All guides
What Self-Hosted Analytics Really Costs (Full TCO)
The real cost of self-hosted analytics: VPS, backups, maintenance time, and the break-even vs Plausible and Fathom Cloud.
Where to Put Analytics Tracking Code in HTML: Head or Body
Short answer: the tag goes in <head>, as high as you can get it — after <meta charset> and the viewport tag, before your stylesheets. The vendors agree,…
GoatCounter on a Cheap VPS: Minimal Self-Hosted Analytics
// AUTHOR Rajeev Sharma — tested this setup on a Hetzner CX23 in Helsinki, April 2026. // TESTED ON GoatCounter v2.7.0 · Ubuntu 24.04 LTS · nginx 1.24…
Self-Hosted Analytics Backup: Plausible, Matomo, Umami
// AUTHOR Rajeev Sharma — recovering data from a botched MariaDB upgrade, so yes, this one is personal. // COVERS Plausible CE 2.x · Matomo CE 5.x ·…
Bounce Rate, Time on Page, Sessions: How Plausible, Matomo, Umami & PostHog Calculate Them Differently
“Bounce rate is 47%.” Compared to what? Calculated how? In which tool? The same visitor doing the same thing on the same page can register as a bounce…
Self-Hosted Server-Side Tracking: SSGTM, Cloudflare Worker, Nginx Proxy Compared
Server-side tracking sounded like a luxury three years ago. Now it’s table stakes: ad blockers eat 30-40% of client-side hits in technical audiences, browser ITP truncates first-party cookies…
Consent Mode v2 Without Google: Self-Hosted Analytics Patterns That Pass CNIL
Google Consent Mode v2 became mandatory for any site sending data to Google Ads or Google Analytics from the EU on March 6, 2024. If you’ve already moved…
Plausible Custom Events, Revenue & Funnels: Self-Hosted CE
Self-hosted Plausible custom events plus Stripe/Paddle revenue tracking. Webhook payloads, ClickHouse SQL funnels, refund handling. The $19/mo Cloud Funnels bypass.
7 Self-Hosted GTM Alternatives That Actually Work
Compare 7 self-hosted tag manager alternatives to Google Tag Manager: Matomo TM, Cloudflare Zaraz, sGTM container, Piwik PRO, Stape, Adobe Launch, Snowplow. With install costs, server-side support, and a 60-second decision wizard.
Matomo Ecommerce Tracking: WooCommerce + Shopify Self-Hosted
Self-host Matomo CE for WooCommerce and Shopify revenue tracking. Four tracking calls, three log tables, refund workarounds, abandoned-cart SQL. Production code with idempotency baked in.