000 pageviews, cookie-free | A dedicated, open-source analytics tool | | Fathom | From $15 a month for 100,000 pageviews, cookie-free | A dedicated tool at higher volumes | | Opser Analytics | 250,000 pageviews a month included, then $5 per million, cookie-free | Analytics next to your website, apps, and AI agent | Prices are from each vendor's pricing page in October 2026. If Google Analytics already gives you what you need, there's no reason to switch for its own sake. Plausible and Fathom are proven, focused products and a good choice if analytics is the only tool you're adding. Opser Analytics makes the most sense when your website, customers, and team already live in Opser, or when you'd like the analytics to answer questions for you. ## Frequently asked questions ### What is the best Google Analytics alternative for a startup? A cookie-free tool that answers the basic questions quickly. Plausible and Fathom are established options with paid plans. Opser Analytics includes 250,000 pageviews a month in every Opser workspace and adds an AI agent that can answer questions about your traffic. ### Is Opser Analytics free? Every workspace includes 250,000 pageviews per billing cycle, shared by all its websites. Past that, pageviews cost $5 per million, paid from your workspace credits. If the allowance and the credits both run out, counting pauses until you add credits or the next cycle starts. ### Does Opser Analytics use cookies? No. It doesn't set cookies or store anything in the browser. Visits from the same browser and connection on the same day count as one visitor, using an ID that resets daily, so it can't follow a person from one day to the next. ### Do I need a cookie banner for Opser Analytics? Opser Analytics doesn't add a cookie to your site, so it doesn't need a place in your consent banner. Whether your website needs a banner at all depends on everything else running on it. ### Will the tracking script slow my website down? The script is about 1.3 KB, under 1 KB compressed, and loads without blocking the page. ### Can my AI agent read the analytics? Yes, if it has access to the Analytics app. Its analytics tools are read-only. It can pull headline numbers, trends, breakdowns by page, source, or country, live visitors, and monthly history for any date range you name.