Google turns off Universal Analytics July 1: What you need to know
Universal Analytics shuts down on July 1, 2024, forcing a swift transition to Google Analytics 4 to maintain data access and measurement capabilities.
Google is discontinuing Universal Analytics, its legacy web analytics platform. This is the final shift in the transition to Google Analytics 4 (GA4).
Why it matters. Businesses that relied on Universal Analytics for website measurement and data analysis need to act quickly to avoid losing access to their historical data and maintain continuity in their analytics capabilities.
Key dates.
- July 1: Users will lose access to Universal Analytics data and interface.
- After July 1: All Universal Analytics data will be permanently deleted.
Why we care. We’ve finally reached the “now or never” moment. Export your historical data or you’ll lose it all in July.
The big picture. This transition marks a significant shift in Google’s analytics offerings, with GA4 designed to be more privacy-focused and adaptable to future changes in technology and regulations. However, search marketers remain unimpressed with GA4 – many of them still absolutely hate GA4.
Details:
- Universal Analytics properties are identifiable by tracking codes starting with “UA-“.
- Google has been automatically creating GA4 properties for users since March 2023.
- Several features, including real-time reports and certain advertising capabilities, have already been deprecated.
- There will be no visibility of historical UA bidding, audience or conversion data.
- Universal Analytics 360 contract holders will no longer be able to create standard Universal Analytics properties.
- Publisher or other product integrations (e.g. UA audience list, BigQuery exports, UA API requests) will be unavailable when services have stopped.
What to do.
- Export your Universal Analytics data before July 1, 2024.
- Set up and configure a Google Analytics 4 property if you haven’t already.
- Migrate Google Ads links and create new conversions based on GA4 events.
What they are saying. I asked Google Ads Liaison Ginny Marvin whether there will be exceptions to people having access to UA and on X she said:
“Universal Analytics 360 properties currently in an active BigQuery backfill will show in the interface for the full duration of that backfill. Correctly configured BigQuery backfills that start on or before June 30, 2024 will continue until completion, even if that date is after July 1, 2024.”
Bottom line. If you haven’t already, you need to act swiftly to preserve your historical Google Universal Analytics data.
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About the author
In 2008, Anu's career started with delivering digital marketing campaigns (mostly but not exclusively Paid Search) by building strategies, maximising ROI, automating repetitive processes and bringing efficiency from every part of marketing departments through inspiring leadership both on agency, client and marketing tech side.