Hey there, Benjamin from Loves Data here! Welcome back! In this video, I'm going to explain the
difference between four of the user metrics you can find in Google Analytics 4 (GA4). We're going
to look at 'Total Users', 'Active Users', 'New Users', and 'Returning Users'. Let's get started!
You've probably seen 'Users' (or 'Total Users') in GA4. This metric tells you the total number
of people who've been to your website based on the date range selected for your reports.
Now, I said people, because I like to keep things simple, but really the total number of users
is the total number of reporting identities that have been collected by Google Analytics.
A reporting identity can be a User ID that you've sent to Google Analytics.
For example, if people can log in on your website or app, then you can send your own identifier for
each individual to Google Analytics. Or a reporting identity can be a Device ID.
If you've implemented GA4 on your website, then this will be the Client ID from the Google
Analytics cookie. If you're measuring an app, this will be the identifier from the app installed on
the user's device, so the app-instance ID. And if you've enabled Google Signals, then this can be
used to identify an individual as they engage with your website or app. (I'll talk more about Google
Signals in a moment.) You can control how GA4 handles reporting identifies for your property.
Let's head to Google Analytics to take a look... To check how reporting identifiers are being used,
you can navigate to 'Admin'... And choose 'Default Reporting Identity' in the property column...
We can see for this property that GA4 will make use of User ID, then Google Signals, and then
the Device ID to identify users on the website. So if you're sending your own identifier for users,
this will be used first. Then if this isn't available, users will be identified by Google
Signals and finally, if that isn't available, then the Device ID will be used. Okay, so what is
Google Signals? Google Signals is a feature that can give you additional insights about your users.
Once enabled, your reports can include aggregated and anonymous data for people who are logged into
their Google account as they browse your website. So if someone is logged in and they're opted-in
to 'Ad Personalization', then you can see how they engage with your website across multiple devices.
This means the feature can improve the accuracy of your user metrics. Google Signals is also required
if you want to create remarketing campaigns in Google Ads using audiences from Google Analytics.
And it's also required if you want to collect demographic and interest data into your reports.
Let's head back to Google Analytics to see where we enable Google Signals... We're still
in the admin area, so we need to select 'Data Settings'... And then 'Data Collection'...
Since the switch at the top is off, it means Google Signals isn't enabled. You'll need
to take a minute to read through the details. When you enable Google Signals you are agreeing
to Google's Advertising Features Policy, so you might need to adjust your privacy policy
and complete some other steps. So I encourage you to read through the details.
When you're ready, you can click the button to enable Google Signals...
This will now mean that you Google Signals can be used to identify individuals as they access your
website. If you have a smaller-scale website, then you might not see much of a difference in
your reports, since only a small percentage of people will be logged into their Google account.
So if, like most people, you're not sending your own User ID to Google Analytics. The
total number of users you see in your reports will include the total number of Client IDs
from the Google Analytics cookie and any available data from Google Signals
(if you've enabled the feature). Okay, so what's the difference between a user and an active user
in GA4? Well, a user is considered active when they've had a page on your website visible
on their device for at least one second. So if someone navigates straight to your website and
spends at least one second viewing your content, then they will be counted as an active user.
But if someone opens your website in a new tab and it's hidden (so it's not in focus), then
they won't be considered an active user until they select the tab. Let's take a look at an example...
We're looking at the Google search results. And I'm going to open my website in a hidden tab
by right-clicking and selecting 'Open Link in New Tab'...
We can see the website has loaded, but it's not in focus, it's hidden. So this means
a page view event has been set to GA4 and we will be reported as a user, but at this stage,
we're not considered an active user. Let's head to Google Analytics...
We're looking at the DebugView which lets us send events to GA4 and drill down on each event
to view the parameters. I'm not going to go into detail on how to use the DebugView in this video,
so let me know in the comments if you would like me to cover it in a future video.
Anyway, looking at the DebugView, we can see some events have come through, including a
page view event for the page I just loaded in the hidden tab. Okay, now let's open the hidden tab...
My website is now in focus and let's navigate to another page...
I've definitely spent at least a second on the website, so let's head back to the DebugView...
We can now see the second page view, and we can also see a user engagement event
has been triggered. Let's select this event... We can see a parameter called
'engangement_time_msec' has also been sent with the event. And this parameter includes
the number of milliseconds I spent on the website before the event was sent.
So the number of active users is based on the 'user_engagement' event
and the 'engagement_time_msec' parameter that is automatically collected by GA4. And you're likely
to find these metrics are very similar, but you might have slightly fewer active users compared to
total users since some people might open a hidden tab and close it before ever seeing your website.
To see this, let's navigate to 'Explore'... And create a new exploration report from scratch...
Let's enable two metrics for the report... Let's enable 'Total Users'... And 'Active Users'...
And click 'Apply'... Now let's add these two metrics under 'Values'...
And we can see that for Google's demo property, there's a difference of 94 users
between the two metrics. This brings us to new and returning users. A new user is anybody who
is visiting your website for the first time. Google Analytics checks to see if a user has
an existing cookie and client ID, if they don't, they're considered a new user in your reports.
There are a number of impacts on the number of new users you will see in your reports. The main
things to consider are that people clearing their cookies will be seen as new users when
they return to your website. Privacy-focused web browsers only save cookies for short periods.
And people using multiple devices will also be reported as two separate users (apart from those
measured by Google Signals). A returning user is someone who has already been to your website.
This means Google Analytics has found an existing cookie and client ID in their browser,
so your reports will include them in the number of returning users. Since Google Analytics can
see they've been to your website before, you can be confident that your number of returning users
is accurate. While the number of new users you see in your report is impacted for the reasons
we've already covered. So that's the difference between the 'Total Users', 'Active Users',
'New Users', and 'Returning Users' metrics in GA4. Remember that people need to spend at least
one second on your website and your website needs to be visible for them to be counted as
active users. Are there any terms in Google Analytics you're struggling to understand?
Let me know in the comments below! And as always, if you found this video helpful,
please like it so I know to make more videos like this one. See you in the next video!