Exclude internal traffic from Google Analytics 4

Goal: Prevent website activity caused by you, your employees, or contractors from influencing your Google Analytics data.

Desired Outcome: Ensure internal traffic doesn’t distort your metrics, maintaining clean and accurate data for informed decisions.

Prerequisites: A functioning Google Analytics 4 account set up for your website.

Importance: Internal traffic can significantly skew your analytics, potentially leading to misleading insights and poor business choices.

Location: Within your Google Analytics 4 account.

When to Perform: Initially, upon setting up your Google Analytics account. Repeat if you suspect internal traffic might be affecting your data.

Who’s Responsible: The person managing your website analytics (you, your employees, or contractors).

Steps:

1. Log in to your Google Analytics account.
2. Click “Admin”.
3. Verify you’ve chosen the correct property (website) and select “Data Streams”.
4. Select the website where you want to implement Google Analytics 4.
5. Scroll down and click “Configure Tag Settings” under Google Tag.
6. Under Settings, click “Show all”.
7. Click “Define internal traffic”.
8. Click “Create” to establish internal traffic rules.
9. Name the rule “Internal traffic” and keep the default traffic_type value set to “internal.”
10. Set the Match type to “IP address equals” and enter your IP address in the value field.
11. If you’re unsure of your IP address, click “What’s my IP address?” for Google to display it.
12. To exclude multiple IP addresses (e.g., colleagues or other devices), click “Add condition” and repeat steps 9-11.
13. With internal traffic defined, proceed to create a filter to exclude it.

Activating the Internal Traffic Filter:

1. Log in to your Google Analytics account.
2. Click “Admin”.
3. Under Data Settings, click “Data Filters”.
4. You should see a pre-existing filter for internal traffic (created during Google Analytics 4 property setup). Ensure it’s in “testing mode”.
5. If it’s not in testing mode, click the three-dot menu and select “Test filter”.
6. Thoroughly test the filter. Filtering in Google Analytics 4 is permanent; once data is filtered, it’s gone forever.
7. Head to Reports > Real-time.
8. Click “Add comparison” followed by “Select dimension”. Search for and choose the Test data filter name.
9. Click “Select dimension values”, choose “Internal Traffic”, and click OK.
10. Verify the test filter is correct and click “Apply”.
11. Open a new browser tab and visit your website.
12. Return to the Google Analytics 4 Real-time report. You should see 1 user under the test data filter, indicating the filter is working.
13. Click “Admin” again.
14. Under Data Settings, click “Data Filters”.
15. Click the three-dot menu and select “Activate filter”.
16. Once activated, internal traffic will be successfully excluded from your Google Analytics 4 data.