This Cookie Policy explains what cookies are, which cookies SimpleCounter.co sets, what each one is for, how long it lasts, and how you can refuse or remove any of them. It is written to be read, not skimmed past, because the honest summary is short: the site works without any non-essential cookies, and if you reject them nothing about the counters or calculators stops functioning.
1. What Are Cookies?
Cookies are small text files placed on your device by websites you visit. A site can read back the cookies it set, which is how it remembers something between one page and the next. They are widely used to make websites work and to provide a better user experience.
Two related technologies do similar jobs and are covered by this policy as well. Local storage also keeps data in your browser, but the data is never sent to a server with each request; it simply sits on your device until something clears it. Session storage is the same idea, except the browser discards it when you close the tab. Most of what SimpleCounter.co remembers, including your counts, is local storage rather than cookies.
2. Types of Cookies We Use
- Strictly Necessary: Required for the site to function (e.g. remembering your cookie consent choice).
- Preferences: Local storage that saves your counter values, theme, language and settings on your device.
- Analytics: Google Analytics cookies (_ga, _gid) help us understand how visitors use our site.
- Advertising: Google AdSense and partner cookies serve ads and measure ad performance. These may be personalized based on your browsing history if you consent.
3. What Each Category Actually Does
Strictly necessary
There is really only one item in this category: the record of the choice you made on the cookie banner. Without it the banner would reappear on every page, and we would have no way to honour a rejection. It contains nothing except your answer and the date you gave it, and it cannot be switched off while still respecting your decision.
Preferences
This is where your actual use of the site lives, and it is all local storage rather than cookies. It holds the counters you have created, their current values and any step size or limit you set, which counter was last active, your chosen design theme and colour, your language, and whether you have sound and vibration turned on. None of it is transmitted to us. The practical consequence is worth understanding: because your counts are stored by your browser and not by our servers, clearing site data will delete them, private browsing windows will not keep them after you close the window, and a count made on your phone will not appear on your laptop. There is no account to sign into that would change this, which is also why we never ask you to create one.
Analytics
Analytics cookies tell us which pages people actually use, roughly how long they stay, what country the visit came from, and whether a page is broken on a particular browser. We use it in aggregate to decide what to build and what to fix; we do not use it to identify you, and we do not sell it. If you reject non-essential cookies these are not set at all.
Advertising
Advertising on this site pays for hosting and for the time spent writing the guides, which is why every tool can stay free with no account and no paywall. Google and its advertising partners may set cookies to choose which advert to show you, to avoid showing you the same one repeatedly, and to measure whether an advert led anywhere. Where you have consented, those choices may be based on your browsing history on other sites. Where you have not, you will still see adverts, but they will be based on the content of the page rather than on you.
4. Third-Party Cookies
We use Google services (Analytics and AdSense). These services place their own cookies. See Google's Cookie information.
These cookies are set by Google under Google's own domains, which means we cannot read them, delete them on your behalf, or tell you their exact contents. They are governed by Google's policies rather than ours, and the opt-out links in the next section go directly to Google because that is the only place the setting can be changed. Advertising partners in Google's network may also set cookies through the same advert slots.
5. Managing Your Cookie Choices
- Use the cookie banner on first visit to Accept or Reject non-essential cookies.
- You can clear cookies and local storage through your browser settings at any time.
- Opt out of personalized ads at Google Ads Settings or aboutads.info/choices.
Every major browser also lets you block or delete cookies for a single site without touching the rest of your browsing. In Chrome and Edge the control is under Settings, then Privacy and security, then Cookies and site data. In Safari on a Mac it is Safari, then Settings, then Privacy, and on iPhone it sits under Settings, then Safari. In Firefox it is Settings, then Privacy and Security. Blocking cookies altogether will stop adverts being personalised and stop analytics being recorded.
One caution before you clear anything: deleting site data for SimpleCounter.co removes your saved counters along with the cookies, and we cannot restore them because we never had them. If the numbers matter, export them first. Several counters offer a CSV export, and copying the totals into a note takes a few seconds.
6. Do Not Track and Global Privacy Control
Browsers can send a Do Not Track header, but there is no agreed standard for what a website must do in response, so we make no claim to honour it as a formal signal. Rejecting non-essential cookies on our banner is the reliable way to limit analytics and personalised advertising here. Where a browser or extension sends a recognised Global Privacy Control signal, Google's advertising services apply their own handling of it under their policies.
7. Children
SimpleCounter.co is a general-audience site and is not directed at children under 13. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children. Teachers and parents using the classroom counters and timers with pupils may reject non-essential cookies on the banner; all of the counting tools keep working normally afterwards.
8. Updates
We may update this policy as our practices change. The "Last updated" date above reflects the most recent revision. Where a change materially affects what is collected or who receives it, the consent banner will ask you to make your choice again rather than relying on the answer you gave before.
9. Contact
Questions about cookies? Reach out via our Contact page. Our Privacy Policy covers data handling more broadly, and the Terms of Service set out the rest of the agreement for using the site.