Statnive
Our PickPrivacy-first WordPress analytics with a real-time dashboard, 8-channel grouping, Ask me! Advisor (116 owner-phrased questions, v1.1.0+), and a 2.4 KB gzipped tracker. Self-hosted in your WordPress database.
5 Best Free WordPress Analytics Plugins
Privacy-first analytics that respects your visitors. Five WordPress plugins with genuinely-free tiers — no 14-day trial, no feature-gated essentials, no consent banner required. Ranked by privacy, performance, and how much you actually get without paying.
Disclosure: Statnive is a privacy-first WordPress analytics
plugin we make. We've ranked the alternatives honestly here and listed each
one's weaknesses, including ours. The methodology is below in
"How we ranked these".
At a glance
| Plugin | Tracker size | Free tier includes | Privacy |
|---|---|---|---|
| Statnive | ~2.4 KB gzipped | Configurable data retention (30 days up to 10 years; default 10 years), real-time dashboard, 8-channel grouping incl. AI Assistants, UTM tracking, geo (city level), device analytics, bot detection, full WooCommerce Revenue Report (5 KPIs + 7 breakdowns, v1.0.0+), Ask me! Advisor with 116 questions (v1.1.0+), REST API, custom events | Cookieless, no consent banner needed under GDPR/ePrivacy, daily-rotating salts, no fingerprinting |
| Independent Analytics | ~3 KB | Unlimited retention, pageviews, top pages, referrers, device breakdown, country-level geo | Cookieless, GDPR compliant, all data stored in the WordPress database |
| Koko Analytics | 468 bytes | Unlimited retention, pageviews, referrers, top content, country-level geo | Cookieless by default, privacy-first design, no fingerprinting |
| WP Statistics | ~12-15 KB gzipped | Unlimited retention, comprehensive dashboards, search-engine reporting, hit counter, online users panel, country/city geo | Fully self-hosted, cookieless mode available; counts include bots by default unless filtered |
| Burst Statistics | ~5 KB | Unlimited retention, pageviews, sessions, top pages, top referrers, device/browser breakdown, basic goal tracking | Cookieless by default, GDPR compliant, no third-party requests |
Independent Analytics
Zero-config WordPress analytics. Activate the plugin and data starts flowing — no setup wizard, no external account, no OAuth flow.
Koko Analytics
Ultra-lightweight WordPress analytics with a 468-byte tracker — the smallest of any option here. Built for sites where every byte matters.
WP Statistics
Mature self-hosted analytics with 600K+ active installs and 15+ years of development. The veteran option.
Burst Statistics
Privacy-friendly WordPress analytics with cookieless tracking and a clean modern interface. From the makers of Really Simple SSL.
How we ranked these
Free-tier WordPress analytics is a category full of bait-and-switch. Many "free" plugins are actually 14-day trials, or lock essentials behind a paid tier so the free version is unusable in practice. We applied four filters:
- Permanently free with usable essentials. A plugin had to ship a real free tier — pageviews, referrers, date filtering, and at least some segmentation — that you can run forever without hitting a feature wall. MonsterInsights Lite, where most features require Pro, did not qualify.
- Privacy by default. Cookieless tracking with no third-party requests, configured securely on first install. Plugins that send data to Google or require a consent banner out of the box were excluded.
- Tracker overhead under 16 KB gzipped. Anything heavier starts to compete with site-critical scripts for the network budget on cellular connections.
- Active maintenance. A release in the last 12 months and an open issue tracker that gets responses. Abandoned plugins are a security liability regardless of how good the free tier looks on paper.
Five plugins met all four filters. Within the five, we ranked by free-tier depth (how much real value the free tier delivers without forcing an upgrade) and tracker performance.
Try Statnive free — install in 2 minutes
From WordPress.org. No account needed. Data appears the moment you activate.
Get Statnive FreeFree forever · Self-hosted · Under 5 KB · No cookies
Frequently asked questions
What does "free" actually mean for WordPress analytics plugins?
There are three flavors. (1) Permanently free with all essentials — Statnive, Koko Analytics, Burst Statistics, and Independent Analytics fit here. (2) Free tier with key features paywalled — MonsterInsights Lite is the canonical example, where most useful features require Pro. (3) Free as a loss-leader — short trials that convert to paid. This page only ranks plugins from category 1: real free tiers you can run forever without hitting an artificial wall.
Are free WordPress analytics plugins actually private?
Most of the plugins on this list are cookieless and self-hosted by default — visitor data stays on your WordPress server, never travels to a third party, and never sets a tracking cookie. That removes the GDPR consent banner requirement for the analytics tracking itself. Statnive, Koko Analytics, Independent Analytics, and Burst Statistics all qualify. WP Statistics can be configured cookieless. Anything that uses Google Analytics under the hood (MonsterInsights, Google Site Kit) is not in this category.
Will a free analytics plugin slow down my site?
Tracker size matters. Koko Analytics ships a 468-byte tracker (the smallest), Statnive ships ~2.4 KB gzipped, Burst Statistics ~5 KB, WP Statistics 12-15 KB. The dashboard side runs in wp-admin and never loads on visitor pages. For Core Web Vitals, the tracker is what matters — anything under 5 KB is essentially invisible to LCP and INP measurements.
Which free plugin should I pick if I only want one?
For most WordPress sites: Statnive (real-time dashboard, channel grouping, bot detection in the free tier). For absolute minimum overhead: Koko Analytics (468-byte tracker, essential metrics only). For a proven veteran: WP Statistics (600K+ installs, 15+ years). For zero-config simplicity: Independent Analytics. Each has a different trade-off; the comparison table above maps them side by side.