Notes on measuring without surveilling.
Head-to-head comparisons and practical guides from the team building sonex. Start with how it reads next to the analytics you already know.
Putting money next to traffic, and reading the pair honestly.
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Analytics tools that show Stripe revenue next to your traffic
Six ways to connect Stripe revenue to your website analytics, from native integrations to self-built webhook pipelines — what each costs, and which one needs a cookie banner.
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Does more traffic mean more revenue?
Often not, and the gap is the most useful thing your analytics can show you. How to read traffic and revenue on one chart, and what each kind of divergence means.
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LTV by acquisition channel, and why your best channel might be your worst
A channel that wins on signups can lose on retention. Splitting lifetime value by where the customer came from is the report that changes budget decisions.
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Revenue attribution without a data team
A practical guide to crediting revenue to channels when you are one person with a Stripe account — which model to use, what it costs, and when a spreadsheet beats a tool.
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Calculating ROAS by channel without trusting the ad platform
Ad platforms mark their own homework and their reported revenue rarely reconciles to your bank account. Here is how to compute ROAS from your own payment data, and what break-even actually is.
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What is revenue-first analytics?
Revenue-first analytics puts money in the first column of your dashboard instead of a spreadsheet you open later. Here is what the term means, what it requires, and what it is not.
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How to connect Stripe revenue to your website analytics
A step-by-step guide to putting Stripe revenue on the same chart as your traffic — which key to create, which two permissions to grant, and what the numbers will and will not tell you afterwards.
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Revenue-first analytics, and why traffic alone lies to you
Traffic tells you a campaign got attention. Revenue tells you whether it was worth running. Here is what changes when money is the first column of your analytics rather than a spreadsheet you open later.
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Revenue per visitor, the metric that ends the traffic argument
One number turns two channels into a ranking you can act on. Here is how to calculate revenue per visitor, when it is honest, and the three ways people get it wrong.
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How to track revenue without tracking people
Ecommerce analytics usually assumes a cookie, a customer id and a consent banner. There is a simpler path — read revenue from your payment provider and never identify a visitor at all.
How sonex reads next to the analytics you already know.
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The best privacy-friendly analytics tools in 2026
Eight cookieless analytics tools compared on price, retention, script weight and what each actually does — with measured script sizes and the honest answer about which to pick for each situation.
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sonex vs Datafast
Both put revenue next to traffic. The real difference is what each gives up to do it — Datafast's default script uses cookies, and sonex reads revenue in aggregate from the payment provider instead.
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sonex vs Mixpanel
Mixpanel is product analytics for teams instrumenting an app, with a 29 kB script and a Stripe integration you have to build yourself. sonex is web analytics that reads revenue natively.
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sonex vs Pirsch Analytics
Two cookieless analytics tools with a real difference in the middle. Pirsch is cheaper to start and hosts in Germany; sonex reads revenue from Stripe or Polar natively, which Pirsch does not.
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sonex vs PostHog
PostHog is a product-analytics platform with a very generous free tier and a 68 kB script. sonex is web analytics that leads with revenue and ships 23 times less JavaScript. They solve different problems.
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sonex vs Simple Analytics
Simple Analytics keeps data in the Netherlands and charges per extra user. sonex reads revenue from Stripe or Polar and does not price by seat. Both are cookieless.
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Looking for a Fathom Analytics alternative? The honest options
Fathom is a solid hosted privacy tool, so the reasons to switch are narrow. Here are the real ones, the alternatives that fit, and how to choose between them.
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Looking for a Matomo alternative? The honest options
Most people leave Matomo to stop running a server, or to stop configuring their way to compliance. Here are the alternatives that actually fix those problems.
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Looking for a Plausible alternative? Here are the honest options
Plausible is a good tool, so the reasons to leave it are specific. Here are the real ones, the alternatives worth considering, and how to pick between them.
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sonex vs Vercel Web Analytics
Vercel Web Analytics is convenient if you already deploy there, with 50k free events on Hobby and one month of retention. sonex is platform-independent, keeps data far longer and reads revenue.
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sonex vs Cloudflare Web Analytics
Cloudflare Web Analytics is free, privacy-clean and deliberately shallow. sonex costs money and answers the questions Cloudflare's product does not attempt — starting with revenue.
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sonex vs Google Analytics (GA4)
A fair, side-by-side comparison of sonex and Google Analytics 4 on privacy, cookies, script weight, data retention and reports — including the 14-month retention cap most GA4 users never notice.
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sonex vs Plausible Analytics
Plausible is open source, EU-hosted and ships the smallest script we measured. sonex reads revenue from Stripe or Polar on every plan, where Plausible gates revenue tracking to its Business tier.
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sonex vs Fathom Analytics
Fathom has unlimited retention and a long track record, and starts at $45/month with no free plan. sonex starts free, costs $20 at 200k events, and reads revenue from Stripe or Polar natively.
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sonex vs Matomo
Matomo is the open-source, self-hostable option with the deepest feature set and an 83 kB script. sonex is a hosted tool that reads revenue natively and ships 8x less JavaScript.
Practical, cited how-tos for measuring traffic without surveillance.
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We measured 13 analytics scripts, and checked which ones ad blockers block
Original data. Every major analytics tracker fetched and measured in raw, gzip and brotli bytes, then checked against EasyPrivacy. Google Analytics is 41x heavier than sonex, and every privacy-first tool in the study is blocked.
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How to migrate from Google Analytics 4 (without losing your history)
A step-by-step GA4 migration guide — export your history before the 14-month retention window closes, run both tools in parallel, and remove the consent banner correctly.
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What is bounce rate, and does it matter?
A clear definition of bounce rate, how it is calculated, why it is so often misread, and when it is actually a useful signal versus a distraction.
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Track custom events without a tag manager
A practical guide to tracking custom events with plain HTML attributes and a tiny JavaScript API, no tag manager, no consent layer, no bloat.
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Cookieless analytics, a complete guide
What cookieless analytics is, how it counts visitors without cookies or fingerprinting, what it can and cannot measure, and how to switch without losing your numbers.
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Getting analytics right in a single-page app
Why single-page apps break traditional pageview tracking, how to count route changes correctly, and how sonex handles SPA navigation automatically.
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GDPR-compliant analytics without consent banners
How to run website analytics that is GDPR compliant without a cookie consent banner, what the law actually requires, and a checklist for choosing a compliant tool.
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Server-side vs client-side analytics
The real differences between server-side and client-side analytics, what each can and cannot measure, and how to get accuracy and privacy without choosing badly.
Cookies, consent and the law, in plain language.
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Attribution without cookies: what you can and cannot know
An honest map of which attribution questions survive without cross-day visitor identity, which do not, and what each answer actually costs your visitors.
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Do Not Track, the signal most analytics ignore
What the Do Not Track browser signal is, why most analytics tools quietly ignore it, and how sonex honours it so visitors who opt out are never counted.
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Is Google Analytics GDPR compliant?
A plain-language answer to whether Google Analytics is GDPR compliant, why it needs consent in the EU, and how a cookieless setup removes the problem entirely.
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Your cookie banner is optional
Consent banners exist because trackers store identifiers and process personal data. Remove both and the banner has nothing left to ask for. Here is the law behind that, and where the line actually sits.
How we think about building quiet, honest analytics.
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How we count visitors without cookies
A plain, honest look at how sonex counts unique visitors with no cookie and no stored identifier, using a rotating daily hash that cannot be reversed or linked across days.
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Inside the 3 kB analytics script
What a lightweight analytics script actually does, why script weight matters for Core Web Vitals, and how sonex fits realtime tracking into roughly 3 kB with no dependencies.
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The only four numbers most sites need
Most analytics dashboards bury the signal in dozens of metrics. For the majority of sites, four numbers answer nearly every real question. Here is what they are and how to read them.
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Measure what matters, not everything
Most analytics setups measure everything and answer nothing. Decide the question first, then track the two or three events that answer it.