GDPR requires you to request consent for any cookies the “could” be used to identify you, which makes them personal information.
So if you want to use cookies to link a user’s sessions on your own website together (without actually identifying them) so every request doesn’t look like a totally anonymous, opaque request, then you must show a cookie banner.
You could (presumably) do this through browser fingerprinting and not require consent (since you don’t actually enrich/link the browser fingerprint to be become user data) but you need a cookie banner if you do it with a cookie.
So if you want to use cookies to link a user’s sessions on your own website together (without actually identifying them) so every request doesn’t look like a totally anonymous, opaque request, then you must show a cookie banner.
You could (presumably) do this through browser fingerprinting and not require consent (since you don’t actually enrich/link the browser fingerprint to be become user data) but you need a cookie banner if you do it with a cookie.