Why TraceLog differs from GA4 or Meta

TraceLog's figures and GA4's or Meta's are not meant to match. Each counts its own record, with its own rules. Neither number is checked against the other: TraceLog reads nothing from those platforms and reconciles nothing they received.

A record of its own

TraceLog records the conversion path you defined — the session, the declared steps and the conversion — from the events it receives, and nothing else. It does not count page views or events you did not declare, so a figure built on those elsewhere has nothing to match here.

Consent

In the browser, TraceLog sends nothing until the visitor consents, and nothing if they refuse. Another tool may follow a different consent setup on the same site, so the visits each one sees can differ.

Conversions the server confirms

Where the server confirms the conversion — built in on Shopify, WooCommerce and PrestaShop, an optional call from a site of its own — TraceLog counts it even if the browser never sent it. Each conversion is counted once by its identifier, however many ways it was seen. Data health states how many only the server saw, as a count over the total, never why.

Sessions and days

A TraceLog session is one visit; after thirty minutes without activity, the next action starts another. Days are the project's own, in its time zone, and a conversion counts on the day it happened. A tool that defines a session or a day differently counts differently, and neither is wrong.

Attribution

A conversion's channel and campaign come from its own session's context: referrer, campaign parameters and landing page. TraceLog models no attribution across visits or devices, so a platform that credits a conversion by its own model can assign it elsewhere.

Verification traffic

Orders placed while verifying an install are marked and excluded from every figure. A platform that receives the same test order may count it.

What TraceLog can say about your tags

Where TraceLog's code runs in the page, data health says, of the conversions that reported their tags, beside how many the page requested each GA4, Meta or Google Ads tag. That the page asked, never that the platform received. To check what a platform received, use that platform's own tools.