GoatCounter vs Skald comparison

Compare pricing, deployment, product fit, integrations, and capabilities side by side.

Catalog capabilities may require a paid plan, add-on or hosted edition. “Not listed” means unverified here, not unavailable. Confirm the exact edition, usage limits and privacy settings.

Starting prices use different billing periods and usage units. Compare the same traffic, events, retention and seats.

Which platform fits your needs?

Choose GoatCounter if

Website owners who want simple, privacy-focused analytics

Capabilities listed only for GoatCounter in this selection

Privacy-first Open source Cookieless GDPR compliant CCPA compliant Real-time data Event tracking Audience insights User segments Data ownership Integrations Custom reports

Important considerations: Hosted use is donation-supported with a reasonable-use policy; high-volume or specialized deployments should be self-hosted.

Choose Skald if

Site owners and agencies with access to suitable server or CDN logs who want visibility into people and automated traffic.

Capabilities listed only for Skald in this selection

Web analytics

Important considerations: Source-available, not OSI open source. Optional browser tracking adds in-page signals. AI-answer monitoring uses your provider keys and paid API samples; it does not reproduce what every app user sees. No verified hosted data-region claim.

Shared capabilities

Self-hosted Free plan Data export

Swipe or use arrow keys to view all columns.

Attribute	GoatCounter	Skald
Overview	A lightweight, privacy-aware open-source web analytics service with cookieless visit counting, referrers, campaigns, browser and location reports, exports, and JavaScript-free tracking options.	Skald analyses web-server logs to distinguish visitors, AI assistants and crawlers. It is free to self-host under Elastic License 2.0, with paid hosted plans and a 30-day trial.
Pricing	Hosted service is donation-supported and free for reasonable public use; self-hosting is free and open source	Free self-hosting. Hosted Starter: $9/month or $86/year for 1 site, 1 million requests/month and 3 team members; 30-day free trial. Requests include assets and bots, not just page views. Server costs and optional AI-provider API charges are separate.
Deployment	Self-hosted and hosted options	Self-hosted and hosted options
Best for	Website owners who want simple, privacy-focused analytics	Site owners and agencies with access to suitable server or CDN logs who want visibility into people and automated traffic.
Operator	Martin Tournoij Independent project	Space-O Technologies Independent private company
Company base	Ireland · European Union	Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India · Other region
Organization scale	1 maintainers · operator, as of 13 Aug 2026	at least 140 team members · operator, as of 26 Oct 2026
Recent direction	self-hosted expansion Recent official evidence shows a focus on self-hosted expansion.	platform integration Recent official evidence shows a focus on platform integration.
Key features	Cookieless visit counting Open-source self-hosting Hosted service Referrer and campaign reports Browser and location reports JavaScript-free tracking pixel Data export	Server-log traffic classification Optional in-page tracking Search Console and Bing reports Optional AI-answer monitoring with a daily cost cap
Important considerations	Hosted use is donation-supported with a reasonable-use policy; high-volume or specialized deployments should be self-hosted.	Source-available, not OSI open source. Optional browser tracking adds in-page signals. AI-answer monitoring uses your provider keys and paid API samples; it does not reproduce what every app user sees. No verified hosted data-region claim.
Integrations	Ghost, Hugo	Google Search Console, Bing Webmaster Tools
Fact check	We checked this information against official vendor sources on 2026-08-27.	We checked this information against official vendor sources on 2026-10-26.

Capability matrix

This matrix shows capabilities recorded in our catalog. Not listed means we have not confirmed the capability here. Check the linked vendor sources for plan, deployment, and usage limits.

Swipe or use arrow keys to view all columns.

Attribute	GoatCounter	Skald
Audience insights	Listed	Not listed
CCPA compliant	Listed	Not listed
Cookieless	Listed	Not listed
Custom reports	Listed	Not listed
Data export	Listed	Listed
Data ownership	Listed	Not listed
Event tracking	Listed	Not listed
Free plan	Listed	Listed
GDPR compliant	Listed	Not listed
Integrations	Listed	Not listed
Open source	Listed	Not listed
Privacy-first	Listed	Not listed
Real-time data	Listed	Not listed
Self-hosted	Listed	Listed
User segments	Listed	Not listed
Web analytics	Not listed	Listed

Full details: GoatCounter Full details: Skald