Research by DNA ·
How to track AI agents when Google Analytics can’t see them
Google Analytics counts people. Most AI traffic comes from crawlers that never run its tracking code, and the agents that do can look like shoppers.
Today an agent buying for a customer and a scraper using GPTBot’s name both hit your store. Google Analytics shows one user. DNA shows both and catches the fake.
- 1 user
- 6 agents
| Agent | In GAWhat Google Analytics records |
|---|---|
| GPTBot | NothingNothing. It never runs the tracking code |
| ChatGPT search | NothingNothing. It never runs the tracking code |
| Googlebot | ExcludedExcluded as a known bot, count hidden |
| ClaudeBot | NothingNothing. It never runs the tracking code |
| ChatGPT agent | 1 userA user, like any shopper |
| GPTBot | NothingNothing. It never runs the tracking code |
Can Google Analytics track AI agents?
Mostly no. Google Analytics records a visit only when its tracking code runs in a browser, and most AI traffic never runs it.
46.6%
of AI agent traffic went to retail and ecommerce sites in 2025.
HUMAN, 2026 State of AI Traffic
Agents work in a browser, so they can run your tracking code. When one does, the visit sits in your sessions and your conversion rate as if it were a shopper.
AI traffic in December 2025, and what Google Analytics can record
- Training crawlers
- 74%
- Mostly can’t be recorded: the major ones never run tracking code.
- Scrapers
- 24%
- Recorded only when they run your tracking code. HUMAN doesn’t say how many do.
- AI agents and agent browsers
- 1.7%
- Work in a full browser, so they can run your tracking code and look like a shopper.
- growth in AI agent traffic in 2025, from a small base.
- 7,851%
- of agent visits landed on product and search pages.
- 77%
- of agent visits reached checkout.
- 2.3%
What does the GA4 AI Assistant channel track?
“At this time, you cannot disable known bot traffic exclusion or see how much known bot traffic was excluded.”
“AI Assistant is the channel by which users arrive at your site from sources like ChatGPT, Gemini, Deepseek, Copilot, or Grok.”
It counts the people that ChatGPT, Gemini and Copilot send you. Keep it for that.
Can you trust the name an agent gives?
84%
of visits calling themselves GPTBot didn’t pass OpenAI’s own check.
News and media sites; we found no figure for stores. At the pooled rate, 2%, counting by name is close enough. At 84%, it’s mostly fakes. Your own log settles which. And most bots can’t prove who they are at all: 95.8% of the 2,175 we track.
Share of visits using each name that failed the maker’s own check
| GPTBot | 84% |
|---|---|
| ClaudeBot | 40% |
| PerplexityBot | 20% |
| Googlebot | 14% |
| ChatGPT-User | 12% |
GA4, server logs or DNA: which tracks AI agents?
| GA4 | Logs | DNA | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sees every AI visit | No | Yes | Yes |
| Tells an agent from a shopper | No | No | If it proves it |
| Catches a borrowed name | No | No | When checkable |
| Says what the agent came for | No | Your own list | Yes |
| Lets you act on it | No | No | Let in, price or stop |
| Setup | Tracking code | A developer | 10 min |
How do you track AI agents on your site?
Track AI agents in five steps: read GA4’s AI Assistant channel, pull your visit logs, check each name, sort agents by what they came for, and decide what each one gets. The measurement guide has the log filters and a weekly scorecard.
1Read the AI Assistant channel in GA4
By hand: Reports > Acquisition > Traffic acquisition. The AI Assistant row is people sent by assistants such as ChatGPT, Gemini and Copilot.
With DNA: Keep it. DNA doesn’t change it.
2Pull every visit from your server logs
By hand: Ask your developer for the site’s visit logs and search them for agent names like GPTBot and ClaudeBot.
With DNA: Every agent visit lands in your log as it happens, including the ones Google Analytics never sees.
3Check each name
By hand: Have your developer check each visit against the list its maker publishes.
With DNA: Checked with the agent’s maker on every visit, where the maker gives a way to check. A borrowed name is caught; the rest show as Name only.
4Sort agents by what they came for
By hand: Keep your own list of which names mean training, search or a shopper’s agent.
With DNA: DNA labels each one by purpose: training data, search indexing, acting for a person.
5Decide what each one gets
By hand: robots.txt rules (grade yours free), which crawlers are free to ignore.
With DNA: Let in, price or stop, before the page is served.
Connect your domain and your log fills in about ten minutes. Nothing is blocked until you say so. ChatGPT agent proves who sent it on every visit, and 28 of the 38 AI assistants we track can do the same, so DNA tells them from fakes. To price training crawlers, read how to charge AI crawlers.
On Shopify you point your domain at DNA, and checkout stays with Shopify. A domain bought through Shopify moves to another registrar first. To leave, switch it back. How DNA handles your traffic
Questions about tracking AI agents
Can Google Analytics track AI agents?
Mostly no. Google Analytics records a visit only when its tracking code runs in a browser. The major AI crawlers never run it, Google filters the bots it knows without showing the count, and agents working in a browser can look like shoppers.
Does the GA4 AI Assistant channel track AI agents?
No. Added on May 13, 2026, it groups visits referred by assistants such as ChatGPT, Gemini and Copilot. It counts the people who click through.
Can I see the bot traffic Google Analytics filtered out?
No. Google says you can’t turn off its known-bot exclusion or see how much traffic it removed.
Why do AI agents look like people in Google Analytics?
Agent browsers such as ChatGPT Atlas and Perplexity Comet run a full browser, so they can run your tracking code and the visit reads like a shopper’s.
How do I know a visit from GPTBot is really OpenAI?
OpenAI publishes where GPTBot really comes from, so a visit from anywhere else isn’t OpenAI. On a typical news site in 2026, 84% of visits calling themselves GPTBot failed that check. DNA runs it on every visit.
Does DNA work on Shopify?
Yes. You point your domain at DNA, and Shopify keeps serving checkout. A domain bought through Shopify has to move to another registrar first.
Does DNA fix my Google Analytics numbers?
No. DNA doesn’t change what Google Analytics records. It shows you the agents Google Analytics can’t: who each one is, whether the name is real, and what it came for.
Does DNA replace Google Analytics?
No. Keep Google Analytics for people. DNA logs the agents, checks each one and lets you decide what they get.
Is DNA free?
Yes. Seeing and checking every agent is free for every site. Stopping agents is on the paid plan.
See every AI agent that visits your store, and catch the fakes.
Sign up freeDNA is free for every site.
Method and sources
- AI traffic: HUMAN, 2026 State of AI Traffic report, from more than a quadrillion interactions it processed in 2025. Training crawlers were 74%, scrapers 24% and AI agents and agent browsers 1.7% of the AI-driven traffic it saw in December 2025; across the year crawlers were 67.5%. Its agents include ChatGPT agent, ChatGPT Atlas and Perplexity Comet. Vertical and page shares are of agent traffic.
- JavaScript: Vercel and MERJ, published December 2024: “none of the major AI crawlers currently render JavaScript,” OpenAI’s, Anthropic’s and Perplexity’s among them. Google Analytics records a visit only when its JavaScript tag runs. Googlebot renders pages; Google Analytics excludes known bots using Google’s research and the IAB’s bot list.
- Google Analytics: known-bot exclusion, read November 7, 2026. The AI Assistant channel, added May 13, 2026, as reported by PPC Land.
- Borrowed names: Centinel Analytica, September 2026, median per site across the news and media sites it protects, checked by signature, published address ranges, then reverse DNS. Pooled across all their traffic the shares run lower, GPTBot’s at 2%, because the busiest sites weigh more. OpenAI’s published address ranges.
- Known bots: our August study of 2,175 bots in the D3 registry: 95.8% publish nothing to check, and 28 of 38 AI assistants publish a way to prove who sent them.
- Every figure on this page, as CSV. To cite it: “DNA by D3, How to track AI agents when Google Analytics can’t see them, November 2026.”
- The store hour is an example, not customer data.