Umami vs Countly
Both are alternatives to Amplitude. Here's how they stack up — verified facts, no spin.
Also searched as Countly vs Umami — same comparison, one verdict.
Umami is open source (MIT) and Countly is not (Countly Lite License (custom, source-available — not OSI open source)) — so the real question is whether you want to own the product analytics stack or rent it.
Umami
One clean dashboard, no cookies, five minutes to deploy.
Umami is deliberately small: page views, referrers, countries, devices and events on a single readable dashboard, with no cookies, no personal data and a script around two kilobytes. It runs on Node with Postgres or MySQL and deploys in minutes. MIT, about 38k stars. It is the honest recommendation for a large number of teams who believe they need product analytics and actually need to know which pages people read and where they came from — and the tracking script being 2 KB rather than 45 KB is a real difference on a phone.
Countly
Mobile-first analytics you can run on-premise — but check the licence.
Countly is built around mobile and IoT rather than the web, with crash reporting, push notifications and user profiles alongside analytics, and a long history of on-premise deployment in regulated and government settings. Around 5.9k stars. One correction to how it is usually listed: Countly is very often described as open source, but the community edition ships under a custom "Countly Lite License" rather than an OSI-approved licence — it is source-available, with restrictions, and the terms are worth reading before you build a product on it. Included here because the mobile and on-premise combination is genuinely rare, and because the licence deserves to be stated accurately.
Side by side
10 points of comparison, every one read from a verified field. Green marks the side that wins a row outright. A dash means we do not hold that fact — never that it is zero.
| Umami | Countly | |
|---|---|---|
| Sovereignty ScoreOur transparent 0–100 composite for data ownership and exit cost. | 95 | 66 |
| Open source | Yes | No |
| Self-hostable | Yes | Yes |
| Local-first data | Yes | Yes |
| License | MIT | Countly Lite License (custom, source-available — not OSI open source) |
| Pricing | Free and open source to self-host. Umami Cloud has a free tier and paid plans. | Community edition free to self-host under its own licence terms; enterprise is commercial. |
| RAM to run it wellThe figure that actually matters, not the vendor's minimum. | 1 GB with PostgreSQL alongside | — |
| Realistic running costWhat the box costs each month if you run it yourself. | $10–18/mo, and it runs on a free-tier serverless host comfortably | — |
| Setup timeHonest first-install estimate, not the marketing quickstart. | 30 minutes | — |
| Ongoing maintenanceThe part nobody budgets for. | Low. One container and a database, with no archiving job to schedule. | — |
Umami edges it on the Sovereignty Score, but the right pick depends on the trade-offs below.
Umami
Strengths
- +Genuinely simple — one dashboard, no training required
- +No cookies and no personal data, so no consent banner
- +Roughly 2 KB script, a meaningful page-speed win on mobile
- +MIT with no enterprise carve-out
Trade-offs
- −No funnels, cohorts or retention analysis worth the name
- −Not a product-analytics tool — do not expect it to be
- −No session replay or heatmaps
- −Small feature surface by design; you will outgrow it if you need depth
Countly
Strengths
- +Mobile and IoT first, where most of this category is web first
- +Crash reporting and push notifications alongside analytics
- +Long track record of on-premise deployment in regulated environments
- +Rich user-profile and cohort features in the enterprise tier
Trade-offs
- −Not open source despite being widely listed as such — read the Lite License
- −Much of the useful functionality sits in the paid enterprise edition
- −Smaller community than every other option here
- −Heavier to deploy than Umami or OpenPanel
Which one fits you
The trade-offs above, turned into a decision. Find the line that describes your team.
Choose Umami
if you want the source and the option to fork it, and genuinely simple — one dashboard, no training required.
Choose Countly
if mobile and IoT first, where most of this category is web first.
Neither, yet
if both carry a real cost you should weigh first — no funnels, cohorts or retention analysis worth the name, and not open source despite being widely listed as such — read the Lite License. If either of those is a dealbreaker for your team, the shortlist is wrong rather than the choice.
What it takes to run these yourself
Real requirements and honest running costs, not the vendor quickstart.
Umami vs Countly — common questions
Is Umami a better fit than Countly for product analytics?
It depends on what you are optimising for, and the honest split is this: Umami scores 95 to Countly's 66 on data ownership and exit cost, so it is the safer choice if you care about being able to leave. Countly earns its place on a different axis — mobile and IoT first, where most of this category is web first. Neither is a wrong answer for every team; the table above is the actual comparison.
What happens if we want to switch later?
Umami keeps its data local or in open formats, so leaving is an export rather than a negotiation. Countly is still self-hostable, so the files stay on your server either way — but it is not local-first by design, so check what its export produces before you rely on it.
Can I self-host Umami or Countly?
Both can be self-hosted. The difference is what it costs you in time rather than whether it is possible — see the setup and maintenance rows above.
Are Umami and Countly both alternatives to Amplitude?
Yes — both appear in our Amplitude comparison, which is why they are worth putting side by side. People usually arrive here already having decided to move off Amplitude and now choosing between the two replacements, which is a narrower and much easier question.
Related alternative guides
Facts verified 2026-07-31. Licenses and pricing change — spotted something out of date? That's a correction we want.