Alejandro Rioja.
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How To Use Google Analytics: A 2026 Beginner's Guide

Alejandro Rioja
Alejandro Rioja
11 min read
TL;DR

GA4 replaced Universal Analytics in July 2023. This guide walks through setup, the events-based data model, the four core report sections, Explorations, and how to connect GA4 with Search Console.

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What is Google Analytics 4?

GA4 is Google’s free web and app analytics platform. It collects data about your visitors and surfaces it as reports you can use to improve traffic, engagement, and conversions.

The main things it tells you:

GA4 integrates with Google Search Console, Google Ads, BigQuery, and Looker Studio. For most independent operators and small teams, the free tier is more than sufficient. There is a paid tier (GA4 360) for large enterprises that need higher data limits, SLAs, and unsampled exports — it is expensive (verify current pricing with Google’s sales team).

Why the shift to GA4 matters

Universal Analytics tracked “sessions.” A session was a bucket of hits that expired after 30 minutes of inactivity or at midnight. GA4 dropped that model. Everything is an event with parameters.

A pageview in GA4 is just an event called page_view. A scroll past 90% of the page fires scroll. Clicking an outbound link fires click. You can add any custom parameter to any event.

The practical upside: you can measure anything without writing custom JavaScript for every interaction. GA4 auto-collects about a dozen events by default (pageviews, scrolls, outbound clicks, site search, video engagement, file downloads). You turn on “enhanced measurement” in the property settings and they all fire automatically.

The downside: metric definitions changed. “Bounce rate” in GA4 is the inverse of “engagement rate” — a session is “engaged” if it lasted more than 10 seconds, had a conversion event, or had two or more pageviews. That means a bounce rate of 60% in GA4 is not the same number as 60% in Universal Analytics. Do not compare old UA data to new GA4 data directly.

Is GA4 free?

The standard property is free. You get unlimited data collection (subject to event limits), 14 months of data retention by default (configurable up to 14 months in the free tier — verify current limits), and access to all the reports described below.

GA4 360 is the paid enterprise tier. It extends data retention, raises event limits, enables unsampled reports, and adds more granular controls. Pricing is not public — you negotiate with Google’s sales team. For anyone running a personal site, a blog, or a small e-commerce store, the free tier covers everything you need.

Setting up GA4

Create a property

  1. Go to analytics.google.com and sign in with your Google account.
  2. Click Admin (the gear icon, bottom left).
  3. Under Account, click Create Account if you need a new one, or select an existing account.
  4. Under Property, click Create Property.
  5. Name your property, set your reporting time zone and currency, and click Next.
  6. Answer the business-type questions — these pre-populate some reports but don’t lock anything in.
  7. Choose Web as the platform (or iOS/Android if you’re measuring an app).
  8. Enter your website URL and stream name.
  9. Click Create stream.

GA4 gives you a Measurement ID (format: G-XXXXXXXXXX). This is what connects your site to the property.

Add the tracking code

There are three main ways to get GA4 collecting data:

Option 1 — Google Tag Manager (recommended for most sites)

If you already use GTM, add a new tag: Tag type → Google Tag, enter your Measurement ID. Set the trigger to “All Pages.” Publish. Done.

Option 2 — Direct code snippet

Paste the gtag.js snippet Google provides directly into the <head> of every page. On a WordPress site, most themes have a “header scripts” field in their customizer. Otherwise, use a plugin like “Insert Headers and Footers.”

Option 3 — CMS native integration

Shopify, Squarespace, Wix, Webflow, and similar platforms have a dedicated field for a GA4 Measurement ID in their analytics settings. No code editing required.

Verify it’s working: open your GA4 property and go to Reports → Realtime. Open your site in a new tab. Within a few seconds you should see “1 user in last 30 min.” If you see nothing after two minutes, check that the Measurement ID is correct and that no ad blocker is interfering.

Enhanced measurement

In Admin → Data Streams → your stream → Enhanced measurement, turn everything on. This enables automatic tracking of scroll depth, outbound clicks, site search, video engagement, and file downloads — without writing a single line of custom code.

Linking Search Console

GA4 can surface your Google Search Console data (queries, impressions, clicks) directly inside the Analytics interface. To link them:

Admin → Property Settings → Product links → Search Console links → Add.

Select your Search Console property and choose your web stream. After a day or two, a “Search Console” section appears under Acquisition in your reports. This shows which search queries brought people to your site alongside their on-site behavior — one of the most useful combinations in all of GA4.

Conversions (formerly Goals)

UA had “Goals.” GA4 has Conversions — these are events you mark as conversion events. Any event GA4 collects can be marked as a conversion.

Admin → Conversions → New conversion event → type the event name you want to track (e.g., generate_lead, purchase, form_submit). When that event fires, GA4 counts it as a conversion.

You can also create custom events in Admin → Events if you want to track something GA4 doesn’t collect by default.

The four main report sections

GA4’s left sidebar has four report categories: Realtime, Acquisition, Engagement, and Monetisation (plus User and Retention reports). Here’s what each is actually for.

Realtime

Realtime shows what’s happening on your site right now — users currently active, the pages they’re on, where they came from, and their geography. It updates every few seconds.

I use Realtime in two situations: immediately after launching a post (to confirm tracking is firing and traffic is landing) and during a time-sensitive campaign like a sale or product drop. Day-to-day, it is not a report I check regularly.

Acquisition

Acquisition answers: “How did people get here?”

The top-level Traffic acquisition report breaks your sessions into channels: Organic Search, Direct, Organic Social, Referral, Paid Search, Email, and so on. The User acquisition report shows the same breakdown but for first-time visitors only — useful for understanding where your new audience is coming from.

Key things to look at here:

Engagement

Engagement is where you understand what happens after someone arrives.

Pages and screens shows your most-visited pages with views, users, average engagement time, and conversions. This is the report I check most often — it tells me which content is pulling weight.

Events shows every event GA4 has collected, with counts. You can click any event to see the parameters attached.

Conversions shows only the events you marked as conversion events, with their counts and the sessions that produced them.

Landing pages shows which pages people enter your site on first — important for understanding which posts or pages are doing SEO work.

Monetisation

If you run an e-commerce store, this is where you find purchase funnels, revenue by item, and checkout drop-off. For a content site without e-commerce, this section is mostly empty unless you set up AdSense revenue reporting.

Explorations

Standard reports are good for monitoring. Explorations (left sidebar, the compass icon) is where analysis happens.

Explorations is a free-form workspace where you build custom data views. The most useful templates:

Funnel exploration — define a sequence of steps (e.g., landing page → product page → add to cart → purchase) and see where users drop off at each step. Critical for e-commerce and lead funnels.

Path exploration — shows the actual sequence of pages or events users navigate through. Useful for discovering unexpected user journeys.

Segment overlap — compare multiple audience segments to find users who fit more than one condition.

Free form — drag and drop any dimensions and metrics into a table or chart. This is the GA4 equivalent of a custom report.

Explorations data is not shared across users by default — each person in your account builds their own. If you want to share an exploration with a colleague, you can duplicate it and transfer ownership.

GA4 glossary for 2026

GA4 — 2026 FAQ

Does GA4 work with AI Overviews traffic from Google?

Sort of. When someone clicks a link from an AI Overview, that traffic typically shows up as Organic Search in GA4, same as a regular SERP click. You won’t see a dedicated “AI Overview” channel in GA4 — that granularity isn’t exposed yet. The practical implication: if your organic traffic drops while your Search Console impressions hold steady, AI Overviews may be absorbing clicks that no longer reach you. Use the Search Console integration to check query-level CTR trends.

What happened to Universal Analytics data?

Google stopped processing UA hits in July 2023. The historical data in UA properties was accessible in read-only mode until July 2024, after which Google deleted it. If you didn’t export your UA data before that deadline, it’s gone. All new tracking happens in GA4.

How long does GA4 store my data?

The free tier stores event-level data for 2 months by default, but you can extend it to 14 months in Admin → Data Settings → Data Retention. Aggregated report data is available longer. If you need raw event data for more than 14 months, link GA4 to BigQuery (free for moderate volumes — verify current BigQuery pricing) and export continuously.

Can GA4 track across a website and a mobile app?

Yes — this is one of GA4’s key improvements over Universal Analytics. A single GA4 property can have multiple data streams (one web, one iOS, one Android). Reports show unified user behavior across platforms. You need to implement the Firebase SDK on the app side and ensure user IDs are shared if you want cross-device stitching.

Related reading:

This guide is part of alejandrorioja.com — written by Alejandro Rioja, who now builds AI agent systems for founders. Including the agent that keeps this site current. How it works →

Updated for May 2026

Google’s 2026 story is AI Overviews everywhere: the SGE experiment from 2023 graduated to a default feature in May 2024 and now appears on an estimated ~60% of US informational queries. For SEO and ad operators:

The “how Google makes money” answer in 2026: still Search ads (dominant), but YouTube ads, Cloud, and Subscriptions (YouTube Premium + Google One) are all material lines now.

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