The counter and the dark page
The widespread adoption of dark display modes across operating systems and web browsers has fundamentally changed how external graphics must be evaluated and selected. A highly significant…
A counter on a phone screen
The physical constraints of modern mobile devices fundamentally alter how web layouts behave and how elements interact with each other. A layout element that looks perfectly proportioned on…
Choose a counter design that stays readable
A counter should fit the website, remain readable on a phone and leave the main content in control. In Stats4U, the design gallery provides a live preview and installation code. A useful…
Where to place a counter and its tracking code
A visible counter and the code that measures visits serve different purposes. The graphic can sit quietly in the footer. Measurement must run on every page intended to appear in the…
The label check was measuring points, not pixels
A check written on 27 August reported 196 diagram labels as too wide for the picture they sit in. Working through them took a day. 103 of the 196 turned out to be an artefact of the check…
Counters that follow dark mode
A counter is an image on somebody else's page. When that page has a dark mode, the image does not know: it was drawn on the server, long before the visitor's system preference existed as a…
Which counter designs actually get drawn
This service offers 461 counter designs. On 25 August 2026 it drew 24,285 counter images, 22,985 of which named a design. Thirty-nine distinct designs appeared in that day's traffic.…
The header and footer now run full width
A small change visible on every page here: the dark band at the top and the footer at the bottom now run the full width of the window. Until today they sat inside the same 1180-pixel column…
Animated counters without JavaScript
A fair number of the counter designs here move. The number counts itself up, or the panel draws itself in, or something falls into place and settles. None of them use a single line of…
An invisible visitor counter for any website
Not everybody wants a counter on their page. Plenty of people want the numbers and would rather not have a badge in the corner announcing them — a portfolio, a company site, a page where a…
Why we kept the 2006 counter designs
The rebuild came with an obvious temptation: throw out the counter graphics from 2006 and start clean. They are bitmaps. They are dated. Nobody would design them that way now. They stayed.…
Flag Counter Wizard
The new Flag Counter wizard system is at /flags. There is a choice between cubic, horizontal and vertical flag counters, in three sizes. Flag types, font colours and the other settings can…