The Hits List stores post view counts locally in WordPress database tables:
hits_list for overall counts, hits_list_daily for daily buckets, and
hits_list_hourly for recent hourly buckets. Table names include your WordPress
database prefix. On multisite, the tables are shared across the network and
each site's rows are identified by its site ID.
The plugin does not send tracking data to a third-party analytics endpoint.
Daily buckets are retained for 180 days by default; this window can be changed
on the settings screen. Hourly buckets are retained for 48 hours by default.
Older daily and hourly rows are removed by scheduled cleanup. Developers can
adjust hourly retention with the thehili_store_hourly_hours filter.
Overall counts have no scheduled age limit. Permanently deleting content
removes its overall, daily, and hourly rows; moving content to Trash preserves
its history by default. Version 1.6.0 also sweeps older orphan rows in the
background. It preserves counts belonging to existing content, including
drafts, private posts, attachments, and Trash.
View tracking records aggregate counts. It does not store visitor IP addresses,
user accounts, user agents, referrers, or other visitor identifiers, and it sets
no cookies of its own.
Editorial features store an article's refresh timestamp, date, timezone, and
snooze expiry locally in post metadata. These markers describe the article's
refresh workflow and do not identify visitors.
You can export overall and daily counts as CSV or JSON from the settings
screen. Exports do not include hourly buckets, plugin settings, or editorial
refresh metadata, so they are not a complete database backup.
Ranking suppression keeps selected posts out of popular and trending lists
and dashboard rankings. It does not stop view tracking or erase stored
history. Individual counts and article reports remain available to users with
the appropriate access.
The plugin records page-view activity for popular-content reporting. Site owners are responsible for describing visitor analytics usage in their own privacy policies when required.
Suggested Privacy Policy Language
You can adapt this language for your site:
We use The Hits List to count views on our own WordPress site and display popular content. View counts are stored locally in our WordPress database and are not sent to a third-party analytics service by The Hits List.
Adjust that language for your site's own data retention, consent, and analytics policies.