The user metric reported by Google Analytics and the StatCounter unique visitor metric are comparable based on the definitions described[1] but I confirmed that the two stats are way off:<p>Last Month (August)
Google Analytics - 1,159,529 users
StatCounter - 3,542,476 unique visits<p>How do you accurately track unique visitors? Which platform is the industry standard?<p>[1] &quot;A Unique Visitor is a separate&#x2F;individual&#x2F;distinct visitor. The sum of your first-time PLUS your returning visitors should always equal your TOTAL unique visitors for the day.&quot; (StatCounter) &quot;For example, if a user visits a website on August 31 and on September 1, Analytics recognizes this user as a single user over the course of these two days.&quot; (Google) &quot;The estimated number of people accessing a property from online and mobile web in aggregate&quot;. (quantcast)
Ask HN: Accurately tracking uniques on a high traffic site