Sealmetrics vs Plausible
Sealmetrics and Plausible are both cookieless, EU-hosted analytics tools that state no consent banner is needed. The main difference is how they tell two pageviews apart: Plausible computes a daily unique-visitor hash from the IP address and user agent, while Sealmetrics never derives any identifier from the IP and does not report unique visitors at all.
Side-by-side
Plausible facts checked 2026-09-04 on plausible.io; each row links to the page it was read on.
| Criterion | Sealmetrics | Plausible |
|---|---|---|
| Company / HQ | Sealmetrics, EU company | Incorporated in Estonia, EU (source) |
| Hosting model | Managed cloud only | Managed cloud or self-hosted Community Edition (source) |
| Licence | Proprietary | AGPLv3 (source) |
| Identifier between pageviews | Hash of standard device characteristics computed in the browser, not derived from IP, never written to the device; re-keyed server-side with a daily salt destroyed on rotation; live session ~2 h (details) | hash(daily_salt + website_domain + ip_address + user_agent), salt rotated every 24 h (source) |
| Visitor IP address | Never stored; country from browser timezone (details) | Input to the hash and to geolocation; raw IP not stored (source) |
| Data residency | Dublin, Ireland only (details) | Hetzner servers in Falkenstein, Germany (source) |
| Vendor's position on consent | No banner needed for its own measurement (self-assessed; Germany: open question) | "No need for cookie banners or GDPR consent" (source) |
| Cookies / local storage | None | "We do not use cookies, browser cache or local storage" (source) |
| Script size (gzipped) | 1.1 KB (measured) | 2.5 KB, stated by the vendor (source) |
| Free tier | Free tier of 1M events total (lifetime, not monthly), no credit card; 14-day free trial of paid plans (billing) | 30-day free trial, no credit card; no free plan — see pricing |
How each one measures visitors
Plausible's data policy spells out its identifier: a hash of a daily salt, the site domain, the visitor's IP address and user agent. The salt is discarded every 24 hours, so the same person becomes a new visitor the next day and cannot be followed across sites. Raw IPs and user agents are never written to disk. This gives Plausible a daily unique-visitor count and visit duration while staying cookieless, at the price of feeding the IP into the identifier.
Sealmetrics also computes a hash, but not from the IP: the tracker hashes standard device characteristics in the browser, never writes it to the device, and the server re-keys it with a daily salt that is destroyed on rotation, so it cannot link a device across days. Each hit is stored with URL, referrer, timestamp, browser timezone and that daily session identifier; the user agent is read in flight for bot and device detection and only the derived browser, OS and device category is kept. The IP is seen at the network layer, checked in flight against a public list of automated-traffic IPs to filter bots, and never stored or used for geolocation — country comes from the browser timezone. The consequence is that Sealmetrics reports entrances rather than unique visitors, and has no visit-duration metric.
When Plausible is the better choice
- You want daily unique visitors and visit duration without cookies, and are comfortable that the identifier is a rotated hash of the IP.
- You want to self-host under an open-source licence or audit the source before trusting the privacy claims.
- You run a small site and want a deliberately minimal dashboard at a low entry price.
When Sealmetrics is the better choice
- Your legal review treats a hashed IP as derived from personal data and you would rather have no IP-derived identifier to explain at all.
- You need item-level e-commerce data, custom channel grouping, an API on every plan and an AI layer (LENS, included in every paid plan and free to run on your own LLM key).
- You want retention fixed at 24 months across the board, with no per-plan variation to document.
Frequently asked questions
Does Plausible store my visitors' IP addresses?
No. Plausible's data policy says raw IPs and user agents are never stored; the IP is used as an input to the daily hash and to derive location, then dropped. Sealmetrics does not use the IP for either purpose.
Which tool needs a cookie banner?
Neither, according to each vendor's own documentation. Both set no cookies and use no local storage. Both statements are vendor positions; no supervisory authority certifies analytics tools, and Sealmetrics' compliance pages are self-assessments.
Which script is lighter?
Plausible publishes 2.5 KB gzipped for its script; the Sealmetrics tracker measured 1.1 KB gzipped in August 2026. Both are small enough that the difference rarely matters — the contrast with GA4 at roughly 145 KB is the one that does.
Can I run both together?
Yes. Neither tool interferes with the other, and a parallel run is the simplest way to compare Plausible's daily uniques against Sealmetrics' entrances on your own traffic.
- Both are cookieless and EU-hosted with no banner required per their own docs.
- Plausible's daily identifier includes the IP address; Sealmetrics derives nothing from it.
- Plausible reports unique visitors and is open source; Sealmetrics reports entrances and adds e-commerce depth and AI.