Umami
Open-source, privacy-focused web analytics — a self-hostable alternative to Google Analytics
Umami is an open-source, privacy-focused web analytics platform — a self-hostable alternative to Google Analytics, with 37,419 GitHub stars as of July 2026 and an MIT license. It reports the essentials a founder needs — pageviews, referrers, top pages, and events — without cookies or personal data, so it needs no cookie banner in most cases. You run it on your own server (or use Umami Cloud) and own the data. But Umami measures traffic; it doesn't create it. The harder half is the SEO, content, and outreach that fill those referrer reports in the first place.
What Umami is
Umami (github.com/umami-software/umami) is an open-source web analytics platform that describes itself as a privacy-focused alternative to Google Analytics, Mixpanel, and Amplitude. You add a small tracking script to your site, and Umami records pageviews, unique visitors, referrers, top pages, countries, devices, and custom events — then shows them on a single clean dashboard. It is built in TypeScript on Next.js, is MIT-licensed, and can be self-hosted from the repository or run on the team's hosted Umami Cloud.
- Privacy-first tracking — no cookies and no personal data by default, so in most regions you skip the cookie-consent banner.
- The core report — pageviews, unique visitors, referrers, top pages, and bounce, on one dashboard, not buried in menus.
- Custom events — track signups, clicks, or any goal without wiring up a heavy product-analytics stack.
- Open-source + self-hostable (MIT) — run it on your own infrastructure so the traffic data stays yours.
Where Umami fits in a founder's growth stack
Umami is the measurement layer for your website. It answers "how many people visited, which pages did they read, and where did they come from?" — the questions you need answered before you can decide where to spend your limited time. For a solo founder it is lighter and faster to reason about than Google Analytics 4, and privacy-friendly out of the box, which is why many indie sites adopt it.
But a dashboard only reflects the traffic you already have. On a brand-new site Umami reports near-zero visitors, because analytics measures demand — it does not generate it. The growth comes from the work upstream of the tracking script: ranking pages, shared posts, and outreach that earn the visit. See the playbook in how do I get my first 100 users.
What Umami doesn't do — and what to pair it with
Umami does not write your content, run your SEO, post to social, or send your outreach. It is deliberately focused: privacy-friendly web analytics, done well. To turn its referrer report into actual growth you still need execution across the channels that feed it.
| Umami shows… | …the work that creates it |
|---|---|
| Referrers from search | SEO content that ranks for what your buyers search |
| Referrers from social | social posts shipped consistently in your voice |
| A spike in a top page | the launch, newsletter, or campaign behind that spike |
This is where Ceres — the AI Growth Officer (agentceres.com) complements a tool like Umami. Ceres is a managed AI marketing team: specialists draft the SEO, social, and outreach that bring visitors to your site, you approve what ships, and Umami measures the result. The tool tracks the traffic; the team does the work that creates it. For how AI engines factor into that traffic, see generative engine optimization.
FAQ
- Is Umami free?
- Umami is open-source under the MIT license, so you can self-host it for free. The team also runs Umami Cloud, a hosted version with a free tier and paid plans for higher event volume. Check the repo and umami.is for current limits.
- Is Umami a good alternative to Google Analytics?
- For most small sites, yes. Its README positions it as a privacy-focused alternative to Google Analytics, Mixpanel, and Amplitude: it covers the core web metrics without cookies or personal data, on a simpler dashboard. If you need deep product-analytics funnels and cohorts, a dedicated product-analytics tool like OpenPanel may fit better.
- Do I need Umami as a solo founder?
- As soon as you have a site, a lightweight analytics tool is worth it — you cannot improve what you cannot see. Umami is a good default because it is simple and privacy-friendly. Just remember the dashboard only reflects traffic you have already earned; the bigger early job is creating the SEO and content that produce that traffic. See /roles/seo-content.
You built it. Now grow it.
Ceres is a managed AI marketing team — specialists draft the SEO, social, and outreach that fill your links, you approve what ships. 14-day free trial, from $19/month.