How to Link AdSense with Google Analytics

Connecting your Google AdSense account to Google Analytics is one of the most powerful moves a publisher can make. It transforms vague revenue numbers into a detailed map, showing you exactly which content, traffic sources, and audience segments are driving your income. This article provides a clear, step-by-step guide to linking AdSense with Google Analytics 4 and unlocking the insights within.

Why Link AdSense with Google Analytics?

Before diving into the "how," let's quickly cover the "why." Separately, AdSense tells you how much you earned, and Analytics tells you about your website traffic. Linking them combines these two stories, giving you the complete picture of your content performance. You immediately gain the ability to answer critical strategic questions.

Go Beyond Basic Revenue Numbers

Instead of just seeing a total revenue number in your AdSense account, you can analyze that revenue within the context of user behavior. This allows you to measure an RPM (Revenue Per Mille) for specific pages, countries, or traffic sources. You learn what a visitor from organic search is worth versus a visitor from social media, which helps you allocate your time and resources far more effectively.

Identify Your Most Valuable Content

Which blog posts or pages are an afterthought, and which are your secret cash cows? Without linking AdSense to GA4, it's mostly guesswork. Once linked, you can directly see Publisher ad revenue by Page path. This report instantly highlights your highest-earning articles, helping you understand which topics and formats resonate most with your highest-value audience. You'll know exactly what kind of content to double down on to grow your revenue.

Discover Your Most Profitable Traffic Sources

Is your effort on Pinterest, SEO, or your email newsletter paying off? Linking your accounts allows you to see AdSense revenue broken down by traffic source (Session source / medium in GA4). You might discover that while Facebook sends tons of traffic, visitors from Google search generate significantly more ad revenue. This data is invaluable for refining your marketing strategy and focusing on the channels that actually impact your bottom line.

Understand Your Audience's Revenue Potential

GA4 allows you to see your ad revenue performance across different audience segments. You can easily compare revenue from different countries, devices (mobile vs. desktop), or demographic groups. For example, you might find that visitors from the United States on a desktop computer generate 5x more revenue per session than visitors from another region on a mobile device. This insight can influence everything from your content topics to your website design and ad layout.

Prerequisites: What You Need Before You Start

To ensure a smooth process, make sure you have the following in place before you begin. Getting these sorted out first will save you from potential headaches later.

• Admin-Level Access: You must have 'Administrator' access to your Google Analytics 4 property and 'Admin' access to your Google AdSense account. 'Editor' or 'Viewer' permissions are not sufficient to create the link.
• Matching Google Accounts: To make life easy, use the same Google account (email address) to log into both AdSense and Analytics. While not strictly required, it simplifies the linking process immensely, as Analytics will automatically detect your AdSense property. If you use different accounts, you'll need admin access on both to complete the verification steps.
• Active GA4 Property: Your Google Analytics 4 property must be set up and actively collecting data from the same website where your AdSense code is implemented. The connection won't work if Analytics isn't tracking the site properly.

Step-by-Step Guide: How to Link AdSense to Google Analytics 4

Ready to get started? The process is straightforward and takes just a few minutes inside your Google Analytics account.

Step 1: Navigate to Your GA4 Admin Settings

Log in to your Google Analytics account. In the bottom-left corner of the screen, you will see a gear icon labeled 'Admin'. Click on it to open the administrative panel.

You’ll see two main columns: 'Account' and 'Property'. All the linking magic happens in the 'Property' column.

Step 2: Find the Product Links Section

In the 'Property' column, scroll down until you see the subheading 'Product Links'. This is where you connect your GA4 property to other Google products like Google Ads, BigQuery, and, of course, AdSense.

Step 3: Choose 'AdSense Links'

Under 'Product Links', click on 'AdSense Links'. If you already have a link set up (perhaps from Universal Analytics), it will show up here. To create a new one, move to the next step.

Step 4: Create a New Link

In the top-right corner of the AdSense linking table, click the blue 'Link' button. This will start the guided setup process.

Step 5: Select Your AdSense Property

On the next screen, you’ll be prompted to ‘Choose an AdSense property’. If you are an admin on an AdSense account using the same Google email, it should appear automatically. Simply check the box next to the AdSense property you want to link and click ‘Confirm’ in the top right.

Troubleshooting Tip: If you don't see your AdSense property listed, the most likely culprit is a permissions issue. Double-check that you're using the right Google account and that you have Admin access to the AdSense property.

Step 6: Configure Your Data Stream

Next, you’ll need to connect the AdSense data to the corresponding data stream in GA4. Click 'Select a stream'. In the dropdown menu, choose the web data stream for the website where your AdSense ads are running. After selecting it, click ‘Next’.

This tells Google Analytics to associate the incoming AdSense data with the behavioral data collected from that specific website.

Step 7: Review and Submit

The final screen gives you one last chance to review your settings. You'll see the AdSense property ID and the GA4 data stream you've selected. If everything looks correct, click the 'Submit' button.

That's it! You've successfully requested the link. You should see a "Link created" message, and it can take up to 24-48 hours for data to begin populating in your GA4 reports.

Where to Find and Use Your AdSense Data in GA4

Once the data starts flowing, you need to know where to find it. All your AdSense revenue information is concentrated in one primary report in GA4.

The Publisher Ads Report

This is your new home for monetization analysis. Here's how to get there:

1. On the left-side navigation panel, click on 'Reports'.
2. Under the 'Lifecycle' collection, expand the 'Monetization' topic.
3. Click on 'Publisher ads'.

Initially, this report shows you your top pages (by Ad unit) alongside these key metrics:

• Publisher Ad Impressions: The total number of ads shown to users.
• Publisher Ad Clicks: The number of times users clicked on your ads.
• Total Ad Revenue: The estimated total revenue from AdSense.

Drilling Down with Secondary Dimensions

The real power comes from adding secondary dimensions to this report. By clicking the plus ‘+’ icon next to the primary dimension (which defaults to 'Ad unit'), you can segment your revenue data by virtually any metric tracked in GA4.

Here are a few powerful combinations to try:

• Find your top-earning traffic sources: Add a secondary dimension of Session source / medium. This will show you exactly how much revenue you're earning from google / cpc, direct / (none), or social media referrals.
• Identify your most valuable pages: Change the primary dimension to Page path and screen class to see revenue on a page-by-page basis. This is an incredibly direct way to inform your content strategy.
• Analyze revenue by country: Add a secondary dimension of Country to see where your most profitable visitors are coming from.
• Check mobile vs. desktop performance: Use the secondary dimension of Device category to understand if your site's mobile experience is capitalizing on ad revenue as well as your desktop version.

Final Thoughts

Connecting AdSense to Google Analytics 4 is a non-negotiable step for any publisher serious about growth. It elevates your data from simple scorekeeping to a strategic tool, giving you precise, actionable insights into which pages, traffic sources, and audiences are most valuable to your bottom line.

Manually connecting all your data sources and building reports is powerful, though it can still be a lot to manage. A common next step for growing businesses is centralizing data analysis even further. It was this need for a simpler, faster way to get answers that drove us to build Graphed. We connect directly to tools like Google Analytics, Shopify, and social ad platforms, letting you ask questions about your performance in plain English and instantly get back dashboards and insights that are updated in real-time. It turns hours of reporting work into 30-second conversations.