How to Create a UA Property in Google Analytics

Thinking about creating a Universal Analytics property? Let’s clear the air right away: it’s no longer possible. Google has officially sunset Universal Analytics (UA) and fully transitioned to its more powerful successor, Google Analytics 4. This guide will break down what happened to UA, highlight key differences in GA4, and walk you through every step of creating your new GA4 property so you can start tracking data the right way.

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What Was Universal Analytics? A Quick Refresher

For roughly a decade, Universal Analytics (UA) was the go-to tool for understanding website traffic. If you set up analytics anytime before 2020, you were using a UA property, identifiable by its tracking ID that started with "UA-".

UA’s data model was built around sessions and pageviews. A session was basically a container for all the things a user did on your site within a specific timeframe. This session-based model was fantastic for a desktop-first world where users visited a website, clicked around a few pages, and then left. Marketers tracked metrics like bounce rate, pages per session, and session duration to measure engagement. But as the user journey became more complex - spanning mobile apps, web browsers, and multiple devices - this model started to show its age.

The Sun Has Set on UA: Why Google Made the Switch to GA4

The digital world has changed, and Google needed a new analytics platform to keep up. Universal Analytics officially stopped processing new data for standard properties on July 1, 2023. The transition to Google Analytics 4 was driven by a few major shifts in user behavior and technology:

• A User-Centric, Event-Based Model: Instead of focusing on sessions, GA4 tracks everything as an event. A page view is an event, a button click is an event, a video play is an event, and a purchase is an event. This model is far more flexible and provides a more granular view of how users interact with your business across both websites and apps. It answers "what did the user do?" rather than just "how long was their visit?"
• Cross-Device and Cross-Platform Tracking: People don’t just use one device anymore. Their journey might start with an ad on their phone, continue with research on a tablet, and end with a purchase on their laptop. GA4 is designed to unify this data, giving you a complete picture of the entire customer journey, not just isolated sessions.
• Built-in Privacy Features: With growing concerns about user privacy and the slow demise of third-party cookies, Google built GA4 with privacy at its core. It offers features like IP address anonymization and cookieless measurement capabilities, making it more compliant with regulations like GDPR and CCPA.
• Smarter Insights with AI: GA4 leans heavily on machine learning to surface predictive metrics and insights. It can automatically alert you to significant trends in your data, like a sudden spike in demand for a product, and even predict outcomes like customer churn or potential revenue.

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My Old UA Property Is Gone! How to Find Your Historical Data

One of the biggest concerns for long-time Analytics users is the fate of their historical UA data. While you can no longer see new data in your UA property, your past data should still be accessible in a read-only state for a limited time. However, Google has stated this access isn't permanent, so it's critical to export and archive your historical data now.

Here are a few ways to back up your old UA data:

• Manual Exports: For specific reports, this is the quickest method. Navigate to any standard report in your UA property, set the desired date range, and use the 'Export' function in the top right corner to download the data as a PDF, Google Sheet, Excel (XLSX), or CSV file.
• Google Analytics Reporting API: If you have technical skills or a developer on your team, you can use the API to programmatically pull large amounts of data. This allows for more complex and customized data exports.
• Third-Party Connectors: Tools can pipe your UA data into a connected spreadsheet or BI tool. This is a great way to transfer your data into a system like Google Sheets or a data warehouse for safekeeping and future analysis.

Making a plan to save this data is crucial. Once it’s gone, it’s gone forever, and you'll lose valuable year-over-year context.

How to Create a New Google Analytics 4 Property from Scratch

Ready to set up your new GA4 property? Let’s walk through the process step by step. If you’re brand new to Google Analytics, this guide will get you from zero to a live tracking installation.

Step 1: Sign in to Google Analytics

To begin, you’ll need a Google account (like a Gmail account). If you have one, head over to the Google Analytics homepage and sign in. If this is your first time, you’ll be guided directly into the setup process.

Step 2: Start the Account Creation Process

If you already have an Analytics account, click the Admin cog icon at the bottom-left of your screen. In the "Account" column, click the Create Account button.

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Step 3: Account Setup

First, you'll need to create an "Account." Think of the account as the top-level folder for your business. A single account can contain multiple properties (for example, if you own several websites).

• Account name: Give your account a recognizable name, like your business or company name.
• Account Data Sharing Settings: These checkboxes control how your data is shared with Google. For most users, leaving the recommended settings checked is perfectly fine. Review them and click Next.

Step 4: Property Setup

Now it's time to set up your first GA4 property within the account. The property is where the data from your website or app will actually live.

• Property name: Name your property. It's best practice to use your website name here, like "My Awesome Website."
• Reporting time zone: Select the primary time zone for your business. This ensures that your daily reports align with your business days.
• Currency: Choose the currency your business operates in. This is especially important for ecommerce tracking.

Once you’re done, click Next.

(Hot tip: You’ll notice there’s no option here to create a Universal Analytics Property. As mentioned, this feature was completely removed during the transition.)

Step 5: Provide Your Business Details

Google asks for some basic business information to help tailor your experience and provide relevant benchmarking data.

• Provide your Industry category and Business size from the dropdown menus.
• For "How do you intend to use Google Analytics," check the boxes that best align with your goals, such as "Generate leads," "Drive online sales," or "Examine user behavior." This helps GA4 set up your default reports.

Click Create and accept the Terms of Service Agreement.

Step 6: Set Up Your First Data Stream

Now, you need to tell Google Analytics where to get its data from. This source is called a "data stream." You will be prompted to choose a platform: Web, Android app, or iOS app. For most users, this will be "Web."

After selecting your platform:

• Website URL: Enter your website’s homepage URL (e.g., www.mywebsite.com).
• Stream name: Give your stream a name, like "[Your Website Name] Web Stream".

Make sure the Enhanced measurement option is toggled on. This is one of the best features of GA4, automatically collecting important events like scrolls, outbound clicks, site search, and video engagement without any extra setup. Now click Create stream.

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Step 7: Find and Install Your GA4 Tracking Code

You’re almost there! After you create your data stream, a screen will appear with your stream details. Find your Measurement ID, which looks like "G-XXXXXXXXXX." This is your unique tracking ID for GA4.

The final step is to install this on your site so GA4 can start collecting data. You have a few options:

• For CMS platforms (like WordPress, Wix, Squarespace): Most website builders have a dedicated field for your Google Analytics Tracking ID. Just copy your "G-" Measurement ID and paste it into the appropriate field in your website’s admin panel. On WordPress, plugins like Site Kit by Google or MonsterInsights make this a simple copy-and-paste job.
• For Shopify: You can add Google Analytics directly within your Shopify Admin under Online Store > Preferences > Google Analytics.
• Using Google Tag Manager (Recommended): For more control and flexibility, install GA4 via Google Tag Manager (GTM). Create a new "Google Analytics: GA4 Configuration" tag in GTM, paste in your Measurement ID, and set the trigger to fire on All Pages. This is the industry-standard approach.

Once your tracking code is in place, it can take 24-48 hours for data to start showing up in your GA4 reports. You can check the "Realtime" report to see if data is being collected correctly.

Final Thoughts

While the chapter on Universal Analytics has officially closed, the move to GA4 opens up a much more powerful and flexible way to understand your users. By following these steps, you can set up a new GA4 property confidently and start gathering smarter data on how people are truly engaging with your business across every platform.

Making sense of all this new GA4 data, especially when you need to combine it with performance from your ad platforms, CRM, or ecommerce store, can still feel scattered. At Graphed, we’ve made it our mission to simplify this process. We let you connect your new GA4 property and all your other marketing and sales tools in just a few clicks. Instead of wrestling with complex reports, you can use plain English to ask questions and instantly get real-time dashboards that show you what’s working, from initial ad click to final sale. If you want to spend less time digging for data and more time acting on it, Graphed is worth a look.