BoUk

There are deffinitely different methods for implementing pageview counters. Considering some external service such as <a href="https://jetpack.com/" rel="nofollow ugc">Jetpack</a> or <a href="https://analytics.google.com/" rel="nofollow ugc">Google Analytics</a> is surely a good option, but there may be scenarios where you may want to handle this just by yourself and have everything more under control.
Since it’s very common to utilize some caching mechanism to improve your site’s performance, implementing counter directly on PHP level wouldn’t work reliably as counter would be barely incremeneted due to the caching. Better solution would be to use WordPress way of triggering AJAX requests and increment pageview counters anytime page is loaded, no matter if served from cache or not.
When we start to think on bigger scale though, we find tradional WP AJAX implementation quite resources heavy as well. This plugin uses slightly more complicated method to increase counters, but it’s very lightweight. In a nuthsell, counters are stored ‘outside’ of WordPress ecosystem into some fast storage such as Memcached or Redis. Then there’s implemented re-occuring cron task on WordPress level, which regularly checks for new counters and store its values as postmeta for each respective post.
Plugin utilizes <a href="https://www.phpfastcache.com/" rel="nofollow ugc">PhpFastCache library</a> which allows to store data into many types of back-ends. See their <a href="https://github.com/PHPSocialNetwork/phpfastcache/blob/master/docs/DRIVERS.md" rel="nofollow ugc">documentation</a> for more details. This feature allows you to choose any back-end depending on your hosting provider.
This plugin comes preconfigured with file-based storage, which should work on any hosting environment, but for higher traffic sites you may want to consider in-memory storage such as MemcacheD.
Whole principle and idea is described in following <a href="https://www.bouk.info/efficient-handling-of-ajax-requests-on-wordpress-platform/" rel="nofollow ugc">article</a> published on my blog.

PageViews Counter

Implement your own pageviews counter in efficient way, using different backend storages such as MemcacheD or Redis.

dFactory

Post Views Counter allows you to collect and display how many times a post, page, or other content has been viewed in a simple, fast and reliable way.
<a href="https://postviewscounter.com/" rel="nofollow ugc">Post Views Counter</a> gives you clear, accurate post view stats — right inside WordPress. No external tools. No bloat. Just the numbers you need to see what’s working.
<h4>Key Benefits</h4>
Clarity, speed, and control:
<ul>
<li>Clear, Focused Metrics — You get a clear picture of how your posts are performing.</li>
<li>Made for WordPress — Runs entirely in your site. No GA, no third-party pipes; accurate counts in your Dashboard.</li>
<li>Privacy-first — Data lives on your server, with controls that respect visitors’ rights and privacy regulations.</li>
<li>Works at scale — Minimal overhead, no external scripts, Multisite-ready.</li>
<li>Display anywhere — Automatically show counts, or place them exactly where you want via blocks or shortcode.</li>
</ul>
<h4>Features</h4>
Practical features that matter:
<ul>
<li>Count & display views for any post type you select.</li>
<li>Three counting modes: PHP, JavaScript, REST API</li>
<li>Dashboard post views stats widget</li>
<li>Sortable Post Views admin column</li>
<li>Exclude bots, logged-in users, specific roles, or IPs</li>
<li>Manually adjust a post’s views when needed.</li>
<li>Query and order content by views (developer-friendly)</li>
<li>Custom REST API endpoints</li>
<li>Option to set count interval</li>
<li>One-click data import from WP-PostViews</li>
<li>Post views display position, automatic or manual via shortcode</li>
<li>Multisite compatibile</li>
<li>WPML/Polylang compatible; translation-ready (.pot)</li>
</ul>
<h4>Post Views Counter Pro</h4>
More capability without extra complexity:
<ul>
<li>Fast AJAX counting for more accurate data.</li>
<li>Caching optimization that guarantees performance even under heavy traffic.</li>
<li>Reports: Views by Date, Post, Author to spot winners, trends, and top contributors.</li>
<li>Customizable Views Period (e.g., last 7/30 days) to control the views count timeframe.</li>
<li>Export to CSV/XML to download and share data.</li>
<li>Integrations for ordering by views in popular builders (e.g., Elementor Pro, Divi, GenerateBlocks).</li>
</ul>
<a href="https://postviewscounter.com/pricing/" rel="nofollow ugc">Learn more about Pro →</a>

Post Views Counter

goood

This plugin is awesome. Hope it will be great for future too

Awesome plugin


I love this simple but easy to use plugin! 


Simple but good

great plugin


I've been using it for a few years as a parallel stats tracker for a pretty traffic-heavy site and it's been serving me well.



It's great for small and simple websites too :)


Stable and scalable

Post Views Counter allows you to collect and display how many times a post, page, or other content has been viewed in a simple, fast and reliable way.

PageViews Counter vs Post Views Counter