Monitor Online Visitors
- Purpose – Shows who is on your site right now and how long they’ve been active.
- Why enable – Great for launches, flash sales, or any time you want to watch traffic spikes live.
- When to disable – If you never look at live stats and want to reduce database writes; normal tracking still runs.
Track Logged-In User Activity
- Purpose – Associates each visit by a signed-in WordPress user with their user-ID.
- Benefits – Reveals how editors, members, or customers navigate private areas.
Privacy Impact – This setting can affect user privacy. Adjust with caution to ensure compliance with privacy standards. For details, open WP Statistics → Privacy Audit in your WordPress admin.
Store Entire User-Agent String
- Purpose – Saves the full browser/device string for every hit (e.g., “Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone…)”).
- Use it only for – Deep diagnostics, bot hunting, or device-compatibility work.
Privacy Impact – This setting can affect user privacy. Adjust with caution to ensure compliance with privacy standards. For details, open WP Statistics → Privacy Audit in your WordPress admin.
Attribution Model
- First-Touch (default) – Credits the first session that attracted the visitor.
- Last-Touch – Credits the session immediately before a conversion.
Tip: First-Touch shows which campaigns bring people in; Last-Touch shows what finally convinces them to act.
Tracking Method
- Client-Side Tracking (recommended) – The visitor’s browser sends hits directly; best with caching/CDNs and future-proof.
- Server-Side Tracking – PHP logs the hit after the page loads; works without JavaScript but can double-count cached pages. Heads-up: Server-Side Tracking will be removed in version 15. See the “Server-Side Tracking Deprecation Announcement” on the WP Statistics blog for details.
Bypass Ad Blockers
Dynamically renames the tracking script so common ad-block lists don’t recognise it, keeping stats accurate for visitors using blockers.
Tracker Debugger
Helps you identify potential tracking issues—e.g., no data captured or unexpected drops in numbers—by surfacing diagnostic information in real time.
Quick-Start Checklist
- Enable Monitor Online Visitors if live stats matter.
- Keep Track Logged-In User Activity on for membership or e-commerce sites; switch off for strict privacy.
- Disable Store Entire User-Agent unless you’re actively debugging.
- Stay with First-Touch attribution unless your marketing team needs Last-Touch.
- Pair Client-Side Tracking with Bypass Ad Blockers for the most reliable data.
- Run Tracker Debugger whenever numbers look off.
