Getting started with GA4
The GOV.UK Google Analytics 4 (GA4) data contains a variety of information on users of GOV.UK, and how those users interacted with various pages on GOV.UK.
How to login
The GOV.UK GA4 interface can be found at https://analytics.google.com/analytics/web/.
If you are not logged in to your Google account when trying to open the above link, Google will prompt you to log in. You will have to log in using a Google account which has been granted access to GOV.UK GA4 data in order to be able to access the GOV.UK GA4 interface.
If you do not have permissisons to access the GOV.UK GA4 property, you will need to sort this before you can login and access the data. To get access to the GOV.UK GA4 data, please follow the steps in our GOV.UK GA access policy.
Google Analytics interface navigation
The interface may not be the best tool to explore the data, depending on your needs, but it’s still useful to know how to navigate it.
Google provide some guidance on how to find your way around GA4 which may help understand the basics.
If you use both GOV.UK’s analytics and another account’s analytics interface (for example, if you also use GA4 data collected by your department or on Blogs or Campaigns sites) you will want to know how to navigate between these different accounts and properties. This can be done using the menu opened by clicking on the current property’s name in the top-left corner of the interface, between the analytics logo and the search bar. In this menu you should find all of the Analytics accounts and properties you have permissions to access.
Within each property, the ‘Explore’ section will probably be of particular interest to most data users, as this is where you can build custom tables to analyse the data. This can be accessed via the left-hand navigation pane.
How to use GA4 data
Other guidance in this section will help you understand more about what you can learn from GOV.UK’s GA4 data and how you can find specific pieces of information in the data.
Explorations are likely to be one of the most useful tools for most users analysing GOV.UK GA4 data. Guidance on using explorations is available in Google’s support documentation, and some best practice advice is available on the page on Google Analytics 4 user interface best practice.
There is also some best practice worth bearing in mind when working with the data in other tools, and this can be found in our best practice guidance.
Sharing GA4 data and reports
You can export data from reports and explorations by downloading to PDF, CSV, or exporting to Google Sheets. Explorations can also be shared with others within the interface, by clicking to ‘Share exploration’ in the top-right corner. Explorations can only be shared in read-only mode; others will have to duplicate your exploration if they wish to make changes.
You can also use the GA4 data in Looker Studio or other visualisation tools, and then share those reports with others.
GA4 resources
As well as the guidance on this site and links provided above, you may find the following useful:
- GOV.UK GA4 Implementation Record - details the GOV.UK GA4 implementation
- Google’s GA4 Dimensions & Metrics Explorer and GA4 Query Explorer
- Google’s support notes on common analytics questions in GA4
- The GA4 Reporting Playbook
The GOV.UK Analytics team, along with other GDS Performance Analysts, may also periodically share videos and other resources via the cross-government performance analytics communities on Basecamp and Slack. You can also use these communities to contact others who use GA4 data and ask for help.
If you have questions for the Analytics team, please contact us via the GA4 support inbox.
Other tools
As well as Google Analytics, other tools may help you when assessing the performance of your pages or improving content.
These include: