GA4 vs Plausible for an SEO's analytics:

GA4 vs Plausible for an SEO's analytics:
I ran both on the same content site for a month, side by side.

GA4
➕ Free, deep, and it ties to Search Console + Ads natively
➕ Landing-page + query reporting is enough for most SEO needs
➖ Steep, sampling on big ranges, and consent/cookie banner friction

Plausible
➕ Cookieless → often no banner, less data loss from rejections
➕ Dead-simple top-pages + sources view in 5 seconds
➖ Paid, and lighter on funnels/segments; no native GSC join

Best for: anyone who needs the GSC tie-in → GA4. Privacy-first sites who just want clean traffic numbers → Plausible.

Price-vs-value: Plausible's cookieless setup recovered ~10% of "missing" sessions GA4 lost to consent rejection in my test. For pure traffic counting, that accuracy is real.

Pick GA4 for the free GSC link. Skip it if a cookie banner is killing your numbers.

I pay for Plausible myself.