The GA4 Pages and Screens Report: How to Read It

This guide is built from Google's Analytics Help article on the Pages and screens report, plus the Help pages on content groups and page view events linked below. Where a session starts is covered in our Landing page report guide, and engagement rate and bounce rate in our engagement rate guide. This page is about the report that counts every page view.

What the report shows

Google calls it "a pre-made detail report that shows data about the pages users visited on your website and the screens users opened on your mobile app." Pages are web pages; screens are app screens. If one property collects both a website and an app, the two sit in the same table.

The report counts a page each time it is viewed, "whether that's the first page or a page later in their session." That is the main difference from the Landing page report, which only shows the page a session started on. A pricing page or a contact page often has many views and few landings, because people reach it from other pages. Use this report for "which pages get read?" and the Landing page report for "which pages bring people in?"

Where to find it

1. Sign in to Google Analytics.
2. From the left menu, select Reports.
3. Click Engagement > Pages and screens.

If it is not there, Google says it "may have been removed or isn't in your default view," and Editors and above can add it back to the left navigation from the Library. Our Landing page report guide walks through those Library steps; they are the same for this report.

Page path, page title or screen class

The report has five dimensions, and Editors or Administrators can add or remove them. Each web dimension is paired with an app one, so the same column works for both.

Which one to use:

• Page path gives one row per URL path. Google's example: on www.example.com/Bags, the path is Bags. The path "/" on its own is the home page; Google explains it as the directory separator showing "the home directory of the website was requested."
• Page title is easier to read but less exact. Pages that share a title (blog archive pages, templates with the same title tag) merge into one row, and a title change splits one page into two rows across a date range. Google also notes that localized pages show "the Page title dimensions in the localized language"; to report titles in one language, send your own value with the page_title parameter. Title tags are also worth getting right for search, which our title tags guide covers.
• Hostname matters when one property covers several domains or subdomains, for example a site and a shop on a subdomain. Add it as a secondary dimension so that /contact on one host is not mixed up with /contact on another. Our cross-domain tracking guide covers measuring several domains as one journey.
• Content group rolls pages up into sections such as "blog" or "services". It is empty until you set it up; see below.

What the metrics count

The default table has seven metrics, and Editors or Administrators can change them.

Points that trip people up:

• Views come from page_view events. Google's enhanced measurement article says page_view is sent "each time the page loads or the browser history state is changed by the active site," and that this event "populates the Views metric." On a single-page app, the browser-history setting decides whether moving between screens counts as views at all. Our enhanced measurement guide covers that setting.
• Views and users answer different questions. One person reading a page five times is five views and one active user. Views per active user shows how often the same people come back to a page.
• Average engagement time is per user, not per view. The formula divides total engagement time by active users, so it reads "time each person spent on this page in the date range", not "time per visit". Our engagement rate guide explains engagement time and how to add engagement rate to this report.
• Event count and key events count all events on that page, including the page_view itself and scrolls or clicks. A key event column is only useful once you have marked one; see our key events guide.

Looking at one page or section

A filter for one page

To focus the charts and table on one page or a few, Google's steps are:

1. Click + Add filter at the top of the report.
2. Leave Include selected.
3. In the Dimension drop-down, select Page path and screen class.
4. In Dimension values, select one or more page paths or screen classes.
5. Click OK, then Apply.

To keep a filter in the saved report for everyone, an Editor saves it through report customization, as described in our Landing page report guide.

Content groups for whole sections

Filtering by path works for one page; for a section of fifty pages, content groups are cleaner. Google's content groups article says they "let you categorize pages and screens into custom buckets." On a website you set the content_group parameter in the Google tag config (for example 'mens' on men's clothing pages), or in Google Tag Manager with a RegEx Table variable on the page path and a default such as "Other group". Then select the Content group dimension in this report. For more than one level of grouping, Google says to create extra parameters and register them as custom dimensions, covered in our custom dimensions guide.

Before and after a page

The report shows totals per page, not order. To see what someone did "before or after visiting a page or screen," Google points to a path exploration: start or end the path on a page, then read the pages viewed right after or right before it. Its examples are "After someone visited the t-shirt page, what page did they go to next?" and what screens people saw before an "Upgrade my plan" screen. Our path exploration guide covers building one, and our funnel exploration guide covers fixed steps such as product, cart and checkout.

How we use the report

This is our own practice, not Google guidance:

• We use Page path and screen class as the default dimension and keep page title for quick reading, because shared or changed titles make title rows unreliable over time.
• On a lead-generation site we add the form submission key event as a column and save the report, so service pages can be compared on enquiries as well as views.
• We set content groups (services, guides, case studies, contact) when we build a site, so section totals are there from launch.
• When a page's views drop, we check the Landing page report and Search Console next, because a fall in views often starts with fewer people arriving from search. Our Search Console integration guide shows how to see both in GA4.

Frequently asked questions

Where is the Pages and screens report in GA4?

Go to Reports, then Engagement > Pages and screens. If it is missing, an Editor or Administrator can add it back to a collection in the Library.

What is the difference between page path and page title in GA4?

Page path is the part of the URL after the domain, such as /contact. Page title comes from the page's title tag, or from the page_title parameter if you send one. Several pages can share a title, so the path is the safer way to tell pages apart.

What does the page path / mean in GA4?

It is the home page. Google describes / as the directory separator that shows the home directory of the site was requested.

Does Views count repeat views of the same page?

Yes. Google defines Views as the pages or screens your users saw and says repeated views of a single page or screen are counted.

How is the Pages and screens report different from the Landing page report?

Pages and screens counts every page view, wherever it falls in the session. The Landing page report only shows the first page of each session.

For more on measurement, see our guides to GA4 basics, users vs sessions, explorations, the Realtime report and monthly website reporting.