Dual Tagging for Google Analytics 4

Since the announcement of Google Analytics 4, a question we regularly get is:

Should I make the switch to Google Analytics 4?

This is a difficult and easy question all at once. The easy part is that Google has given us a heads up about GA4 because they intend to deprecate Universal Analytics – so in short, at some point, you will be forced to embrace GA4. The difficult part is that GA4 is still a work in progress, so making GA4 your primary analytics platform is not advised.

The compromise here is to set up dual tagging.

Dual tagging means implementing both a Google Analytics 4 property and a Universal Analytics property.

For every tag that you currently have set up in GTM, you will need to set up a corresponding tag in GTM for GA4. You will need to replicate this process until all of your current UA tags have parallel GA4 tags.

This is how dual tagging works for your website

The flow is similar for your app

By implementing dual tagging now you’re able to capture your historical data into the GA4 property before you’re forced to migrate. That way you’ll have a multi-year look-back window of your data. You won’t be stuck flipping between multiple properties to stitch together reports when your current analytics property finally gets ‘shut off’.

We liken this concept of having both UA and GA4 to that of a website. On your website, you likely have a staging site and your live production site. Your staging site is GA4. You can go in, play around with things, test things, and get comfortable with the changes you’re making. But at some point, you’re going to push staging to production.

Read our blog post Implementing Google Analytics 4 on your website to learn more about Dual Tagging.