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Home Page : Web Site Counters
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Web site counters allow you to find out the number of visitors to each page.
This list deliberately concentrates on free site counters or commercial counters that also provide a free service. In general this page does not include commercial counters that provide a free but time limited trial.
The emphasis is also on counters and not trackers. A counter provides an indication of the number of visitors to a particular page, whereas a tracker also gives a indication of how visitors navigate through your site. A comprehensive list of trackers is also available on this site (click here to view).
Generally, each counter will require you to insert a small block of HTML or JavaScript into each page to be tracked. Some counter sites also make reports available with their counter, such as where visitors come from or the type of browser being used.
The information provided on this page is believed to be accurate, and is based on the information published on each counters website. Please check with each company before signing up. If you find any errors or omissions please report these via e-mail to: feedback@cryer.co.uk.
The following table provides summary information on each tracker included in this comparison. More details on each tracker are included via the links in the table.
| Page Counters | Free service | Paid service | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Max counters | Visible counter | Page views/m | Reports | e-mail stats | Max counters | Invisible counters | Page views/m | |
| A-Counters | no limit | 20x20 | no limit |  |
 |
3 | no limit | |
| CrazyCounters | ? | various | no limit | |
|
no paid service | ||
| GemStats | 1 | optional | 10,000 | |
|
no paid service | ||
| HitsLog | n/a | optional | no limit | |
|
no paid service | ||
| RealTracker | 1 | 120x64 | no limit | |
|
varies | unknown | no limit |
| RtStats (7 realtime statistics) | no limit | 18x18 | 10,000 | |
|
no limit | |
no limit |
| NextGenStats | no limit | optional | no limit | |
|
no paid service | ||
| QuickHitCounters | 1 | 110x52 (approx) | no limit | |
|
no paid service | ||
| SiteMeter | 1 | 20x20 | 25,000 | |
|
no limit | none | more |
| StatCounter | no limit | optional | 250,000 | |
|
no limit | optional | more |
| StatsQuick | 1 | 110x35 | no limit | |
|
no paid service | ||
| StatsSheet | 1 | optional | 10,000 | |
|
1 | |
up to 50,000 |
Terms:
Free counter for non-commercial homepages. Also provides a business tracking service (http://business.realtracker.com). Stats are accessible to all (for the free service). Whilst it records number of hits, it does not provide the ability to display the number of hits (this is true for the free service, unclear for the paid service).
| free.realtracker.com | Free service | Paid service | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Max counters: | 1 | Depends on subscription | |||
| Counter size: | 120x64 pixels | not known | |||
| Example: |
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| Limit on page views: | No apparent limit | No apparent limit | |||
| Reports: | various | various | |||
| Stats by e-mail: | No | not known |
Note: 
The
example shown above is an accurate representation of what will be displayed on
your website (as of November 2003), however it is not the actual graphic but a
copy. The reason for this is that the real code will sometimes generate a virus
warning (Exploit-ByteVerify). RealTracker have been notified, but have not
responded.
The free Web site stats service offers real-time data about your site's traffic. HitsLog's services include a hit counter, which you can opt to make invisible on your site's pages. Stats featured here include referring URLs and domains, search engine keyword analysis, system tracking, Google PageRank site analysis and more. Registered users can receive statistics by email.
| http://hitslog.com | Free service | Paid service |
|---|---|---|
| Max counters: | 1 (per registration). This serves the whole site. Count is therefore of visitors to the site and not per page. | No paid service |
| Counter size: | optional: invisible or 88x31 pixels | |
| Example: |
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| Limit on page views: | No apparent limit | |
| Reports: | Various | |
| Stats by e-mail: | No |
Of the three numbers on the visible counter, the top number is a count of unique visitors today, the middle number is the count of visits today and the bottom number is the count of total visits.
StatsSheet.com provides a well laid out and easy to use site, giving a range of statistics from a single page counter.
As well as providing a count of visitor numbers they also provide a service to display an estimate of the number of visitors currently active on a site.
| http://statssheet.com | Free service | Paid service |
|---|---|---|
| Max counters: | One | One |
| Counter size: | invisible or 88x31 pixels | |
| Example: |
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| Limit on page views: | 10,000 per month then need to upgrade. |
25,000 or 50,000 hits depending on subscription level. |
| Reports: | various. Providing both plain text and charts. | |
| Stats by e-mail: | No | |
Free site counter. Provides a number of different counter styles and allows you to keep your counter stats private or to make them publicly accessible to everyone.
| www.a-counters.com | Free service | Paid service |
|---|---|---|
| Max counters: | no obvious limit | No paid service |
| Counter size: | 20x20 or 88x20 | |
| Example: | ||
| Limit on page views: | No apparent limit | |
| Reports: | various | |
| Stats by e-mail: | No |
Click on the counter to see the information available.
Choose from more than 30 different counter styles, just fill in some basic information about your website and you're ready to go - copy and paste a little snippet of code wherever you want your new counter to appear. If you're more of the subtle type don't worry – Crazy Counters offers plenty of conservative web counters that despite the name of the website are not so 'crazy' at all, on top of plenty of fun styles to choose from.
| www.crazycounters.com | Free service | Paid service | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Max counters: | unclear | No paid service | |
| Counter size: | Various different styles. | ||
| Example: |
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| Limit on page views: | No limit. | ||
| Reports: | None. | ||
| Stats by e-mail: | No |
Free basic counter.
| www.gemstats.com | Free service | Paid service |
|---|---|---|
| Max counters: | 1 | No paid service |
| Counter size: | optional, 23x23 or 110x23 pixels | |
| Example: | ||
| Limit on page views: | 10,000 hits/month | |
| Reports: | Various | |
| Stats by e-mail: | No |
NextGenStats (NGS) provides invisible, text-based and graphical counters (as of October 2003 it was offering 165 high-quality digit styles). NGS also provides detailed statistics about visitors. Multiple pages can be tracked by registering each page individually.
Only problem at the time of reviewing was that statistics could only be viewed for individual pages and not totalled for the site, this makes it less manageable the more pages there are to be tracked. NGS is a good, feature-rich, web page counter but is less suited as a web site tracker.
| www.nextgenstats.com | Free service | Paid service |
|---|---|---|
| Max counters: | no limit | No paid service |
| Counter size: | Optional (counter) | |
| Example: |
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| Limit on page views: | No limit. | |
| Reports: | Various | |
| Stats by e-mail: | No |
Offers free hit counters including an invisible counter. It's very simple and to create a free counter for your website, BLOG or where every you want to use the hit counter. All you're required to do is copy and paste a small snippet of HTML code into your pages. Quick Hit Counters furthermore offer real-time statistics, and track daily hits, unique visitors, referrers, search engines, keywords, system info, visitor countries, and much more and it’s all for free.
| www.quickhitcounters.com | Free service | Paid service |
|---|---|---|
| Max counters: | 1 | No paid service |
| Counter size: | Optional (counter) | |
| Example: | ||
| Limit on page views: | No limit. | |
| Reports: | Various | |
| Stats by e-mail: | No |
Known as "7 realtime statistics", they provide a free counter for personal as well as commercial websites. They provide tracking features such as:
They also provide a free update service that enables you to stay informed about your statistics by email each day, week or month.
Their service is free until you hit 10,000 page views per month and then there is an annual charge.
| www.rtstats.co.uk | Free service | Paid service |
|---|---|---|
| Max counters: | no limit. A single (common) counter is used by default for all pages, but if you wish to track statistics for individual pages then you can create a "unique textlink" to track information about specific pages. | same as free service |
| Counter size: | 18x18 pixels | Allows counter to be invisible. |
| Example: | (Example temporarily withdrawn) | |
| Limit on page views: | 10,000 then you must use their paid service | no limit |
| Reports: | Various | same as free service |
| Stats by e-mail: | Yes | not known |
Provides both a free and paid service. It displays 'visits' rather than page views, so an individual reloading a page will not count as a second page hit. The free version must display a small graphic (20x20 pixel) on each page to be tracked. You can use a larger and more informative graphic if you so wish. The free version does not appear to allow visitor movement between pages to be tracked, this information may be available with the paid version. The paid version also allows provides access to the IP addresses of visitors as well as showing where those visitors came from.
| www.sitemeter.com | Free service | Paid service |
|---|---|---|
| Max counters: | 1 may be placed on more than one page and gives a total count. Not possible to distinguish visitor counts for different pages. |
not known |
| Counter size: | 20x20 pixels (smallest) 200x40 (largest) |
None |
| Example: |
|
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| Limit on page views: | Up to 25,000 per month | more |
| Reports: | Various | Various, generally more useful ones than with the free service. |
| Stats by e-mail: | No | not known |
StatCounter provides a free invisible web site tracking service complete with the option to display a site counter. The counter (which is optional and can be turned invisible) can be set to count unique visitors or page views.
| www.statcounter.com | Free service | Paid service |
|---|---|---|
| Max counters: | no limit - but see note below | no limit - but see note below |
| Counter size: | invisible or customisable | invisible or customisable |
| Example: |
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| Limit on page views: | 250,000 per month or 8,000 a day |
more |
| Reports: | Various | Various, generally more useful ones than with the free service. |
| Stats by e-mail: | No | No |
Note:
Free site counter. Appears to count unique visitors and not simply page views (so if a visitor looks at five pages this will be counted as one hit not five).
| www.statsquick.com | Free service | Paid service |
|---|---|---|
| Max counters: | 1 | No paid service |
| Counter size: | invisible or 110x35 pixels | |
| Example: | ||
| Limit on page views: | No apparent limit | |
| Reports: | various | |
| Stats by e-mail: | No |
There are a number of lists of counters on the net. If looking for other counters or counters of a purely commercial nature then consider the following sites:
If you know of other web site trackers that you would like to see listed on this page or wish to report any errors on this page then please e-mail: feedback@cryer.co.uk.
© Copyright 2004-2009, A B Cryer, All rights reserved.
