How to Find Number of Visitors in Google Analytics

Knowing how many people visit your website is one of the most basic, yet most important, metrics for your business. This number tells you if your marketing is working, if your content is resonating, and if your audience is growing. This tutorial will show you exactly how to find your total number of visitors in Google Analytics 4, understand what the numbers mean, and use that information to make smarter decisions.

Understanding Key Traffic Metrics: Users, New Users, and Sessions

Before jumping into the reports, it's essential to understand the language Google Analytics uses, as "visitors" can mean a few different things. Getting this right is the key to accurately interpreting your traffic data.

Think of your website like a coffee shop:

Users: This is the total number of unique individuals who came to your website during a specific period. In our coffee shop analogy, this is the total number of distinct customers that came in during the month. Even if one customer, Jane, came in 10 times, she is still counted as only one user. This is the metric that most closely aligns with "unique visitors."
New Users: This is a subset of "Users." It counts the number of people who visited your site for the very first time. In the coffee shop, this would be all the customers who walked in for the first time ever that month.
Sessions: A session is a single visit or a period of activity on your website. If Jane came to the coffee shop on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, she would be 1 User who had 3 Sessions. If a user visits your site, leaves, and comes back 3 hours later, that counts as two separate sessions. Sessions will almost always be a higher number than Users.

Understanding this difference is critical. If you only look at Sessions, you might think you have more of an audience than you actually do. The "Users" metric gives you a clearer picture of your actual audience size.

How to Find Your Visitor Count in Google Analytics 4

GA4 has several built-in reports where you can easily find your visitor numbers. Here are the most useful places to look, from a quick overview to a more detailed analysis.

1. Using the Reports Snapshot for a Quick Overview

The Reports Snapshot is your main dashboard. It’s the first thing you see when you navigate to the "Reports" section, and it's designed to give you a high-level view of your website's performance at a glance.

Step-by-step instructions:

Log in to your Google Analytics 4 account.
From the left-hand navigation menu, click on Reports.
You are now on the Reports snapshot page. Look for a large card near the top, usually labeled "Users."

This card will display your total number of unique visitors ("Users") for the selected time frame. You can change the date range in the top-right corner of the screen to view data for today, yesterday, the last 7 days, the last 30 days, or a custom range.

This is the fastest way to get a simple answer to the question, "How many people visited my website?"

2. Using the Traffic Acquisition Report to See Where Visitors Come From

While the snapshot is great for a quick look, the real insights come from understanding where your visitors are coming from. The Traffic Acquisition report breaks down your users by channel, such as Organic Search, Direct, Social, and Referral.

Step-by-step instructions:

From the left-hand menu, navigate to Reports > Acquisition > Traffic acquisition.
You will now see a chart at the top and a detailed table below it.
The table shows you a list of channels in the first column, labeled "Session default channel group."
In this table, find the columns for Users, New users, and Sessions.

Here you can see not just your total user count, but which marketing channels are most effective at bringing people to your site. For example, you can directly compare how many visitors came from Google search versus how many came from a link on Facebook. This is incredibly valuable for figuring out where to focus your marketing efforts.

3. Using Exploration Reports for Custom Visitor Analysis

For those who want to dig even deeper, GA4’s "Explore" section allows you to build custom reports from scratch. This is perfect for answering very specific questions about your visitors, like "How many visitors from the United States are using a mobile device?"

Step-by-step instructions to create a simple user report:

In the left-hand menu, click on Explore.
Click on the Blank report template to start a new exploration.
In the "Variables" column on the left, click the plus sign (+) next to "Dimensions." Search for and import dimensions like "Device category" and "Country."
Next, click the plus sign (+) next to "Metrics." Search for and import the "Users" metric.
Now, drag the Dimensions you imported ("Country," "Device category") from the Variables column to the "Rows" box in the "Tab Settings" column.
Finally, drag the "Users" metric to the "Values" box in the "Tab Settings" column.

Instantly, GA4 will generate a custom table on the right side of the screen showing you the exact number of visitors broken down by the dimensions you chose. It might seem intimidating at first, but Explorations are an immensely powerful tool for segmenting your audience and finding hidden insights.

A Note on Universal Analytics (UA)

Before GA4, the standard was Universal Analytics. Google officially stopped processing new data for standard UA properties on July 1, 2023. However, you might still see old data in a UA property or work with a company that hasn't fully migrated. In UA, finding visitor data was more straightforward.

You would navigate to Audience > Overview from the left-hand menu. The primary metric on this report was "Users," which gave you the total number of unique visitors front and center. While GA4 is the new standard, it's helpful to know where this lived in the previous version.

Beyond the Numbers: What Do Your Visitor Stats Mean?

Finding the visitor number is the first step. The next, more important step is understanding the story the data is telling you. Here are a few ways to add context to your analysis.

Look at Trends Over Time

A single number is just a data point. The real value is in the trend. Are your user numbers going up month-over-month? If so, your efforts are paying off. Did you see a sudden spike on a specific day? Check to see if a blog post went viral, if you were mentioned in the news, or if a particular social media post took off. Comparing date ranges (like this month vs. last month) is the best way to measure growth.

Compare New vs. Returning Users

This comparison tells a story about your audience development. A high percentage of new users suggests that your top-of-funnel marketing - like SEO, social media, and advertising - is successfully reaching new people. A healthy number of returning users indicates that your website offers valuable content that keeps people coming back, which is a great sign of community and brand loyalty. A good mix of both is usually the goal.

Segment Your Audience

Don’t just look at the total number of visitors. Break it down. As we did in the Traffic Acquisition report, look at which channels are driving the most users. Segmenting by device (desktop vs. mobile) can also tell you if your site needs a better mobile experience. If you find that 80% of your visitors are on their phones, that’s a clear signal to prioritize mobile design and performance.

Common Questions About Google Analytics Visitors

Here are a few quick answers to common questions about visitor data.

Why is my user count slightly different in different reports?

You might notice small discrepancies in the "Users" metric between, say, the Reports Snapshot and an Exploration report. This can be due to a few factors, including data sampling (where GA analyzes a subset of data for a quick report) or differences in how "active users" are calculated for specific report types. For general trend analysis, these minor differences usually aren't a concern.

Can I see exactly who my visitors are?

No. Google Analytics is designed to protect user privacy. It collects anonymous, aggregated data. You can see how many users came from New York or that a certain number visited from an iPhone, but you will never be able to see personally identifiable information (PII) like names or email addresses of individual visitors.

What is a "good" number of website visitors?

This is the million-dollar question, and the answer is: it depends entirely on your business, industry, and goals. A local plumbing business might succeed with 500 visitors a month, while a national e-commerce store might need 50,000. Instead of chasing an arbitrary number, focus on consistent growth and the quality of your traffic. It's better to have 100 highly engaged visitors who are likely to buy than 1,000 visitors who leave immediately.

Final Thoughts

Checking your website visitor stats in Google Analytics 4 is a straightforward process once you know where to look. By using the Snapshots for a quick check and the Traffic Acquisition report for deeper insights, you can quickly get a clear picture of your audience size and where it comes from. The true power, however, comes from analyzing trends and segments to understand the story behind the numbers.

We know that constantly logging into Google Analytics, Facebook Ads, Shopify, and your CRM to piece together a full performance picture is exhausting. That's why we created Graphed. It connects all your data sources in one place, allowing you to ask questions in plain English, like "Show me my website visitors from Google search this month compared to my ad spend," and get an instant real-time dashboard. It eliminates the manual drudgery of data gathering, giving you more time to focus on actually growing your business.