In web and app analytics, sessions are the foundation of most user-level metrics. However, GA4 fundamentally redefines sessions compared to Universal Analytics (UA). Where UA relied heavily on time-based rules, cookies, and pageview hits, GA4 is event-driven, focusing on user engagement and cross-device tracking. Understanding GA4 sessions is critical to correctly interpreting metrics like…
Marketing teams constantly ask: “Which channel truly drives conversions?” GA4 provides user-level metrics and event data, but discrepancies between the GA4 interface and BigQuery exports can make attribution tricky. For example, Active Users or New Users may not match when you try to analyze traffic by campaign, source, or medium in BigQuery. This guide…
Understanding the difference between new and returning users is critical for marketers and analysts who care about user acquisition, retention, and behavior trends. While GA4 simplifies many things, it doesn’t directly provide an easy way to segment returning users—especially if you want to go beyond default reports. This deep dive walks you through how…
When Consent Mode is enabled in GA4, your session reporting gets a bit trickier — especially if you’re working with raw event data in BigQuery. If a user hasn’t granted analytics consent (analytics_storage = ‘granted’), GA4 won’t assign session or user IDs. That means no session continuity and no proper attribution. But if you’re…