Tiaro Analytics
Tiaro Analytics counts what visitors look at and shows it inside WordPress. The script, the data and the world map are all on your own server; nothing is sent to anyone else. By default it sets no cookie and stores no IP address, so no consent banner is needed for it.
It is meant for site owners who want to know how the website is used without handing visitor data to a third party.
In this article: The Reports · How Visitors Are Recognized · What Is Not Stored · Other Settings · Exports · Permissions · Privacy · Related
The Reports
The plugin adds Analytics to the admin menu. Each report is a menu entry and a tab. Choose the Period at the top: Today, Yesterday, Last 7, 30 or 90 days, This month, Last month, Last 12 months or Custom.
| Report | What it shows |
|---|---|
| Overview | Visitors, Visits, Page views, Pages per visit, Bounce rate and Time per visit, each compared with the period before; a chart per day; Right now with the visitors of the last 30 minutes. |
| Pages | Most viewed pages and Entry pages. |
| Sources | How visitors arrive, Referring websites and pages, Campaigns with their sources and media. |
| Countries | A world map, Countries and Browser languages. |
| Technology | Devices, Browsers, Operating systems and Screen widths. |
| Forms & Events | Sent forms and the pages they were sent from, Clicked outbound links, Downloaded files, Searches on the site and Addresses not found (404). |
| Bots | Search engines, AI crawlers, SEO tools and other programs, kept apart from visitors: which come, what they fetch and what the site answered. |
The WordPress dashboard also gets a box, Visitors (last 7 days).
Note: A bot request is only counted when WordPress answers it. Pages delivered by a page cache are not seen there, so the real bot numbers are higher. Visitor counts are not affected: they are counted in the browser and work with a page cache.
How Visitors Are Recognized
Under Analytics › Settings › Privacy, Recognising visitors offers two ways:
- Without a cookie (default): a visitor is recognized for one day through an anonymous code that cannot be turned back into an IP address. Nothing is stored on the visitor’s device. Someone who returns on another day counts as a new visitor.
- With a cookie: a cookie of your own website recognizes returning visitors for up to 13 months. In the EU this needs the visitor’s consent. An extra option sets the cookie only after the visitor allowed “Tracking” in the cookie notice and counts without a cookie until then.
A visit ends after 30 minutes without a page view. The country comes from the time zone set on the visitor’s device, not from the IP address.
What Is Not Stored
- IP addresses: with Never store, the default, the address is used for a moment to make the anonymous code and is then dropped. You can choose to store it half masked, with the last part masked, or in full; the full address is personal data and belongs in your privacy policy.
- For sent forms only which form and from which page is recorded, never what was typed.
- With Do Not Track ticked (default), visitors whose browser sends “Do Not Track” or “Global Privacy Control” are not counted at all.
- Logged-in users who can edit content are not counted while Your own visits is ticked.
Other Settings
- Tracking: switch the counting off entirely, and choose under Also record whether forms, outbound links, downloads, searches, 404 addresses and bots are recorded.
- Keep data for: 3, 6, 12, 25 (default) or 37 months, or forever. Older records are deleted once a day. Keep bot records for has its own, shorter period (default 3 months).
- Exclusions: IP addresses, for example your office, and addresses of the site that should not be counted.
- Tracking address: the plugin uses a fast address that costs the server a few milliseconds when it answers, and the normal WordPress address otherwise. Test the fast tracking address checks it.
- Stored data: Remove stored IP addresses keeps the statistics and removes the addresses; Delete all statistics cannot be undone.
Exports
Every list and the daily chart have an Export link that downloads the report for the chosen period as CSV. On the Overview, Export all records of this period (CSV) downloads the raw data, one row per page view or event.
Permissions
Administrators have full access. For the client user types of Tiaro Core there are two rows under Users › Client Roles:
- See the visitor statistics: all reports and their CSV exports, without stored IP addresses. Allowed for both client types by default.
- Manage the visitor statistics: the settings, deleting data and IP addresses in the full export. Off by default.
Privacy
Tiaro Analytics contacts no third party. All records are in one table of your own website’s database. Deactivating the plugin keeps the data; deleting the plugin removes the table and the settings.