Open-Source Google Analytics Alternatives: Umami, Plausible, Matomo

Choose by the job you need analytics to do. For simple traffic stats on your own server, start with Umami, which needs only Node.js and PostgreSQL, or Plausible Community Edition, which can import your Google Analytics 4 history. To replace GA4 fully and bring your history with you, use Matomo: its Google Analytics importer is a free plugin for self-hosted installs. For product analytics across a signed-in app, such as funnels, user paths, and lifecycle analysis, PostHog fits, but its self-hosted deployment is officially unsupported and asks for 16 GB of RAM, so PostHog's own docs point most teams to PostHog Cloud. Rybbit and Swetrix sit in the middle, adding funnels and session replay to web analytics their vendors describe as cookieless. Be careful with Shynet, which has had only security fixes since 2024, and vince, which has had no commits since September 2025.

Facts below were checked on October 29, 2026, against each project's repository and, where they exist, its license file, documentation, and pricing page, which are linked where we use them and listed under Sources. About PickOpenSource explains how we write guides.

Traffic stats, a full GA4 replacement, or product analytics

This guide covers nine self-hosted projects from our analytics category. They fall into three groups, and for replacing Google Analytics the group matters more than the brand.

• Simple traffic stats: Umami and Plausible Community Edition run on small stacks, with trackers their vendors say set no cookies. Start here if you mostly need traffic numbers, not GA4's full feature set.
• Full GA4 replacement: Matomo pairs a free importer for your Google Analytics history with paid plugins for funnels and session recording. Start here if you want your Google Analytics history plus built-in ecommerce, goal, and campaign tracking.
• Product analytics: PostHog tracks what people do inside an app, with funnels, user paths, stickiness, and lifecycle analysis.

Between the two, Rybbit and Swetrix bring funnels and session replay to web analytics on a lighter stack than PostHog.

For a wider list of replacements, see the Google Analytics alternatives page. For every project we list, browse the analytics category.

The open-source Google Analytics alternatives compared

Umami has the lightest stack, Plausible CE and Matomo import Google Analytics history, and PostHog needs the most server. The table compares license, stack, cookie default, and fit for all nine projects.

What the free self-hosted version includes

Included means the project's own README, documentation, or features page lists the feature without limiting it to a paid or cloud plan. Paid plugin means you buy it separately for your self-hosted install. Cloud only means the vendor offers it on its hosted service but not in the free self-hosted edition. Not found means we did not find it for the self-hosted version in the project's own sources. Unconfirmed for self-host means the vendor lists the feature but we could not confirm it is in the self-hosted version. Shynet and vince are left out: Shynet's README describes basic metrics only, and vince has had no commits since September 2025.

Server requirements

Where a project documents a minimum, we list it.

• Umami: Node.js 18.18 or later and PostgreSQL 12.14 or later. We found no published RAM minimum.
• Plausible CE: Docker Compose, a CPU with SSE 4.2 or NEON for ClickHouse, and at least 2 GB of RAM, as the README recommends.
• Matomo: up to 100,000 pageviews a month, 2 CPUs, 2 GB of RAM, and 50 GB of SSD; up to 1 million, 4 CPUs, 8 GB of RAM, and 250 GB.
• PostHog (hobby deploy): 4 vCPUs, 16 GB of RAM, and 30 GB or more of storage.
• Rybbit: at least 2 GB of RAM; ARM servers need ARMv8.2-A.
• Swetrix: MySQL, ClickHouse, and Redis, plus S3-compatible storage for session replays. We found no published RAM minimum.
• OpenAnalytics: about 4 GB of RAM and 25 GB of disk, with amd64-only images.

Umami

Umami is a Next.js and TypeScript app that uses Prisma for database access. Its README asks for Node.js 18.18 or later and PostgreSQL 12.14 or later, and covers installing from source with pnpm or with Docker Compose, which bundles PostgreSQL. Version 3, announced in a November 6, 2025 blog post, dropped MySQL, and the docs include a MySQL to PostgreSQL migration guide.

The features page lists custom events, goals, funnels, revenue, automatic UTM capture, a realtime view, and an API. The marketing site also mentions session replay and heatmaps, but we could not confirm that the self-hosted version includes them. Version 3.4.0 added API keys, saved funnels and goals in the API, a UTM metrics endpoint, annotations, and an MCP server. The latest release, v3.4.1, shipped on October 23, 2026 as a security hotfix, and its notes tell all self-hosted users to upgrade.

As listed on October 29, 2026, Umami Cloud has a free Hobby plan (100,000 events a month, 1 site, 6 months of retention) and Pro at $20 a month (1 million events, up to 20 sites, 2 years of retention). If Umami is close but not quite right, see the Umami alternatives page.

Plausible Community Edition

Plausible Community Edition (CE) is the self-hosted release of Plausible. Per its repository, it is written in Elixir with Phoenix, stores data in PostgreSQL and ClickHouse, and has a React front end. It runs with Docker Compose. On its lightweight analytics page, Plausible puts its script at 2.5 KB, against 135 KB gzipped for Google Analytics.

CE is not the same product as Plausible Cloud. Plausible's comparison page says CE lacks marketing funnels, user journeys, ecommerce revenue goals, SSO, the sites API, and the Data Studio connector. CE has basic bot filtering only, while Cloud excludes about 32,000 data-center IP ranges. CE gets two releases a year and community support only. The latest CE release is v3.2.1, a security patch from May 15, 2026.

As listed on October 29, 2026, Plausible Cloud Starter is $9 a month for 10,000 monthly pageviews on 1 site, including GA import, goals, and custom events. Yearly billing gives 2 months free.

Matomo

Matomo On-Premise is a PHP application on MySQL or MariaDB, licensed GPL-3.0 or later, per its repository. Its requirements FAQ lists PHP 8 with MySQL 5.5 or later or MariaDB for Matomo 4.16 and 5. Matomo 6 raises that to PHP 8.1 or later with MySQL 8.0 or later or MariaDB 10.6 or later, so choose a server that meets the newer floor.

Matomo suits teams that want to replace GA4 and keep their history. Its repository README lists ecommerce, goal, and campaign tracking among the built-in features. The Google Analytics Importer is a free plugin for On-Premise. Funnels and Heatmaps & Session Recording are paid On-Premise plugins with 30-day trials; we did not verify their prices. Matomo tracks with cookies by default, which matters for consent (see below). The latest release is 5.14.2, from October 22, 2026, per the changelog. A hosted Matomo Cloud also exists; we did not verify its price.

PostHog

PostHog is a product analytics platform. Its product analytics docs cover trends, funnels, user paths, stickiness, lifecycle analysis, and an API, and PostHog also offers session replay. We did not confirm whether the self-hosted hobby deployment includes replay.

The self-host docs describe a hobby deployment installed with one curl script. It runs web, worker, and plugins containers alongside Caddy, ClickHouse, Kafka with ZooKeeper, Redis, PostgreSQL, and MinIO. It needs 4 vCPUs, 16 GB of RAM, and 30 GB or more of storage. The docs say this deployment is officially unsupported and has no tagged self-host releases. They suggest self-hosting only below roughly 300,000 events per instance, and say Cloud is usually the better choice beyond about 1 million events a month. For most teams, that points to PostHog Cloud; we did not verify its pricing. If you are replacing a product analytics tool rather than GA, see the Mixpanel alternatives page.

Rybbit

Rybbit is AGPL-3.0 web analytics that its README describes as cookieless and privacy friendly. It lists session replays, funnels, goals, user journeys, retention, custom events, error tracking, a realtime view, and public dashboards; Web Vitals are Cloud only. Its Docker Compose file runs ClickHouse, PostgreSQL, Redis, a backend, a client, and an optional Caddy proxy. The self-hosting docs install it with a setup script that takes your domain.

We could not confirm a release date; the latest commit is from October 25, 2026. As listed on October 29, 2026, Rybbit Cloud Standard is $13 a month billed annually, from 100,000 pageviews and up to 5 sites. There is no free plan, and the trial lasts 7 days.

Swetrix

Swetrix Community Edition is AGPL-3.0, and contributors sign a CLA, per its README. It runs a Nest.js API with MySQL for accounts, ClickHouse for analytics, and Redis, deployed with Docker; self-hosted session replays need S3-compatible storage. Swetrix lists funnels, sessions and user flows, error tracking, and performance metrics, while revenue analytics is Cloud only.

We could not verify a server release version; the latest commit is from October 28, 2026. As listed on October 29, 2026, Swetrix Cloud Standard is $19 a month, from 100,000 events and 10 sites, and yearly billing saves 17%. The 14-day trial asks for a payment method.

Cookies and consent banners

Umami, Plausible, Rybbit, Swetrix, and OpenAnalytics say their trackers set no cookies, while Matomo and PostHog set cookies by default and can be configured not to. The privacy and consent statements below are the vendors' own, not ours or a regulator's. Whether you need a consent banner depends on how you configure the tool and on the law where you and your visitors are. This is not legal advice; check with someone qualified in your jurisdiction.

Umami's docs say it works without cookies, cross-site tracking, or automatic collection of personal data, and its features page says no cookie banner is needed and claims GDPR and CCPA support. Plausible's privacy page says it uses no cookies or other persistent identifiers, claims compliance with GDPR, CCPA, and PECR, and says no consent banner is needed. Rybbit calls itself cookieless, and Swetrix says it uses no cookies and needs no consent banner. OpenAnalytics says it sets no cookies, does no fingerprinting, uses a salted hash that rotates daily, and honors Do Not Track and Global Privacy Control.

Matomo uses cookies by default, according to its cookie FAQ, and you can turn them off in the JavaScript tracker or with a global setting. Its FAQ on tracking without consent lists 12 steps. They include disabling cookies, anonymizing 2 or 3 bytes of the visitor's IP address, not using User ID, and offering an opt-out form. The same page says some national exemptions, for example from France's CNIL and in Spain, Italy, and the Netherlands, may allow consent-free use. It still recommends treating JavaScript tracking as needing consent under strict readings of GDPR and ePrivacy until regulators clarify. So Matomo can run without cookies, but Matomo itself stops short of saying you can skip consent.

PostHog's JavaScript library stores data in localStorage plus a cookie by default, per its persistence docs; you can switch persistence to memory or turn it off. Its GDPR guidance advises a cookie banner if you use cookies for logged-out users and recommends PostHog Cloud EU, hosted in Frankfurt.

Importing your Google Analytics history

Plausible and Matomo are the only projects here with a documented Google Analytics importer; we found none for the others.

Plausible imports GA4 data through the Google Analytics Data API, up to 5 GA4 properties per site, according to its import docs. Goals must be recreated in Plausible, and ecommerce revenue is not imported. On Community Edition, the import needs your own Google OAuth credentials, set as GOOGLE_CLIENT_ID and GOOGLE_CLIENT_SECRET, as the CE Google integration guide describes.

Matomo's Google Analytics Importer is free for On-Premise and licensed GPL-3.0 or later; its latest version, 5.2.4, was updated on October 19, 2026. Matomo Cloud uses a Quick Connect flow instead, per Matomo's import guide.

Umami documents no Google Analytics importer for self-hosted installs. Its Cloud import docs list only Umami PostgreSQL exports and CSV files, imported by the Umami team on request from the Pro plan up. We found no Google Analytics importer for PostHog, Rybbit, or Swetrix. OpenAnalytics lists CSV and JSON import and export, but we could not verify a Google Analytics importer.

Analytics licenses: MIT, AGPL, GPL, and PostHog's ee directory

Umami is MIT licensed. Plausible CE (AGPL-3.0 or later), Rybbit, Swetrix, vince, and OpenAnalytics use the GNU AGPL-3.0. If you modify an AGPL project and let people use the modified version over a network, you must offer those users the complete corresponding source of your modified version, not only your changes; running it unmodified does not trigger that condition.

Plausible and OpenAnalytics license their tracker scripts under MIT, and Plausible's repository says this keeps the AGPL from extending to sites that embed its script. Matomo is GPL-3.0 or later, which, unlike the AGPL, does not require offering source to users who only interact with the software over a network. PostHog is MIT outside its ee directory; code in ee falls under the PostHog Enterprise License and needs a subscription for production use. Shynet is Apache-2.0. This is a summary, not legal advice, so read the license before you ship changes.

Projects to check before you adopt

Shynet, vince, and OpenAnalytics carry adoption risk: Shynet gets security fixes only, vince has had no commits since September 2025, and OpenAnalytics is still before version 1.0.

Shynet is a Django app whose README describes a script under 1 KB that works without cookies, with a 1x1 pixel fallback when JavaScript is off. It covers basic metrics only. Its last commits are two security fixes on March 15, 2026, for stored XSS and password-reset poisoning; the commit before that is from December 19, 2024. Expect security fixes, not new features.

vince is a Go port of Plausible that runs as a single binary and accepts Plausible's tracking script, per its README. The repository is not archived, but its last commit, tagged v1.11.8, was on September 1, 2025, about 14 months ago.

OpenAnalytics lists funnels, retention, Web Vitals, Stripe revenue, journeys, an MCP server, and a CLI. The latest release is v0.8.0, from September 19, 2026, so it is still before 1.0. Test upgrades before you depend on it.

How to choose

1. Decide the job: simple traffic stats, a full GA4 replacement, or product analytics.
2. If you must keep your Google Analytics history, run Plausible's GA4 import or Matomo's importer plugin on a test install first.
3. List the features you need on day one, such as funnels, revenue, and session replay, then check the second table for which are free.
4. Size the server from the requirements above; PostHog's 16 GB is the outlier.
5. Check the tracker's cookie defaults and get advice on consent for your jurisdiction.
6. Read the license, especially if you plan to modify an AGPL-3.0 project or use PostHog's ee code.
7. Run the new tool alongside your current analytics, compare the numbers, then remove the old tag.