Understand Engagement
Without Persistent User Tracking
Session-based analytics gives you actionable engagement metrics while maintaining strong user privacy protections. No persistent identifiers, no cross-session tracking, designed with privacy as the priority.
Session Metrics Dashboard
Comprehensive engagement analytics without compromising user privacy
Events per Session
Distribution of engagement depth across sessions
Hourly Patterns
When your users are most active (with timezone support)
Session Duration
How long users engage with your app
Session Conversion
Percentage of sessions that convert
The Privacy Advantage
How session-based analytics protects user privacy while delivering actionable insights
User-Based Analytics
With persistent user identifiers
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⚠️
Persistent User IDs
Tracks same user across sessions, days, devices
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⚠️
Device Storage Required
Writes identifiers to disk (UserDefaults, Keychain)
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⚠️
Personal Data Stored
Writes identifiers to device, retains personal data
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⚠️
Retention Cohorts
Can track D1, D7, D30 retention (but privacy cost)
Trade-off: Rich user-level insights at the cost of storing personal data and increased privacy compliance complexity.
Session-Based Analytics
Respectlytics approach
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✅
2-Hour Rotating Session IDs
Automatically rotates every 2 hours or on app restart
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✅
RAM-Only Storage
Session IDs never written to device storage
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✅
No Personal Data Retained
Privacy by design—may reduce compliance complexity in many jurisdictions
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✅
Session Quality Metrics
Depth, duration, patterns—all privacy-safe
Design Choice: Intentionally cannot track users across sessions. This is a feature, not a limitation—it's privacy by design.
How Session IDs Work
Our SDK generates session identifiers that protect privacy by design
App Launch
SDK generates a new random session ID in memory
RAM Only
Never written to disk—lost when app closes
2-Hour Rotation
Session ID automatically rotates after 2 hours of use
Server-Side Hash
Session ID is hashed server-side with daily salt
// Session ID lifecycle in Respectlytics SDK
class SessionManager {
// Generated fresh on each app launch
private var sessionId: String = UUID().uuidString
private var sessionStart: Date = Date()
func getSessionId() -> String {
// Rotate after 2 hours
if Date().timeIntervalSince(sessionStart) > 7200 {
sessionId = UUID().uuidString
sessionStart = Date()
}
return sessionId
}
// Note: sessionId is NEVER persisted to UserDefaults,
// Keychain, or any device storage. RAM only.
}Actionable Use Cases
What you can learn from session-based analytics
Peak Engagement Hours
Identify when sessions are most active and have the highest conversion rates. Use this to time push notifications, feature releases, and marketing campaigns.
Example insight: "Sessions starting at 2 PM have 3x higher conversion than 8 AM sessions"
Session Depth Patterns
Understand how deep users engage in a single session. Sessions with 11+ events convert at 18.4% vs 2.1% for shallow sessions—focus on increasing depth.
Example insight: "Sessions that reach the pricing page have 5x conversion lift"
Platform Comparison
Compare session behavior across iOS, Android, and Web. Identify which platform has longer sessions, deeper engagement, and higher conversion.
Example insight: "iOS sessions average 5.2 minutes vs Android at 3.8 minutes"
Frequently Asked Questions
What is session-based analytics?
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How is this different from other analytics solutions?
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How does Respectlytics protect user privacy?
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Can I do retention analysis without user tracking?
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What engagement metrics can I track?
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Ready for Privacy-First Analytics?
Get session-based engagement metrics without relying on persistent user tracking. Privacy by design, session-based analytics, no persistent user tracking.