Ahoy

🔥 Simple, powerful, first-party analytics for Rails

Track visits and events in Ruby, JavaScript, and native apps. Data is stored in your database by default, and you can customize it for any data store as you grow.

📮 Check out Ahoy Email for emails and Field Test for A/B testing

🍊 Battle-tested at Instacart

Installation

Add this line to your application’s Gemfile:

gem"ahoy_matey"

And run:

bundle install
rails generate ahoy:install
rails db:migrate

Restart your web server, open a page in your browser, and a visit will be created 🎉

Track your first event from a controller with:

ahoy.track"My first event",language: "Ruby"

JavaScript, Native Apps, & AMP

Enable the API in config/initializers/ahoy.rb:

Ahoy.api=true

And restart your web server.

JavaScript

For Importmap (Rails 7+ default), add to config/importmap.rb:

pin"ahoy",to: "ahoy.js"

And add to app/javascript/application.js:

import"ahoy"

For Bun, esbuild, rollup.js, or Webpack, run:

bun add ahoy.js
# or
yarn add ahoy.js

And add to app/javascript/application.js:

importahoyfrom"ahoy.js"

For Sprockets, add to app/assets/javascripts/application.js:

//= require ahoy

Track an event with:

ahoy.track("My second event",{language: "JavaScript"});

Native Apps

Check out Ahoy iOS and Ahoy Android.

Geocoding Setup

To enable geocoding, see the Geocoding section.

GDPR Compliance

Ahoy provides a number of options to help with GDPR compliance. See the GDPR section for more info.

How It Works

Visits

When someone visits your website, Ahoy creates a visit with lots of useful information.

traffic source - referrer, referring domain, landing page
location - country, region, city, latitude, longitude
technology - browser, OS, device type
utm parameters - source, medium, term, content, campaign

Use the current_visit method to access it.

Prevent certain Rails actions from creating visits with:

skip_before_action:track_ahoy_visit

This is typically useful for APIs. If your entire Rails app is an API, you can use:

Ahoy.api_only=true

You can also defer visit tracking to JavaScript. This is useful for preventing bots (that aren’t detected by their user agent) and users with cookies disabled from creating a new visit on each request. :when_needed will create visits server-side only when needed by events, and false will disable server-side creation completely, discarding events without a visit.

Ahoy.server_side_visits=:when_needed

Events

Each event has a name and properties. There are several ways to track events.

Ruby

ahoy.track"Viewed book",title: "Hot, Flat, and Crowded"

Track actions automatically with:

classApplicationController < ActionController::Baseafter_action:track_actionprotecteddeftrack_actionahoy.track"Ran action",request.path_parametersendend

JavaScript

ahoy.track("Viewed book",{title: "The World is Flat"});

See Ahoy.js for a complete list of features.

Native Apps

See the docs for Ahoy iOS and Ahoy Android.

AMP

<head><scriptasynccustom-element="amp-analytics" src="https://cdn.ampproject.org/v0/amp-analytics-0.1.js"></script></head><body><%=amp_event"Viewed article",title: "Analytics with Rails"%></body>

Associated Models

Say we want to associate orders with visits. Just add visitable to the model.

classOrder < ApplicationRecordvisitable:ahoy_visitend

When a visitor places an order, the ahoy_visit_id column is automatically set 🎉

See where orders are coming from with simple joins:

Order.joins(:ahoy_visit).group("referring_domain").countOrder.joins(:ahoy_visit).group("city").countOrder.joins(:ahoy_visit).group("device_type").count

Here’s what the migration to add the ahoy_visit_id column should look like:

classAddAhoyVisitToOrders < ActiveRecord::Migration[8.1]defchangeadd_reference:orders,:ahoy_visitendend

Customize the column with:

visitable:sign_up_visit

Users

Ahoy automatically attaches the current_user to the visit. With Devise, it attaches the user even if they sign in after the visit starts.

With other authentication frameworks, add this to the end of your sign in method:

ahoy.authenticate(user)

To see the visits for a given user, create an association:

classUser < ApplicationRecordhas_many:visits,class_name: "Ahoy::Visit"end

And use:

User.find(123).visits

Custom User Method

Use a method besides current_user

Ahoy.user_method=:true_user

or use a proc

Ahoy.user_method=->(controller){controller.true_user}

Doorkeeper

To attach the user with Doorkeeper, be sure you have a current_resource_owner method in ApplicationController.

classApplicationController < ActionController::Baseprivatedefcurrent_resource_ownerUser.find(doorkeeper_token.resource_owner_id)ifdoorkeeper_tokenendend

Exclusions

Bots are excluded from tracking by default. To include them, use:

Ahoy.track_bots=true

Add your own rules with:

Ahoy.exclude_method=lambdado |controller,request|
request.ip == "192.168.1.1"end

Visit Duration

By default, a new visit is created after 4 hours of inactivity. Change this with:

Ahoy.visit_duration=30.minutes

Visitor Duration

By default, a new visitor_token is generated after 2 years. Change this with:

Ahoy.visitor_duration=30.days

Cookies

To track visits across multiple subdomains, use:

Ahoy.cookie_domain=:all

Set other cookie options with:

Ahoy.cookie_options={same_site: :lax}

You can also disable cookies

Token Generation

Ahoy uses random UUIDs for visit and visitor tokens by default, but you can use your own generator like ULID.

Ahoy.token_generator=->{ULID.generate}

Throttling

You can use Rack::Attack to throttle requests to the API.

classRack::Attackthrottle("ahoy/ip",limit: 20,period: 1.minute)do |req|
ifreq.path.start_with?("/ahoy/")req.ipendendend

Exceptions

Exceptions are rescued so analytics do not break your app. Ahoy uses Safely to try to report them to a service by default. To customize this, use:

Safely.report_exception_method=->(e){Rollbar.error(e)}

Geocoding

Ahoy uses Geocoder for geocoding. We recommend configuring local geocoding or load balancer geocoding so IP addresses are not sent to a 3rd party service. If you do use a 3rd party service and adhere to GDPR, be sure to add it to your subprocessor list. If Ahoy is configured to mask IPs, the masked IP is used (this can reduce accuracy but is better for privacy).

To enable geocoding, add this line to your application’s Gemfile:

gem"geocoder"

And update config/initializers/ahoy.rb:

Ahoy.geocode=true

Geocoding is performed in a background job so it doesn’t slow down web requests. The default job queue is :ahoy. Change this with:

Ahoy.job_queue=:low_priority

Local Geocoding

For privacy and performance, we recommend geocoding locally.

For city-level geocoding, download the GeoLite2 City database.

Add this line to your application’s Gemfile:

gem"maxminddb"

And create config/initializers/geocoder.rb with:

Geocoder.configure(ip_lookup: :geoip2,geoip2: {file: "path/to/GeoLite2-City.mmdb"})

For country-level geocoding, install the geoip-database package. It’s preinstalled on Heroku. For Ubuntu, use:

sudo apt-get install geoip-database

Add this line to your application’s Gemfile:

gem"geoip"

And create config/initializers/geocoder.rb with:

Geocoder.configure(ip_lookup: :maxmind_local,maxmind_local: {file: "/usr/share/GeoIP/GeoIP.dat",package: :country})

Load Balancer Geocoding

Some load balancers can add geocoding information to request headers.

Update config/initializers/ahoy.rb with:

Ahoy.geocode=falseclassAhoy::Store < Ahoy::DatabaseStoredeftrack_visit(data)data[:country]=request.headers["<country-header>"]data[:region]=request.headers["<region-header>"]data[:city]=request.headers["<city-header>"]super(data)endend

GDPR Compliance

Ahoy provides a number of options to help with GDPR compliance.

Update config/initializers/ahoy.rb with:

classAhoy::Store < Ahoy::DatabaseStoredefauthenticate(data)# disables automatic linking of visits and usersendendAhoy.mask_ips=trueAhoy.cookies=:none

This:

Masks IP addresses
Switches from cookies to anonymity sets
Disables automatic linking of visits and users

If you use JavaScript tracking, also set:

ahoy.configure({cookies: false});

IP Masking

Ahoy can mask IPs with the same approach Google Analytics uses for IP anonymization. This means:

For IPv4, the last octet is set to 0 (8.8.4.4 becomes 8.8.4.0)
For IPv6, the last 80 bits are set to zeros (2001:4860:4860:0:0:0:0:8844 becomes 2001:4860:4860::)

Ahoy.mask_ips=true

IPs are masked before geolocation is performed.

To mask previously collected IPs, use:

Ahoy::Visit.find_eachdo |visit|
visit.update_column:ip,Ahoy.mask_ip(visit.ip)end

Anonymity Sets & Cookies

Ahoy can switch from cookies to anonymity sets. Instead of cookies, visitors with the same IP mask and user agent are grouped together in an anonymity set.

Ahoy.cookies=:none

Note: If Ahoy was installed before v5, add an index before making this change.

Previously set cookies are automatically deleted. If you use JavaScript tracking, also set:

ahoy.configure({cookies: false});

Data Retention

Data should only be retained for as long as it’s needed. Delete older data with:

Ahoy::Visit.where("started_at < ?",2.years.ago).find_in_batchesdo |visits|
visit_ids=visits.map(&:id)Ahoy::Event.where(visit_id: visit_ids).delete_allAhoy::Visit.where(id: visit_ids).delete_allend

You can use Rollup to aggregate important data before you do.

Ahoy::Visit.rollup("Visits",interval: "hour")

Delete data for a specific user with:

user_id=123visit_ids=Ahoy::Visit.where(user_id: user_id).pluck(:id)Ahoy::Event.where(visit_id: visit_ids).delete_allAhoy::Visit.where(id: visit_ids).delete_allAhoy::Event.where(user_id: user_id).delete_all

Development

Ahoy is built with developers in mind. You can run the following code in your browser’s console.

Force a new visit

ahoy.reset();// then reload the page

Log messages

ahoy.debug();

Turn off logging

ahoy.debug(false);

Debug API requests in Ruby

Ahoy.quiet=false

Data Stores

Data tracked by Ahoy is sent to your data store. Ahoy ships with a data store that uses your Rails database by default. You can find it in config/initializers/ahoy.rb:

classAhoy::Store < Ahoy::DatabaseStoreend

There are four events data stores can subscribe to:

classAhoy::Store < Ahoy::BaseStoredeftrack_visit(data)# new visitenddeftrack_event(data)# new eventenddefgeocode(data)# visit geocodedenddefauthenticate(data)# user authenticatesendend

Data stores are designed to be highly customizable so you can scale as you grow. Check out examples for Kafka, RabbitMQ, Fluentd, NATS, NSQ, and Amazon Kinesis Firehose.

Track Additional Data

classAhoy::Store < Ahoy::DatabaseStoredeftrack_visit(data)data[:accept_language]=request.headers["Accept-Language"]super(data)endend

Two useful methods you can use are request and controller.

You can pass additional visit data from JavaScript with:

ahoy.configure({visitParams: {referral_code: 123}});

And use:

classAhoy::Store < Ahoy::DatabaseStoredeftrack_visit(data)data[:referral_code]=request.parameters[:referral_code]super(data)endend

Use Different Models

classAhoy::Store < Ahoy::DatabaseStoredefvisit_modelMyVisitenddefevent_modelMyEventendend

Explore the Data

Blazer is a great tool for exploring your data.

With Active Record, you can do:

Ahoy::Visit.group(:search_keyword).countAhoy::Visit.group(:country).countAhoy::Visit.group(:referring_domain).count

Chartkick and Groupdate make it easy to visualize the data.

<%= line_chart Ahoy::Visit.group_by_day(:started_at).count %>

Querying Events

Ahoy provides a few methods on the event model to make querying easier.

To query on both name and properties, you can use:

Ahoy::Event.where_event("Viewed product",product_id: 123).count

Or just query properties with:

Ahoy::Event.where_props(product_id: 123,category: "Books").count

Group by properties with:

Ahoy::Event.group_prop(:product_id,:category).count

Note: MySQL and MariaDB always return string keys (including "null" for nil) for group_prop.

Funnels

It’s easy to create funnels.

viewed_store_ids=Ahoy::Event.where(name: "Viewed store").distinct.pluck(:user_id)added_item_ids=Ahoy::Event.where(user_id: viewed_store_ids,name: "Added item to cart").distinct.pluck(:user_id)viewed_checkout_ids=Ahoy::Event.where(user_id: added_item_ids,name: "Viewed checkout").distinct.pluck(:user_id)

The same approach also works with visitor tokens.

Rollups

Improve query performance by pre-aggregating data with Rollup.

Ahoy::Event.where(name: "Viewed store").rollup("Store views")

This is only needed if you have a lot of data.

Forecasting

To forecast future visits and events, check out Prophet.

daily_visits=Ahoy::Visit.group_by_day(:started_at).count# uses GroupdateProphet.forecast(daily_visits)

Anomaly Detection

To detect anomalies in visits and events, check out AnomalyDetection.rb.

daily_visits=Ahoy::Visit.group_by_day(:started_at).count# uses GroupdateAnomalyDetection.detect(daily_visits,period: 7)

Breakout Detection

To detect breakouts in visits and events, check out Breakout.

daily_visits=Ahoy::Visit.group_by_day(:started_at).count# uses GroupdateBreakout.detect(daily_visits)

Recommendations

To make recommendations based on events, check out Disco.

Tutorials

Tracking Metrics with Ahoy and Blazer

API Spec

Visits

Generate visit and visitor tokens as UUIDs, and include these values in the Ahoy-Visit and Ahoy-Visitor headers with all requests.

Send a POST request to /ahoy/visits with Content-Type: application/json and a body like:

{
"visit_token": "<visit-token>",
"visitor_token": "<visitor-token>",
"platform": "iOS",
"app_version": "1.0.0",
"os_version": "11.2.6"
}

After 4 hours of inactivity, create another visit (use the same visitor token).

Events

Send a POST request to /ahoy/events with Content-Type: application/json and a body like:

{
"visit_token": "<visit-token>",
"visitor_token": "<visitor-token>",
"events": [
{
"id": "<optional-random-id>",
"name": "Viewed item",
"properties": {
"item_id": 123
},
"time": "2025-01-01T00:00:00-07:00"
}
]
}

History

View the changelog

Contributing

Everyone is encouraged to help improve this project. Here are a few ways you can help:

Report bugs
Fix bugs and submit pull requests
Write, clarify, or fix documentation
Suggest or add new features

To get started with development:

git clone https://github.com/ankane/ahoy.git
cd ahoy
bundle install
bundle exec rake test

To test different adapters, use:

ADAPTER=postgresql bundle exec rake test
ADAPTER=mysql2 bundle exec rake test
ADAPTER=mongoid bundle exec rake test

Name		Name	Last commit message	Last commit date
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.github		.github
app/controllers/ahoy		app/controllers/ahoy
config		config
docs		docs
gemfiles		gemfiles
lib		lib
test		test
vendor/assets/javascripts		vendor/assets/javascripts
.gitignore		.gitignore
CHANGELOG.md		CHANGELOG.md
CONTRIBUTING.md		CONTRIBUTING.md
Gemfile		Gemfile
LICENSE.txt		LICENSE.txt
README.md		README.md
Rakefile		Rakefile
ahoy_matey.gemspec		ahoy_matey.gemspec

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Ahoy

Installation

JavaScript, Native Apps, & AMP

JavaScript

Native Apps

Geocoding Setup

GDPR Compliance

How It Works

Visits

Events

Ruby

JavaScript

Native Apps

AMP

Associated Models

Users

Custom User Method

Doorkeeper

Exclusions

Visit Duration

Visitor Duration

Cookies

Token Generation

Throttling

Exceptions

Geocoding

Local Geocoding

Load Balancer Geocoding

GDPR Compliance

IP Masking

Anonymity Sets & Cookies

Data Retention

Development

Data Stores

Track Additional Data

Use Different Models

Explore the Data

Querying Events

Funnels

Rollups

Forecasting

Anomaly Detection

Breakout Detection

Recommendations

Tutorials

API Spec

Visits

Events

History

Contributing

About

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