Search code examples
google-analyticsgoogle-analytics-apigoogle-analytics-firebase

Google Analytics difference between "TimeOnPage" and "AvgSessionDuration"

Can anyone explain what the difference between Google Analytics "TimeOnPage (avg)" and "Average Session duration" is?

Currently we have massive variance between this like:

Time on page (average): 133 seconds
Session duration (average): 9 seconds

Thanks a lot!

Solution

  • Time on Page (avg) is calculated as an average between times for each pageview on the site. Single page visits (bounce visits) are not taken into account since the last page visit has no timestamp and GA needs two timestamps to calculate the time on page.

    Session Duration (avg) is calculated based on the difference between the first and final timestamp during a session.

    Note: Since Session Duration (avg) includes bounce visits, which logs 0 as the time spent for single visits, then the higher your bounce rate, the lower your avg session duration.