Does Shopify Support Google Analytics 4?

Yes, Shopify supports Google Analytics 4, but understanding the best way to connect them is crucial for getting accurate ecommerce data. While Shopify offers a simple, native integration, it often falls short of what growing stores need. This guide will walk you through the options, explain the limitations of the built-in method, and show you the professional-grade way to set up GA4 for a complete view of your store's performance.

Does Shopify Natively Support GA4? The Short Answer

Shopify provides a straightforward, copy-and-paste integration for Google Analytics 4. You can find your GA4 Measurement ID, paste it into a field in your Shopify settings, and - voilà - basic tracking is active. This native setup is designed to be user-friendly and gets the essential tracking in place without requiring any code.

This method automatically tracks fundamental user actions, including:

• Page views (page_view)
• Product detail views (view_item)
• Adding an item to the cart (add_to_cart)
• Starting the checkout process (begin_checkout)
• Completing a purchase (purchase)

For store owners who are new to analytics, this is a reasonable starting point. However, if you rely on data to make decisions about marketing spend, product merchandising, or website optimization, you'll quickly discover this simple integration has some significant limitations.

Why Just Using Shopify's Native Integration Isn't Enough

Relying solely on Shopify's native GA4 integration is like trying to understand your business by only looking at total revenue. You're missing all the rich detail that tells you why things are happening. Here's where the native setup can leave you in the dark:

• Limited Event Details: The standard events are great, but they lack depth. For instance, the add_to_cart event doesn't tell you which product was added or if it came from the collection page or the product page. Enhanced ecommerce tracking provides this item-level data, which is essential for understanding which products are driving engagement.
• No Custom Event Tracking: What if you want to track email signups from a pop-up, interactions with a size guide, or clicks on your "About Us" video? With the native integration, you're out of luck. You can't add custom events to track the unique interactions that matter to your brand and customer journey.
• Inconsistent Data: Many merchants report discrepancies between what Shopify Analytics reports and what GA4 shows. These gaps can be caused by ad blockers, cookie consent settings, and different ways of defining a "session" or attributing a sale. Having a more robust tracking setup can help minimize - though never completely eliminate - these differences.
• Lack of Control: The native integration is a black box. You paste the ID and hope for the best. You have no control over how the tracking script is implemented, what exact data is sent, or how it responds to user consent preferences. This becomes a major issue as privacy regulations evolve and your marketing stack grows more complex.

Simply put, for any store serious about growth, the native integration is a beginner's tool. To unlock the full power of GA4, you need a more flexible and powerful setup.

How to Set Up the Native Shopify GA4 Integration (Step-by-Step)

If you've decided the basic setup is enough for you right now, or you just want to get started quickly, here’s how to do it. It only takes a couple of minutes.

1. Find Your Measurement ID in GA4

First, you need to grab your unique ID from your Google Analytics 4 account.

• Log in to your Google Analytics account.
• Go to the Admin section (the gear icon in the bottom-left corner).
• In the Property column, select your GA4 property.
• Click on Data Streams and select the data stream for your website.
• Your Measurement ID will be in the top right corner. It starts with "G-". Copy this entire ID.

2. Add the ID to Your Shopify Store

Next, you'll paste this ID into your Shopify settings.

• In your Shopify Admin, navigate to Online Store > Preferences.
• Scroll down to the Google Analytics section.
• You'll see a box labeled "Google Analytics account." Click Manage pixel here.
• This will take you to the Google & YouTube app in Shopify. Click Connect next to your Google account.
• If GA4 is set up correctly in that account, your property tag should appear. Select it and click Connect.
• That's it! Shopify will now automatically add the necessary GA4 tracking code to your store pages.

Remember, this process only enables basic page view and ecommerce tracking. For deeper insights, you'll want to use the method below.

The Better Way: Setting Up GA4 on Shopify Using Google Tag Manager

Google Tag Manager (GTM) is a free tool that acts as a middleman between your website and your analytics/marketing tools (like GA4, Facebook Pixel, etc.). It gives you a central control panel to manage all your tracking tags without having to directly edit your website's code every time.

Why Google Tag Manager is the Best Approach

Using GTM is the industry standard for a reason. It gives you:

• Complete Control: You decide precisely what to track, when to track it, and what information to send. From clicks on a specific button to detailed product views, GTM makes it possible.
• Enhanced Ecommerce Data: GTM allows you to implement a "data layer," which is a structured format for passing detailed information - like product names, SKUs, prices, quantities, and coupon codes - from your Shopify store to GA4.
• Simplified Tag Management: As you grow, you'll want to add other tools like a TikTok Pixel, Hotjar for heatmaps, or a chat widget. GTM consolidates all of these scripts into one interface, improving website load speed and making management a breeze.
• Future-Proofing: When analytics standards change or you switch marketing platforms, you can make updates in GTM instead of digging through your Shopify theme code again.

Step 1: Get Your GTM Code Snippets

First, create a Google Tag Manager account and a "container" for your store's website. GTM will give you two snippets of code to install on your Shopify site.

• Go to tagmanager.google.com and create an account.
• Set up a new container for your website domain.
• After creation, GTM will show you a pop-up with code. If you closed it, you can always find it by clicking your GTM ID (e.g., GTM-XXXXXXX) in the main dashboard.
• You'll have one snippet for the <head> of your website and one for the <body>. Keep this browser tab open.

Step 2: Add GTM to Your Shopify Theme (theme.liquid)

This part involves touching your theme code, but it's a simple copy-and-paste job.

• From your Shopify Admin, go to Online Store > Themes.
• Find your current theme, click the three-dots icon, and select Edit code.
• In the file explorer on the left, find and open the theme.liquid file.
• Copy the GTM code snippet meant for the <head>. Paste it as high up as possible, immediately after the opening <head> tag.
• Next, copy the GTM code snippet meant for the <body>. Paste it immediately after the opening <body> tag.
• Click Save.

Doing this installs GTM on all regular pages of your store - like the homepage, product pages, and collections. But there's one critical extra step for tracking sales.

Step 3: Add GTM to Your Shopify Checkout Pages

The theme.liquid file doesn't control the checkout process (for security reasons). To track purchases, you need to add your GTM code to a different spot.

• In your Shopify Admin, go to Settings > Checkout.
• Scroll down to the Order status page section.
• Find the box for Additional scripts.
• Paste only the GTM snippet meant for the <body> into this box. You don't need the <head> snippet here.
• Click Save.

With that, GTM is now properly installed across your entire store, including the crucial post-purchase page.

Step 4: Setting Up GA4 Tags in GTM

Now that GTM is on your site, you can use it to send data to GA4. It starts with creating a base tag in GTM.

1. Go to your GTM container and click Tags > New.
2. Name it something like "GA4 - Configuration".
3. Click Tag Configuration and choose Google Analytics: GA4 Configuration as the tag type.
4. Paste your GA4 Measurement ID (the same "G-..." ID from before) into the Measurement ID field.
5. Click Triggering and select the All Pages trigger. This tells GTM to fire this configuration tag on every page load.
6. Click Save.

Congratulations! You've just replicated - and improved upon - the basic page view tracking from the native integration. To track detailed ecommerce events like add_to_cart and purchase, you'll need to use GTM to read data from Shopify's data layer. This is a more advanced topic, sometimes requiring dedicated Shopify apps like Elevar or Analyzify to push the right data. However, the powerful structure is now in place for you to build upon.

Common Issues & How to Fix Them

As you set up your tracking, you might encounter a few common hurdles. Here’s what to look out for.

Duplicate Tracking

The problem: You're seeing double the number of page views or transactions in GA4. The cause: This usually happens when you have both the native Shopify integration and a GTM setup active at the same time. Both are sending page view data, so Google counts it twice. The fix: Choose one method. If you've set up GTM, go back to your Shopify Preferences (or the Google App) and remove the direct integration to stop Shopify from sending its own events.

Data Discrepancies

The problem: Shopify reports $1,000 in sales, but GA4 only shows $950. The cause: This is normal and almost impossible to eliminate entirely. Reasons include ad-blockers preventing the GA4 script from running, different attribution logic (Shopify knows all orders, GA4 attributes based on traffic source), bot traffic being filtered out by Google, or a user clearing their cookies mid-session. The fix: Don't try to match the numbers one-for-one. Instead, treat Shopify as your "source of financial truth" and GA4 as your primary tool for analyzing user behavior patterns and marketing channel performance.

Testing Your Setup

To make sure everything is working correctly, use GTM's built-in "Preview" mode. When you click the Preview button in GTM, it opens a debug version of your website in a new tab. As you browse your store, you can see exactly which tags are firing on each page and what data they contain. Inside GA4, you can also use the DebugView (found in the Admin panel) to see test data coming in from your browser in real-time.

Final Thoughts

So does Shopify support GA4? Absolutely. But for any ecommerce store serious about leveraging data, relying on the limited native integration is a missed opportunity. Setting up your analytics through Google Tag Manager gives you the control, flexibility, and depth of data needed to truly understand customer behavior and grow your business.

As you can see, a robust analytics setup is just the beginning. The real value comes from connecting your GA4 and Shopify data with your other sales and marketing platforms to see the full picture. Instead of spending hours each week wrangling data and stitching reports together manually, we built Graphed to do the heavy lifting for you. We connect directly to services like Shopify and Google Analytics, allowing you to create live dashboards and get instant answers simply by asking questions in plain English. Just ask “what’s my conversion rate from Facebook Ads versus Google search traffic this month?” and watch your dashboard build itself. Feel free to give Graphed a try and turn your data into decisions.