Complete Guide to Events in Google Analytics 4

Laura Caveney
7th November 2022

Discover more about events in Google Analytics 4 including the different types of events, how to create them and more. 

Events are a great way to track meaningful actions on your website. 

While Universal Analytics offered a decent range of actions to track on-site, GA4 offers more in the way of set and custom events that you can create and own. 

Related: How to set up Google Analytics 4

Events can help you better understand the actions being taken on your website and how they play a part in driving meaningful results. 

In this blog, we’ll go through: 

Let’s get started. 

What is an event in Google Analytics 4?

Events work differently in Google Analytics 4 from how they worked in Universal Analytics. In UA, events were made to track actions within a page. 

Related: Key differences between UA and GA4

Meanwhile, in GA4, events are used to send a wide range of data to your reports. 

This is anything from actions on site, to details about users and more. 

Previously, this type of data was sent as a ‘hit’, and you had a set list of hits that you could send, which meant you couldn’t collect any custom information. 

Hit types in Universal Analytics were: 

Now hits have been replaced by events, you can collect data for anything you like. That leads us nicely onto our next topic. 

What types of events are available 

There are four different types of events in Google Analytics 4: 

Google Analytics allows you to have up to 500 defined events in your account. 

But remember, you can’t delete any events so be sure to consider what data you need before you set up a new event. 

Automatically collected events 

These events are automatically collected by Google Analytics 4. They start tracking when you set up the Google tag snippet on your website. 

Learn exactly which events will be tracked automatically here

Enhanced measurement events 

These events are tracked automatically when enhanced measurement is enabled within Google Analytics. 

You can track: 

You can enable enhanced measurement by heading to Data Streams > Web in the Property column of your admin settings.

Under Enhanced Measurement, switch to On to enable all options. 

Recommended events 

These are events with predefined names and parameters. These can help you unlock further reporting capabilities. 

To set these up as well as custom events, you need to do a little coding on your site. Learn how to set up these events

Custom events 

These are a deeper level of customisation within your events. Custom events don’t show up in standard reports, so you need to set up custom reports in order for the data to pull through. 

These events also require custom coding to enable them. 

Where are the events in GA4?

You can access events in Google Analytics 4 by following these easy steps. 

Step one, navigate to your GA4 property and click on Reports

Next, click on Engagement. 

Then, click Events. 

report for events in google analytics 4

Here you can see all of the events you’re currently tracking plus apply a range of filters to your report to better understand your data. 

How to set up an event in Google Analytics 4

Setting up an event in Google Analytics 4 is easy. 

Just follow these simple steps: 

Step 1: Click to Create Event

Under Configure, select Events. From here, you can see a list of all your current events. 

To create a new event, just click Create event

how to create an event in google analytics 4

You’ll then be taken to the Custom events screen. Click Create. 

customising events in google analytics 4

Step 2: Configure your event

You need to set up the correct parameters within your event. 

First, you need to give your event a name. Make sure to choose something that you can easily recognise. 

Next, enter the matching conditions. 

You need to specify the conditions you want to track. You can add parameters like page information, item variables and more.  

setting GA4 event parameters

We advise copying the parameters from the source event. Then click Save and you’re ready to go. 

Step 3: Check your event works with Debug view  

The last step is to confirm your new event is firing as intended. To do this, head to the designated page and complete the chosen action. 

This should fire off your event. 

To check that it does fire, open up the debug report in GA4 to confirm. 

In Configure, select DebugView. 

Here you’ll see a real-time report of actions on your site that will look something like this. 

debug view in google analytics 4

How do you check events in GA4?

Remember, you can also mark your events as conversions too. 

To do this, head back to the Events section of your configure report. Here, you can simply toggle on and off if you want an event to be tracked as a conversion or not. 

making events conversions in google analytics 4

Tracking conversions is vital as part of measuring the impact of your website. 

Related: Complete guide to measuring marketing effectiveness

Track more than conversions and events in GA4 

While tracking your conversions is important, it’s not the most important metric of all. 

For us, the best metric is revenue. Sometimes, it can be hard to get revenue into Google Analytics 4, but it’s not impossible. 

You can pull revenue from your CRM, no matter if you’re generating leads through your website, not direct revenue. 

Related: How to track revenue in Google Analytics

The trick to getting revenue in Google Analytics 4 is to connect the data all the way through the pipeline. 

Marketing attribution is the missing link. 

Attribution tracks users from their very first touchpoint on your website, which feeds into your CRM and your analytic tools. 

Related: Best marketing attribution tools to try

Ruler is a great tool for attribution. It links all of your data together and helps you track, evidence and optimise your marketing data. 

💡Pro Tip 

Learn exactly what you can discover using Ruler Analytics and how it can help you make better decisions when it comes to optimising your strategy. 


Book a demo to learn more about how Ruler can help you connect the dots between your website, CRM and analytics.