Simple Analytics is a hosted, cookieless traffic product: a small script, a readable dashboard, events, and an API you can point at Looker Studio or a CSV. SiteLine overlaps on cookieless pageviews and then does a second job Simple Analytics does not take: a durable Google Search Console import. Simple Analytics is not “weaker SEO.” It is a traffic tool. SiteLine is traffic plus an archive of what Google still (and then no longer) holds.
Two honest product sentences
Simple Analytics: count visits without an analytics cookie, export or API the aggregates, keep the UI boring on purpose.
SiteLine: count visits without an analytics cookie, and copy Search Console (read-only) so query/page/country/device history lasts longer than Google’s 16-month UI.
If you never open Search Console, this page does not matter — use Simple Analytics, Fathom, or Plausible. If you open it every Monday and lose last year’s queries every month, the archive is the product.
Comparison
| SiteLine | Simple Analytics | |
|---|---|---|
| Job | Cookieless on-site analytics + durable GSC | Cookieless website analytics |
| Cookie | None; collect omits credentials | Cookieless by design |
| Uniques | Truncated IP (/24 v4, /48 v6) + UA + daily salt; resets daily | Cookieless, aggregated visitors |
| Search Console | Import: 16-month backfill, 25k rows/day, keep while subscribed, including fresh data before Google finalizes it | Not a native GSC archive; use Google’s UI or your own pipeline |
| Goals / funnels | UI rules on paths and events | Events and goals in their product |
| Proxy | DIY (docs) | Hosted script; their own bypass options on their plans |
| Self-host / warehouse | No | No (API/CSV out; not your MySQL) |
| MCP | Yes | Stats API, not MCP |
| Price | $4.99 / $19.99 / $99.99 + overage, 7-day trial | Hosted pageview tiers |
Cookieless, in SiteLine’s actual mechanics
SiteLine does not set an analytics cookie. The tracker posts with fetch, keepalive, and credentials: 'omit'. The server hashes a truncated client IP, the user agent, and a daily salt. IPv4 is /24, IPv6 is /48. The salt is not something you download. Tomorrow the hash is different, so “returning visitor over 30 days” is not a SiteLine metric you should expect. Country, device, browser, and OS are derived from the request and UA, not from a third-party cookie.
Simple Analytics occupies the same privacy category. Do not weaponize that. Both are trying to make a consent banner unnecessary for this tracking model. Replay, sales pixels, and ad click ids are outside both products. SiteLine’s write-up: /docs/privacy. Snippet: /docs/script.
Why Search Console is not “a traffic feature”
Pageview scripts see google.com as a referrer. They do not see the query. Google stopped putting the query in the referrer years ago. The only source for queries, impressions, CTR, and position is Search Console (or a copy of it). Simple Analytics’ public integrations list is CMS, frameworks, APIs, and BI — not a durable GSC backfill. You can run Simple Analytics and Search Console side by side. Many sites should.
SiteLine’s copy is specific so nobody has to infer: OAuth scope is read-only. Backfill is 16 months of what Google still has on connect. Each dimension-day import is capped at 25,000 rows. Google publishes about two days late. SiteLine keeps the imported days while you subscribe, including after Google has dropped them from its UI. Nightly jobs re-import a rolling window because Google revises recent days upward. MCP lets an agent query that store without a write grant.
That is not a claim that Simple Analytics “cannot do SEO.” SEO still happens in Search Console, crawlers, and your CMS. SiteLine is for people who want the GSC tables next to on-site stats, with history that does not evaporate.
Goals, proxy, and non-goals
SiteLine goals and funnels live in the UI: exact path, path contains, event name. They do not emit extra events. Custom events you send are billable, same as pageviews. First-party proxy is DIY — nginx, Caddy, Cloudflare, Vercel examples in /docs/proxy. SiteLine does not self-host, does not offer session replay, heatmaps, or user profiles, and is not a warehouse.
Simple Analytics is similarly not PostHog. If you need identified funnels, read SiteLine vs PostHog. If you are choosing among hosted cookieless dashboards, Fathom vs Simple Analytics is the traffic-only page.
Price
SiteLine: $4.99, $19.99, $99.99/month with Scale overage, 7-day trial, unlimited Search Console sites and analytics domains on paid tiers, one shared event pool. Trial signup: /register. Quota language: /docs and the billing docs.
Simple Analytics prices by their own pageview ladders. Compare pageviews to pageviews. Do not compare their traffic price to SiteLine’s GSC retention; you would be mixing meters.
Who should pick which
Pick Simple Analytics if you want a focused cookieless traffic dashboard and you are fine keeping Search Console in Google’s product (or exporting it yourself).
Pick SiteLine if you want that traffic job and a Search Console import you keep while subscribed (16-month backfill, 25k rows/day, including fresh data before Google finalizes it).
FAQ
Does Simple Analytics import Google Search Console?
Not as a first-class durable archive in the sense SiteLine ships: 16-month backfill, 25k rows/day, retained for the subscription. Use Search Console itself, or a warehouse job, alongside Simple Analytics if queries are the job.
Is SiteLine cookieless like Simple Analytics?
SiteLine sets no analytics cookie, omits credentials on collect, and hashes truncated IP + UA + a daily salt that resets each day. Same class of traffic product. Details at /docs/privacy. Neither is a substitute for a cookie policy if you also run ads pixels.
Will SiteLine give me user profiles?
No. No session replay, no heatmaps, no warehouse, no self-host. Goals and funnels are path/event rules. If you need profiles, you want product analytics, not this comparison.