If the only reason your site has a cookie banner is Google Analytics, switching to a cookieless analytics tool is tempting. No cookies, no banner, no lost data from visitors who click reject. Tools like Plausible, Fathom, Umami and Simple Analytics have grown on exactly that promise.
The promise is mostly true. This post covers where it holds, where it does not, and how the main options compare.
What does "cookieless" actually mean?
A cookieless analytics tool counts page views without storing an identifier on the visitor's device. No cookie, no localStorage entry, nothing that follows the visitor from one day to the next. To count unique visitors, several of them combine the IP address and browser details into a hash that is thrown away every day, so the IP is processed briefly but never stored or shared.
Google Analytics 4 works the other way round. It sets cookies such as _ga to recognise returning visitors, and that is what triggers the consent requirement. We covered GA4 in detail in Is Google Analytics 4 GDPR compliant?
Does cookieless analytics need consent?
Usually not, but it is not automatic. The consent rule in the ePrivacy Directive is about storing or accessing information on the visitor's device. A tool that stores nothing has much less to answer for, which is why most privacy-first tools are designed to stay outside it.
The European Data Protection Board reads that rule broadly, though. Its guidelines on the technical scope of the cookie rule, updated in October 2024, say that techniques other than cookies, such as tracking pixels and identifiers generated on the device, can fall under it too. "No cookies" is therefore not the same as "no consent needed" in every case.
Some regulators are explicit about when analytics can run without consent. France's CNIL exempts audience measurement when it is used only for statistics on a single site, is not combined with other data, truncates the IP address and keeps data for a limited time. The privacy-first tools are built to fit inside conditions like these.
Two things apply whatever tool you pick. The IP address is still personal data under GDPR, so the processing belongs in your privacy policy. And visitors should be able to see that the tool is running.
How the main tools compare
| Tool | Cookies | Open source | Based in | In Consentify |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plausible | None | Yes | EU (Estonia) | Loads without waiting for consent |
| Fathom | None | No | Canada | Loads without waiting for consent |
| Simple Analytics | None | No | Netherlands | Loads without waiting for consent |
| Umami | None | Yes | Self-hosted or Umami Cloud | Loads without waiting for consent |
| Pirsch | None | No | Germany | Loads without waiting for consent |
| Cloudflare Web Analytics | None | No | USA | Loads without waiting for consent |
| Matomo | Yes, by default | Yes | Self-hosted or Matomo Cloud | Waits for consent |
| Google Analytics 4 | Yes | No | USA | Waits for consent |
Prices change often, so check each tool's own pricing page. GoatCounter is another open source option, free for personal use.
Plausible, Fathom and Simple Analytics
These three are the best known paid options. All of them show a single dashboard with visitors, pages, referrers, countries and devices, and none of them set cookies. Plausible is open source and can also be self-hosted. If you want the most familiar choice with an EU company behind it, Plausible is usually where people start.
Umami and self-hosting
Umami is open source and popular with developers who want to run analytics on their own server. Self-hosting means the data never leaves your infrastructure, at the cost of running and updating one more service. Umami also offers a hosted version if you do not want that job.
Matomo
Matomo is the closest thing to a full Google Analytics replacement: goals, funnels, e-commerce reports and much more. It sets cookies by default, so out of the box it needs consent like GA4. It can be configured to run without cookies, and Matomo publishes a guide for meeting the CNIL exemption, but that is a setup you choose and maintain yourself.
And Google Analytics 4 with Consent Mode?
With Consent Mode v2 in advanced mode, GA4 loads before consent but sends cookieless pings while consent is denied, and Google models the missing data. That is not the same as a cookieless tool. The tag still loads from Google, the data still goes to Google, and the full tracking switches on as soon as a visitor accepts. If you rely on Google Ads, GA4 with Consent Mode is often the right call anyway. If you only want to know how many people read your pages, it is a lot of machinery for that.
When do you still need a cookie banner?
Switching analytics only removes the banner if analytics was the only thing that needed it. Most sites also run something else that sets cookies before consent:
- An advertising pixel, such as the Meta Pixel, LinkedIn Insight Tag or TikTok Pixel.
- Embedded YouTube videos, Vimeo, Google Maps or a booking widget.
- A chat widget, a heatmap or session recording tool.
- Marketing tools that track form submissions or email clicks.
The quickest way to find out is to run the free GDPR scan. It shows everything that starts before consent, and the cookieless tools show up as a caution rather than a violation.
How Consentify handles cookieless analytics
Consentify supports Plausible, Fathom, Simple Analytics, Umami, GoatCounter, Pirsch and Cloudflare Web Analytics, and they are free on every plan. Because they store nothing on the device, Consentify loads them on page load instead of waiting for consent. They are still listed under analytics in the banner, ticked and locked, with a line explaining why, so visitors can see what runs. Matomo and GA4 wait for consent like any other cookie-setting tool.
That gives you an honest middle ground: cookieless analytics counts every visit, and the tools that need consent still get it.