Product & Web Analytics · decision tool

Plausible vs GA4 — what free actually costs

GA4 is $0 but pays in retention limits, sampling and consent friction; Plausible starts at $9. Priced and scored at your traffic with verified data.

Prices verified 2026-07-17 against official pricing pages · fit weights are our estimates (see methodology) · share the URL to share your configuration

As of Jul 2026, with 500,000 tracked events/month, a $20 budget for this slot, Google Analytics 4 ranks first for these inputs at 76% fit and a StackSays-estimated $0/month (Plausible: 33% fit, $49.00/month). Fit weights are our estimates; prices trace to official pages. Change any input below and the verdict recomputes.

Your situation

The verdict updates as you move these.

Events or pageviews / month (thousands)500 = 500,000; pageview-billed vendors (Plausible/Fathom) count pageviews, event-billed ones count every eventBudget for this slot ($/mo)what you'd accept paying for the analytics platform layerTeam size1 = solo; bundled platforms save glue time for small teams

Clear pick for your inputs

Google Analytics 4fit 76% · est $0/mo

The free default — you pay in retention limits, sampling and consent friction instead of dollars

vs Plausible: fit 76% against 33%, est $0 against $49.00 per month

Google Analytics 4fit 76%

$0/mo

Plausiblefit 33%

$49.00/mo

Comparing 2 tools head-to-head. Open the full field (8 options) →

The decision, in plain words

For a solo builder at 500,000 tracked events/month and a $20.00/mo budget for the analytics platform slot, Google Analytics 4 leads at 76% fit and $0/mo. The two rules doing the work: budget fit (Runs free at your usage — $0 vs your $20/mo budget); ecosystem maturity (established — our estimate from ecosystem age, docs and hiring pool).

The gap to Plausible (33% fit) is wide at these inputs — you'd need to change your requirements, not your taste, to flip it.

Honest weak spot of the pick: no free tier — paying from day one.

Generated from the calculation above — every number traces to the sourced data; nothing here is written by an AI making things up.

Why Google Analytics 4 scores 76%

Budget fit (weight 30, our estimate) — Runs free at your usage — $0 vs your $20/mo budget+30

Batteries included (weight 12, our estimate) — Bundles funnels — fewer services to glue at team size 1+3

Exit cost (weight 4, our estimate) — Proprietary SaaS — historical analytics rarely survive a migration-1.6

Ecosystem maturity (weight 8, our estimate) — established — our estimate from ecosystem age, docs and hiring pool+8

Free-tier runway (weight 10, our estimate) — No free tier — paying from day one-6

Total (lines sum exactly)33.4

Possible range −64…+64 (sum of active rule weights) · fit % = (total + max) / (2 × max)(33.4 + 64) / 128 = 76%

How the $0/mo estimate is calculated

Your usage fits Google Analytics 4's free tier () — the estimate is $0.

What could change this verdict

Cost risk

Estimated now (StackSays estimate, not your final bill)$0/mo · Free

Free-tier statusNo free tier — paid from the first unit

Official prices verified 2026-07-17; calculation is deterministic code over those prices.

At a glance

Tool	Free tier	Paid entry	Verified
Plausible	No free tier	Starter 10K $9/mo	2026-07-17
Google Analytics 4	No free tier	—	2026-07-17

Where did you land?anonymous, one click

Data sources

Tool	Source	Verified
Plausible	Plausible pricing	2026-07-17
Google Analytics 4	GA4 data retention (official Google doc)	2026-07-17

A monitor re-checks these pages for changes; when a vendor moves a price, the date updates and every verdict recomputes.

Keep deciding