How to Install Plausible Analytics on Windows 10

Plausible Analytics is an open-source website analytics tool that provides privacy-focused analytics for website owners. In this tutorial, we will guide you through the process of installing Plausible Analytics on Windows 10.

Prerequisites

Before starting the installation process, make sure you have the following prerequisites:

A website that you want to track with Plausible Analytics.
A server or hosting provider where you can install and run Plausible Analytics. (You can also use cloud hosting providers such as DigitalOcean, AWS, etc.)
A Windows 10 machine with administrative access.

Installation Steps

Follow the below-given steps to Install Plausible Analytics on Windows 10.

Step 1: Install Node.js

To use Plausible Analytics, you need to install Node.js, which is a JavaScript runtime built on Chrome's V8 engine. You can download and install the latest version of Node.js from its official website.

Go to the Node.js download page at https://nodejs.org/en/download/.
Download the recommended version for Windows 10.
Run the downloaded setup file and follow the installation wizard.

Once you have installed Node.js, you can verify whether it is installed correctly by running the following command in Command Prompt:

node --version

If Node.js is installed correctly, it will display the installed version number.

Step 2: Install Git

Plausible Analytics is available as a Git repository. Therefore, you need to install Git on your Windows 10 machine to clone and access the Plausible Analytics repository.

Go to the Git download page at https://git-scm.com/downloads.
Download the latest version of Git for Windows 10.
Run the downloaded setup file and follow the installation wizard.

Once you have installed Git, you can verify whether it is installed correctly by running the following command in Command Prompt:

git --version

If Git is installed correctly, it will display the installed version number.

Step 3: Clone Plausible Analytics

After installing Node.js and Git, you can clone the Plausible Analytics repository to your Windows 10 machine.

Create a directory on your Windows 10 machine where you want to store the Plausible Analytics project. For example, C:\projects.
Open Command Prompt and navigate to the directory you just created by running the following command:
```
cd C:\projects
```
Clone the Plausible Analytics repository by running the following command:
```
git clone https://github.com/plausible/analytics.git
```

Step 4: Install Plausible Analytics

After cloning the Plausible Analytics repository, you can install Plausible Analytics and all its dependencies by following these steps:

Open Command Prompt and navigate to the Plausible Analytics project directory by running the following command:
```
cd C:\projects\analytics
```
Install the dependencies by running the following command:
```
npm install
```

Step 5: Configure Plausible Analytics

After installing Plausible Analytics, you need to configure it to track your website's traffic. To do this, you need to create a .env file in the Plausible Analytics project directory, which contains the configuration settings for Plausible Analytics.

Create a new file named .env in the Plausible Analytics project directory.
Add the following configuration settings to the .env file and replace yourdomain.com with your website's domain name:
```
HOST_URL=http://localhost:8000
BASE_URL=https://yourdomain.com
```

Step 6: Run Plausible Analytics

After configuring Plausible Analytics, you can run it by following these steps:

Open Command Prompt and navigate to the Plausible Analytics project directory by running the following command:
```
cd C:\projects\analytics
```
Start Plausible Analytics by running the following command:
```
npm start
```

If everything is configured correctly, you should see the following output on the Command Prompt:

Server listening on http://localhost:8000

You can now access Plausible Analytics by visiting the following URL in your web browser: http://localhost:8000.

Conclusion

In this tutorial, we have shown you how to install Plausible Analytics on Windows 10 using Node.js and Git. We hope this tutorial was helpful to you. If you have any questions or suggestions, feel free to leave a comment below.