Googleless

I’ve finally got rid of Google Analytics from all my websites. It’s no longer here at dsokolovskiy.com, daniellesden.com or psytranceguide.com. Yay!

There were many things I didn’t like about Google Analytics for a long time: it’s a service run by one of the world’s largest companies whose business model relies on intrusive ads; it conflicts with all modern privacy regulations like GDPR (and even declared illegal in certain countries); it’s bloated, with an outdated UI that is overkill for small websites like mine.

Upon my recent research, I was surprised to find how many alternatives are available today, even though it once seemed that Google Analytics had a monopoly on the market. That may have been true several years ago, making it the default option for me, but fortunately, that’s no longer the case.

In case you’re curious, I’ve switched to a service called Plausible. There are other good services around now too, but I liked this one after giving it a 30-day trial. It’s a simple, open-source, lightweight script that doesn’t use cookies and doesn’t collect personal data. I also like the way the dashboard looks, which is an important factor to me too.

This service isn’t free. It costs me £19 a month for my current configuration which is more than I pay for hosting and domain name services combined. However, if you think about it, Google Analytics wasn’t ‘free’ either, I just paid with a different currency – the privacy of my website’s visitors. I’d rather pay with money; at least that feels fair.