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How are active users counted in GA4?
Active users = distinct users with an engaged session, a first visit or recorded engagement time
Source: Analytics Help, Understand user metrics.
Each person counts once over the period, however many times they came. GA4 tells people apart with the reporting identity you chose: a user ID when your site sends one, otherwise the device's cookie. The same person on a phone and a laptop counts twice without a user ID.
GA4 has two other user counts. Total users counts everyone who triggered any event, engaged or not. New users counts first visits only. Active users is the default because it leaves out drive-by visits.
Why days never add up to the week
A person who visits on Monday and Thursday is one active user that week but appears in both days. Only Google Analytics can total a period, because only it knows who came back.
| Active users | |
|---|---|
| Sum of the 7 daily figures | 2,900 |
| The week, as GA4 counts it | 2,240 |
| Difference | 660 extra counts of people who came back |
Versus Google Ads
Google Ads counts clicks and interactions, never people on your site. 1,000 clicks can come from 700 people. Comparing clicks with active users mixes two units.
Where do you find active users in GA4?
- In Google Analytics, open Reports, then Reports snapshot: Active users is the first card.
- Reports, then User attributes or Tech, splits it by country, age or device.
- Admin, then Data display, then Reporting identity, shows which method GA4 uses to tell people apart.
How does Optizads read active users?
Active users heads the Visitors group in Add a metric. Total users, New users and Sessions per active user sit beside it.
Optizads reads the period's figure from Google Analytics for the exact days asked, so a person seen on two days is one user, as in GA4. It never adds days together for any user count.
The rolling counts, 1-day, 7-day and 28-day active users, are a different read. Optizads shows the figure of the period's last day, as GA4 does. A 28-day active users card for March reads the 28 days up to 31 March.
What are the common mistakes with active users?
- Adding daily active users to get a week or a month.
- Comparing Active users in one tool with Total users in another. They count different people.
- Changing the reporting identity and comparing across the change.
- Dividing Google Ads clicks by active users and calling it a click-per-person rate.
Related terms
- Google tag: The piece of code on your website that sends conversions and site data to Google Ads and Google Analytics.
- KPI (key performance indicator): The number an account is judged on, such as cost per lead or ROAS.
Related metrics
- Sessions (GA4): A session in Google Analytics 4 is one visit to your site or app, opened by the session_start event.
- Average engagement time (GA4): Average engagement time in Google Analytics 4 is the time your site spent on screen and in focus, divided by active users.
- Cart-to-view rate (GA4): Cart-to-view rate in Google Analytics 4 is the number of users who added a product to their cart, divided by the number of users who viewed that product.
- Engaged sessions (GA4): An engaged session in Google Analytics 4 is a visit that lasted longer than 10 seconds, viewed at least two pages or screens, or triggered a key event.
