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OpenRev vs Fathom

Fathom describes itself as “Analytics without the cookies”

The short answer

Fathom is hosted, cookieless traffic analytics with pricing based on pageviews. OpenRev is free, open-source software you host yourself, built to show which channels bring in revenue: it connects payment providers directly. Fathom totals sales only from events your site sends with a value, and it has no funnels or per-visitor journeys.

Facts checked on , from Fathom's own site. Sources

Side by side

Pricing

OpenRev

Free. You pay only for your own hosting, and small sites fit Cloudflare's free plan

Fathom

From $15/month for 100k monthly pageviews and 50 sites; 7-day free trial (card required); no free plan

Source code

OpenRev

Open source (MIT)

Fathom

Proprietary (the older Fathom Lite is MIT-licensed but no longer gets new features)

Hosting

OpenRev

You host it: Cloudflare Workers + D1, Docker or Node.js, with D1, SQLite or PostgreSQL

Fathom

Hosted by Fathom; EU visitor data is processed in the EU

Revenue attribution

OpenRev

Built in: payments are linked to visitors and the channel that brought them, with LTV and renewals by source

Fathom

From events your site sends with a value

Payment providers

OpenRev

Stripe, Lemon Squeezy, Paddle, Polar, Dodo Payments, Creem, Shopify, WooCommerce, Gumroad, Paystack and Razorpay, plus a custom webhook and a Payments API

Fathom

No direct connections

Cookies

OpenRev

First-party visitor ID by default; optional cookieless mode per site

Fathom

Cookieless, with a salt that rotates daily

Goals & funnels

OpenRev

Fathom

Goals (called events); no funnels

Visitor journeys

OpenRev

Fathom

No

Realtime view

OpenRev

Fathom

Yes, updated every 5 minutes

API

OpenRev

REST API with an OpenAPI spec

Fathom

REST API; requests count toward your pageviews

MCP server for AI agents

OpenRev

Built into every install

Fathom

No

Alerts

OpenRev

Payments, goals, traffic spikes and digests to Slack, Discord, Telegram, email or webhooks

Fathom

Weekly or monthly email reports

The main differences

Revenue

Fathom lets your site send a value, in cents, with an event and shows sales totals next to completion counts. It doesn't connect to payment providers. OpenRev receives each payment, renewal and refund from your provider by signed webhook and credits it to the visitor's source.

Funnels and journeys

Fathom has goals but no funnels, and it resets how it identifies a visitor every 24 hours, so there are no per-visitor journeys. OpenRev has funnels and shows each visitor's sessions, pages, goals and payments.

Hosting

Fathom is hosted only; its site answers "Can I host the data locally?" with no. OpenRev always runs on your own infrastructure.

Cookies

Fathom is cookieless and says no consent banner is needed for its analytics. OpenRev stores a first-party visitor ID by default, for attribution across days, and offers a cookieless mode per site.

Price

Fathom starts at $15/month for 100k pageviews, and custom events and API requests count toward that allowance. OpenRev's software is free; you pay only your host.

Which one fits you

Choose Fathom if

  • You want hosted, cookieless traffic analytics with nothing to run.
  • You manage many sites: the base plan includes 50.
  • Event values are enough revenue data for you.

Choose OpenRev if

  • You want revenue attributed from your payment provider's own data.
  • You want funnels and per-visitor journeys.
  • You want to self-host and keep the data in your own database.

Switching from Fathom

Add OpenRev's script next to Fathom's and compare the two. Fathom's custom events become OpenRev goals, and purchases no longer need a client-side event once your payment provider is connected. Fathom history isn't imported.

OpenRev and Fathom: questions

Does Fathom track revenue?

Only as event values: your site sends a value, in cents, with an event, and Fathom totals it. It doesn't connect to payment providers such as Stripe. OpenRev receives payments from your provider by webhook and credits each one to the visitor's source.

Can I self-host Fathom?

No. Fathom says it is a hosted product. Its older open-source version, Fathom Lite, can still be self-hosted, but Fathom is no longer adding features to it. OpenRev is free to self-host on Cloudflare, Docker or Node.js.

Does Fathom have funnels?

No. Fathom has goals, which it calls events, but no funnels, and it doesn't track individual visitors. OpenRev has funnels and per-visitor journeys.

Try OpenRev on your own site

One command sets it up on Cloudflare, Docker or Node.js. It's free.

Get started View on GitHub

Sources

Facts about Fathom come from these pages, read on October 25, 2026. Facts about OpenRev come from its source code and docs. Spotted something out of date? Open an issue.

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Fathom is a trademark of its owner. OpenRev is not affiliated with, endorsed by or sponsored by Fathom.