What Does Google Analytics Call a URL?

Pop quiz: what does Google Analytics call a URL? If you answered "a URL," you're not wrong, but you're also not entirely right. Google Analytics uses multiple, specific terms to describe different parts of a URL, and knowing the difference is essential for accurate reporting. This article will explain exactly how Google Analytics labels URLs, where to find this data, and how to use it to get clearer insights into your website's performance.

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Page Path, Page Location, and Page Title: The Three Key Dimensions

When you're looking at your content reports in Google Analytics 4, you won't find a dimension simply called "URL." Instead, you'll primarily interact with three distinct dimensions: Page path, Page location, and Page title. Understanding the role each one plays is the first step to mastering your content analysis.

Page Path: The URI After the Domain

The most common dimension you'll see in GA4 content reports is the Page path and screen class. For websites, this refers to the part of the URL that comes after your domain name (the .com, .org, etc.) but before any question marks (which indicate query parameters).

Think of it as the specific address of the page on your website, without the "city and state" (your domain).

Here’s an example:

• Full URL (Page Location): https://www.yourstore.com/collections/summer-shirts?style=v-neck
• Your Domain: yourstore.com
• Page Path: /collections/summer-shirts

The "Page path" is GA4's default view in the Pages and screens report because it’s clean and easy to scan. It groups all views of a single page together, regardless of how a user got there or which tracking parameters were attached to the URL. For most day-to-day analysis, like identifying your most popular blog posts or product categories, this is the perfect dimension to use.

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Page Location: The Full and Complete URL

If the Page Path is the street address, the Page location is the complete mailing address, specifying everything needed to find that page on the internet. This dimension shows the entire URL exactly as it appears in the user's browser bar, including:

• The protocol: http:// or https://
• The subdomain (if any): www. or blog.
• The domain name: yourstore.com
• The page path: /collections/summer-shirts
• Any query parameters: ?style=v-neck

So, for the same example, the Page Location would be https://www.yourstore.com/collections/summer-shirts?style=v-neck.

When would you use Page Location instead of Page Path? It’s most useful when you need to differentiate traffic based on criteria that Page Path ignores, such as:

• Analyzing Subdomains: If you run a blog on blog.yourstore.com and your main site on www.yourstore.com, they both might have a page with the path /contact. Page Location lets you see the difference between https://blog.yourstore.com/contact and https://www.yourstore.com/contact.
• Investigating Query Parameters: If you want to see how different filtered versions of a collection page perform, Page Location will show you views for /products?filter=men and /products?filter=women as separate line items.
• Auditing Your Site: Differentiating between http and https versions of a page, or www and non-www versions, can be critical for SEO audits.

Page Title: The User-Friendly Name

Finally, there's the Page title. This isn't a URL at all, but it’s often used in the same reports and serves a similar purpose. The Page Title is the text that appears in the browser tab for a given page and is defined in your website's HTML <title> tag.

For a page with the path /collections/summer-shirts, the Page Title might be something like "Summer Shirts Collection | YourStore.com."

Analyzing reports by Page Title can be more intuitive than deciphering URLs. A title like "The Ultimate Guide to GA4 Reporting" is instantly understandable, whereas its page path, /ultimate-ga4-reporting-guide-2024, is less so at a quick glance. However, relying on Page Title alone can be problematic if:

• You have multiple pages with the same or very similar titles.
• Your page titles change over time, which can split historical data in your reports.
• Your content management system (CMS) automatically generates non-descriptive titles.

Where to Find Your URL Data in GA4

Now that you know the terminology, let’s find the data. The primary place to analyze your most visited pages is the Pages and screens report.

Here’s how to get there and switch between the different dimensions:

1. Navigate to Reports on the left-hand navigation panel.
2. Under the Life cycle section, click on Engagement.
3. Select the Pages and screens report.

By default, the primary dimension in the report table will be Page path and screen class. To change this, simply click the small downward arrow next to the dimension name at the top of the first column. A dropdown menu will appear, allowing you to select Page location or Page title instead.

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Common Challenges with URL Reporting in Google Analytics

Even with a clear understanding of Page Path and Page Location, you may still run into a few common reporting snags. Here are some of the most frequent issues and how to think about them.

1. Fragmented Data from Query Parameters

Have you ever seen a report where the same page appears multiple times with slight variations after a question mark?

/products/cool-gadget?ref=newsletter /products/cool-gadget?utm_source=facebook /products/cool-gadget

This happens because campaign tracking parameters (like utm_), sitewide search parameters (?q=searchterm), or filtering parameters are being included in the Page Location report. While sometimes useful, it often fragments your analysis, making it hard to see a page's total traffic.

In most situations, sticking with the Page path dimension solves this easily. It consolidates these fragmented URLs into a single line item (/products/cool-gadget), giving you a clear view of that page's aggregate performance.

2. Case Sensitivity Issues

Google Analytics is case-sensitive. This means it treats /Blog/My-First-Post and /blog/my-first-post as two completely separate pages. This can split your traffic data and give you an inaccurate picture of a page's popularity.

While you can use functions in external tools like Looker Studio or Google Sheets to merge this data (by converting all page paths to lowercase), the best fix is a permanent one. Work with your developers to implement a sitewide rule that redirects all URLs to a single, consistent case — usually lowercase. This not only cleans up your analytics but is also a best practice for SEO.

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3. Forgetting About (not set) Traffic

Sometimes you might notice (not set) appearing in your page reports. This essentially means Google Analytics received data for an event but was missing the value for the Page Path, Page Location, or Page Title dimension. This can occur for several reasons, such as events firing before the page-tracking code has fully loaded or misconfigured custom events that don't pass along page information correctly.

If you see a significant amount of (not set) traffic, it's a signal to investigate your GA4 implementation, especially for any custom events you've set up, to ensure they're configured to capture all necessary page parameters.

Final Thoughts

In summary, Google Analytics doesn't have a single "URL" dimension. Instead, it offers Page path for the clean URI after your domain and Page location for the full, complete URL. Knowing when to use each (alongside the user-friendly Page title) is fundamental for accurate and insightful website performance reporting.

Manually pulling reports and remembering these nuances across all your different marketing platforms is exactly the kind of tedious work that slows teams down. That's why we built Graphed. Instead of navigating GA4 and fussing with dimensions, you can simply ask, "Show me my top 10 most visited pages last month," and get an instant dashboard. We connect to all your data sources — from analytics and ad platforms to your CRM and Shopify store — letting you use natural language to create real-time, shareable dashboards in seconds, freeing you up to focus on the insights, not the setup.