Consent mode allows you to adjust how your Google tags behave based on the consent status of your users and enables Google to model for gaps in conversions. You can indicate whether consent has been granted for analytics and ads cookies. Google's tags will dynamically adapt, only utilizing cookies for the specified purposes when consent has been given by the user. Using consent signals, we apply conversion modeling to recover lost conversions due to consent changes.
You can use consent mode in Google Ads for conversion tracking and your data segments.
Consent mode can also be used in:
Consent mode modeling is available in Google Ads for users that meet all eligibility requirements. Modeled conversions will appear in the “Conversions” column and be reflected in all downstream reports that use this data. You can view your consent mode status to find out if your consent mode is implemented and if your modeling is active, and you can view the consent mode impact results to determine the impact of modeling on your conversion volumes. Learn more About consent mode impact results
How it works
After consent mode is deployed, it will adjust the behavior of these types of pings:
- Consent status pings (Google Ads and Floodlight tags): Consent status pings are sent from each page the user visits where consent mode is implemented, and are also triggered for some tags if the consent state changes from denied to granted (for example, if the user opts in to a consent dialog). These pings communicate the default consent state configured by the site owner and the updated consent state (such as granted or denied) for each consent type (for example, ad storage, analytics storage).
- Conversion pings: Conversion pings are sent to indicate that a conversion has occurred.
- Google Analytics pings: Google Analytics pings are sent on each page of a website where Google Analytics is implemented and upon events being logged.
When consent is granted, the associated tags will function normally. When consent for ad storage or analytics storage is denied, the associated Google tags deployed via the Google tag or Google Tag Manager will adjust their behavior accordingly.
For examples of consent language and available third-party consent solutions, read cookiechoices.org. Google Ads can now read and interpret the TCF v2.0 transparency and consent (TC) string. TCF v2.0 is a way to indicate consent following a default mapping. For advertisers that would rather customize, they can turn off the TCF V2 default mapping and use Consent Mode.
Consent mode pings
In all cases, pings may include:
- Functional information (such as headers added passively by the browser):
- Timestamp
- User Agent
- Referrer
- Aggregate or non-identifying information:
- An indication for whether or not the current page or a prior page in the user's navigation on the site included ad-click information in the URL (for example, GCLID or DCLID)
- Boolean information about the consent state
- Random number generated on each page load
- Information about the consent platform used by the site owner (for example, Developer ID)
Consent mode behaviors in your conversion tracking tags
Consent and conversion pings may include the following behaviors depending on the state of the consent settings and the configuration of your tags:
ad_storage='granted' and analytics_storage='granted' (Default):
- Cookies pertaining to advertising may be read and written.
- IP addresses are collected.
- The full page URL, including ad-click information in URL parameters (for example, GCLID or DCLID) is collected.
- Third-party cookies previously set on google.com and doubleclick.net, and first-party conversion cookies (for example, _gcl_*) are accessible.
ad_storage='denied':
- Cookies aren't used for advertising purposes.
- Existing first-party advertising cookies won’t be read.
- Requests are sent through a different domain to avoid previously set third-party cookies from being sent in request headers.
- Google Analytics won't read or write Google Ads cookies, and Google signals features won't accumulate data for this traffic.
- IP addresses used to derive IP country, but are never logged by our Google Ads and Floodlight systems and are immediately deleted upon collection.
- Note: Google Analytics collects IP addresses as part of normal internet communications. Learn more about IP Anonymization (or IP masking) in Universal Analytics
- Other fields normally collected by advertisers’ tags (for example, order id, value) are still sent.
- Full page URL is collected and may include ad-click information in URL parameters (for example, GCLID or DCLID). Ad-click information will only be used to approximate accurate traffic measurement.
ad_storage='denied' + ads_data_redaction=true:
- Cookies aren't used for advertising purposes.
- Existing first-party advertising cookies won’t be read.
- Requests are sent through a different domain to avoid previously set third-party cookies from being sent in request headers.
- Google Analytics won't read or write Google Ads cookies, and Google signals features won't accumulate data for this traffic.
- Full page URL is collected and may include ad-click information in URL parameters (for example, GCLID or DCLID). Ad-click information will only be used to approximate accurate traffic measurement.
- IP addresses used to derive IP country, but are never logged by our Google Ads and Floodlight systems and are immediately deleted upon collection.
- Note: Google Analytics collects IP addresses as part of normal internet communications. Learn more about IP Anonymization (or IP masking) in Google Analytics
- Other fields normally collected by advertisers’ tags (for example, order id, value) are still sent.
- Page URLs with ad-click identifiers are redacted.
analytics_storage='denied':
- Won't read or write first-party analytics cookies.
- Cookieless pings will be sent to Google Analytics for basic measurement and modeling purposes.
Set up consent mode
When you’re ready, learn more about how to set up consent mode:
Consent mode status
After consent mode is implemented, you’ll find one of 2 statuses in your conversion diagnostics tab. You’ll find a green checkmark if they are active:
- In your Google Ads account, click the Goals icon
.
- Click the Conversions drop down in the section menu.
- Click Summary.
- In the conversion actions table, click on a Google Ads website conversion action.
- On the top page menu, click the Diagnostics tab. You’ll find one of the following consent mode statuses:
- Consent mode is implemented
- Your consent mode is implemented but you have not yet met the thresholds for conversion modeling. The click threshold for conversion modeling is 700 ad clicks over 7 days for a domain x country grouping.
- Consent mode is implemented and modeling is active
- This status will first be accompanied by uplift data per domain country for 4 weeks after the modeling start date. If you do not find an uplift in those 4 weeks, it could be because you have not yet met the threshold for consent mode impact results. This may be because consent mode hasn’t been implemented for at least 7 full days, or the 4-week window of modeling impact results has passed.
- After the impact table with your modeling uplift goes away, you will still find the status that consent mode is implemented and modeling is active to validate that consent mode is working.
- Consent mode is implemented
Consent mode impact results
After you’ve implemented consent mode for at least 7 full days, Google Ads may have enough data to report the uplift. The uplift numbers will only be shown when a slice’s uplift meets the minimum data threshold. Learn more About consent mode impact results