Examples and best practices for using analytics.js

analytics.js boilerplate

Best practices for implementing analytics.js on modern websites.

For an in-depth explanation of all the features used in this boilerplate (as well as how to report on them), see my article:

The Google Analytics Setup I Use on Every Site I Build →

Boilerplate versions

analytics/base.js

The base boilerplate extends the default tracking snippet and includes the following features:

• Tracks uncaught errors.
• Tracks custom user, session, and hit-level dimensions.
• Sends an initial pageview.
• Sends a pageload performance event.

analytics/autotrack.js

The autotrack boilerplate builds on top the base boilerplate and includes select autotrack plugins

analytics/multiple-trackers.js

The multiple-trackers boilerplate builds on the autotrack boilerplate and includes support for using multiple trackers.

Running the boilerplate locally

analytics.js boilerplate uses webpack to compile the source and webpack-dev-server to run it locally.

To install the dependencies and load the boilerplate in a browser, run the following commands:

npm install
npm start

Then visit localhost:8080 in your browser and open the developer console to see the analytics.js debug output.

Running different boilerplate versions

The boilerplate index.js JavaScript file imports the base boilerplate by default. To run a different version, replace the URL imported via import('./analytics/base.js') with the version you want to load.