The 30-second answer
If you have a blog or a simple marketing site and only need visitor counts and traffic sources, Plausible is excellent at $9/mo. If you run a SaaS, bill through Stripe, and need to know which traffic source actually makes money, Dashly is the better pick at $10/mo. Both are cookieless, both need no consent banner, both are GDPR compliant. The difference is SaaS features: Dashly adds revenue attribution, bot filtering, funnels, session replays, and AI search detection — none of which Plausible has. For $1/mo more, you get the features Plausible deliberately leaves out.
Why people compare Plausible and Dashly
Both tools occupy the same category: cookieless, privacy-first web analytics. Both use a daily-changing hash instead of cookies. Both show a clean one-page dashboard. Both cost around $10/mo. Both are GDPR compliant without a consent banner. The overlap is real — if you just want "GA4 but simpler and privacy-friendly," either works. The comparison matters because they diverge on the question every SaaS founder eventually asks: which of my traffic sources is making money? Plausible cannot answer that. Dashly can.
What Plausible does well
Plausible is the most popular open-source cookieless analytics tool, and for good reason. The dashboard is genuinely beautiful — one page, every metric visible without clicking. The script is ~1KB, the smallest in the category. It is open-source (MIT license), so you can self-host for free. It has a Search Console integration that Dashly does not match. The team is well-known and trusted in the privacy community. For a blog, a docs site, or a hobby project, Plausible is hard to beat. We use it on our own marketing pages for a side project and it does exactly what it claims.
See which channels actually make money. Connect Stripe, filter bots, and track AI search traffic — all cookieless.
Try Dashly free →What Plausible does not do
Plausible is deliberately minimal. No revenue attribution — there is no Stripe, LemonSqueezy, or Polar integration. You see traffic sources but not which sources drive paying customers. No bot filtering — bots, AI crawlers, and scrapers inflate your visitor count by 20-40% and Plausible counts them all. No funnels on the lower tiers, and even on Business they are basic. No session replays. No AI search traffic detection — ChatGPT and Perplexity visits land as Direct. If any of these matter to you, Plausible alone is not enough, and you will end up bolting on a second tool.
What Dashly adds that Plausible does not
Dashly is built for the gap Plausible leaves open. Revenue attribution via a read-only Stripe key — every payment is matched to the traffic source that drove it, server-side, no cookies required. Bot filtering at collection time using three layers (user-agent, behavior, IP) so bots never enter your data. Funnels to see where visitors drop off between landing and signup. Session replays that are privacy-safe (no page text, form values, or media captured). AI search detection that separates ChatGPT and Perplexity traffic from Direct. All at $10/mo — $1 more than Plausible.
Feature comparison: Plausible vs Dashly
| Feature | Plausible ($9/mo) | Dashly ($10/mo) |
|---|---|---|
| Cookieless / no consent banner | Yes | Yes |
| Script size | ~1KB | ~2KB |
| Open source / self-host | Yes (MIT) | No |
| Bot filtering | No | Yes (3 layers) |
| Revenue attribution (Stripe) | No | Yes (automatic) |
| Funnels | Business only | Yes |
| Session replays | No | Yes (privacy-safe) |
| AI search traffic detection | No | Yes |
| Search Console integration | Yes | Roadmap |
| Custom events | Business only | Yes |
| Dashboard complexity | 1 page | 1 page |
| Setup time | 2 min | 2 min |
Pricing: where the $1 difference shows up
Plausible starts at $9/mo for 10K pageviews. Dashly starts at $10/mo for 5M events. The pricing models differ: Plausible charges by pageviews, Dashly by events (pageviews + custom events + heartbeats). For a typical SaaS site getting 10-50K pageviews/month, both cost the same. For a high-traffic site, Dashly's 5M event allowance is more generous than Plausible's pageview tiers. The real cost question is not the $1/mo difference — it is whether you will need a second tool (a separate attribution tool, a separate replay tool) on top of Plausible. If you will, Dashly is cheaper in total.
Who should pick Plausible
Pick Plausible if you run a blog, a docs site, a hobby project, or a simple marketing site where you only need visitor counts and traffic sources. Pick it if open-source and self-hosting matter to you — Plausible is the only one in this comparison you can run on your own server for free. Pick it if you already have a separate revenue attribution workflow (a spreadsheet, a Stripe dashboard, a separate tool) and do not need it in your analytics. Plausible is a genuinely excellent tool for what it does. We are not arguing it is bad — we are arguing it is incomplete for SaaS.
Who should pick Dashly
Pick Dashly if you run a SaaS, bill through Stripe (or LemonSqueezy or Polar), and want to see which traffic source drives revenue — not just visitors. Pick it if bot traffic is polluting your numbers (it is, whether you know it or not). Pick it if you want funnels, session replays, and AI search detection in the same tool, at the same price, without bolting on a second product. Pick it if you tried Plausible and hit the wall where "simple" means "cannot answer my business questions." Dashly is built for the founder who checks analytics every morning and wants to know: did the channel I invested in last week actually make money?
The honest take
If I were running a blog, I would use Plausible. It is cleaner, lighter, open-source, and the dashboard is beautiful. I would not pay $1/mo more for features a blog does not need. But I built Dashly because I run a SaaS, I bill through Stripe, and Plausible could not tell me which of my traffic sources was making money. I was spending 20 hours a week on the wrong channel because my analytics showed traffic, not revenue. If that is your situation, the $1/mo difference is the cheapest business decision you will make this year.
FAQ
Is Dashly better than Plausible?
For SaaS companies that need revenue attribution, bot filtering, and session replays, yes. For blogs and simple marketing sites that only need visitor counts, Plausible is excellent and $1/mo cheaper. Both are cookieless and GDPR compliant.
Does Plausible have revenue attribution?
No. Plausible does not connect to Stripe or any payment processor. You can see traffic sources but not which sources drive revenue. Dashly includes automatic Stripe revenue attribution at $10/mo.
Is Plausible open source?
Yes. Plausible is MIT-licensed and you can self-host it for free. Dashly is not open source — it is a hosted product. If self-hosting is a hard requirement, Plausible is the right choice.
Does Plausible filter bots?
No. Plausible counts all traffic including bots, AI crawlers, and scrapers. This inflates visitor counts by 20-40%. Dashly filters bots at collection time using three layers: user-agent matching, behavioral analysis, and IP filtering.
Why is Dashly $10/mo when Plausible is $9/mo?
Dashly includes revenue attribution (Stripe integration), bot filtering, funnels, session replays, and AI search detection — features Plausible does not have. The $1/mo difference covers the infrastructure for payment polling and bot detection. If you would otherwise buy a second tool for any of those features, Dashly is cheaper in total.