Tech

Google Analytics has an anti-tracking problem

Daniel Lockyer

Daniel Lockyer

— 1 min read

We've always known Google Analytics would be susceptible to anti-tracking extensions like AdBlock and uBlock Origin.

I never really thought about how big that difference would be. It was only when we started using Cloudflare on Nomad List and Remote OK that I started taking a look.

What I found has been staggering. Google Analytics can't account for a large proportion of the views that a site receives. This is a problem if you're using these page views to make business decisions, or for use in marketing.

(The numbers below are for the 30 day period from 2018/11/24 - 2018/12/24.)

My personal site:

  • Cloudflare: 4,698
  • Google Analytics: 916
  • Difference: -80.5%

Nomad List:

  • Cloudflare: 394,913
  • Google Analytics: 185,000
  • Difference: -53.5%

Remote OK:

  • Cloudflare: 210,931
  • Google Analytics: 133,000
  • Difference: -36.9%

Maybe it's time we started taking the numbers from Google Analytics with a pinch of salt. Cloudflare seems to produce much more accurate numbers and you can also use the Piwik integration to allow better analysis.

Now we just need Cloudflare to support embeddable charts showing users or page views over time. Or, use their API to create our own.

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