Our take
Pick GoatCounter if personal / small-site owners who will stay on hosted $0 (reasonable use) while they open a first Pages list, then self-host at $0 if they send more than “millions of pageviews/day” — not Plausible’s paid cloud first unless they need that team SKU. Pick Plausible if indie / small-site teams who will start the 30-day Cloud trial (no card) and land on Starter at $9/month (10k pageviews, 1 site,
Best for
GoatCounter Counts you start at a public $0
Plausible Pageviews you start at $9/month (10k, 1 site)
Free plan
GoatCounter $0 · “for reasonable public usage.” Homepage: personal sites and small-to-medium businesses are fine; “sending millions of pageviews/day isn’t.”
Plausible $0 · to run. You host it in the EU or wherever you deploy
Lowest paid
GoatCounter Not published by the vendor
Plausible Growth $14
Next step up
GoatCounter
Plausible Business $19
Runs where
GoatCounter Local or hosted
Plausible Local; you host it
Watch out
GoatCounter Hosted is not unlimited
Plausible $9 is 10k pageviews and 1 site
Last checked
GoatCounter 2026-10-23 · goatcounter.com
Plausible 2026-10-22 · plausible.io
personal / small-site owners who will stay on hosted $0 (reasonable use) while they open a first Pages list, then self-host at $0 if they send more than “millions of pageviews/day” — not Plausible’s paid cloud first unless they need that team SKU.
Read the GoatCounter pageindie / small-site teams who will start the 30-day Cloud trial (no card) and land on Starter at $9/month (10k pageviews, 1 site, 3-year retention) — or self-host when they will run the script themselves.
Read the Plausible page
