Google Images is a visual playground where people search for pictures, illustrations, and photos. When someone finds an image on Google and then clicks through to your website, that’s valuable traffic. But unlike plain text search results, image search can be tricky to track and measure using standard analytics tools. In this blog, we explore why that’s so and what you can realistically do to see those clicks.
 |
| How to Track Google Images Search Clicks? |
What Are Google Images Search Clicks?
When we talk about “Google Images search clicks,” we mean people clicking on images in Google’s image search results and then going to your website. These aren’t just views — they are actual click‑throughs where a user moves from Google to your content, signaling interest in what you offer.
In standard web analytics like Google Search Console, “clicks” generally means how many times users have clicked your site’s links from a Google search results page. This includes organic listings in search results. But image search works a little differently than web search, and that makes click tracking more complicated. (narrative.bi)
Why Google Images Clicks Are Hard to Track
Unlike traditional website pages, Google Images doesn’t always behave like a normal search results page. When someone searches in Google Images and clicks an image thumbnail, it may first expand inside Google’s own interface instead of immediately taking the visitor to the site. Until the user actually leaves Google and visits your site, a real click isn’t counted in standard search analytics. (gsqi.com)
Another challenge is how data is shown in analytics tools. Google Search Console used to show more detailed image‑search click metrics, but over time this has been limited or changed, making it less straightforward to isolate image search traffic from general organic search traffic. Some reports suggest that when Google changed how referrals from image search work, it affected how that data appears in analytics. (Search Engine Land)
Where You Can See Image Search Clicks
Google Search Console (GSC) is the best place to start. In the Performance report, you’ll see clicks from Google search results. However, GSC doesn’t always break out image search clicks separately in a clear way.
For example, if someone clicks your image and then goes to your site, that click may show up under organic clicks — but only after the visitor actually leaves Google’s results and lands on your page. Internal interactions in Google Images alone don’t count as actual clicks in GSC metrics. (gsqi.com)
If you rely heavily on images — such as if you run an ecommerce site, portfolio, photography blog, or recipe site — this problematic tracking can feel like a blind spot. You know people are seeing your visuals, but you can’t easily see exactly how often they click through.
Google Analytics: What It Can Track
Google Analytics (GA) normally tracks visitors once they reach your website. It doesn’t inherently know whether a visitor came from image search or normal web search unless the referral source is identifiable.
In older versions or certain specific setups, you might see “google images” as a referral source when someone clicks through from image search and is taken directly to your site. But this behavior has changed over time, and in many recent setups you might only see a generic “google/organic” source. (Search Engine Land)
That means Google Analytics can tell you when someone arrives from a Google search, but it won’t inherently tell you that they clicked an image first unless the referral data clearly identifies that. The problem here is partly due to privacy updates and how browser referrer information has evolved.
Using Google Tag Manager to Track Image Clicks
If your goal is to track when users click an image on your own website, Google Tag Manager (GTM) combined with Google Analytics 4 (GA4) can be useful. GTM lets you set up event tracking for clicks on any element, including image links.
You would create a “click trigger” in GTM that fires whenever a visitor clicks on an element that matches your image link’s CSS selector or HTML attributes. Once that trigger is set, you can send this data as an event to GA4. The analytics tool will then record these events, and you can view them in your event reports. (support.timesites.com)
This method tracks clicks on images within your website but doesn’t automatically show whether someone came from Google Images search. It shows what visitors do after they arrive on your pages.
A Simple Way to Distinguish Image Search Traffic
One practical approach is to use source/medium segmentation in Google Analytics. If your analytics shows incoming traffic with a source that looks like “google images” or a similar referral label, you can filter or segment those visits to see how those visitors behave compared to other organic search traffic.
Even if the specific label isn’t obvious, you can use custom reports in GA4 to examine incoming traffic pathways, landing pages, and referral paths. Looking at landing page URLs that receive lots of traffic and tracing where those visitors came from may help infer likely image search activity.
But remember, Google sometimes aggregates image search referrals into general organic search labels, so you may not always get a perfect breakdown.
Using Event Tracking for More Insight
If you want more granular insights on what people do after clicking an image, you can set up event tracking in Google Analytics.
For example, you could track:
When visitors scroll to a particular image
When they click an image lightbox or expand a gallery
When they click a product image link
Any interactions with visual elements that represent important engagement
Setting up these events gives you a window into how users interact with your versatile visual content once they reach your site. Tools like jQuery or data‑attributes can help send click events to analytics if you prefer a code‑based solution. (Medium)
Why This Matters for Your Site
Images can be powerful drivers of traffic and engagement. On many sites — especially ecommerce, travel blogs, recipe platforms, portfolios, and social feeds — images are not just decoration, they are a primary discovery channel.
When users search for visuals and your images show up high in results, there’s a real chance those clicks can bring brand new visitors to your site. But unless you’re tracking those clicks effectively, you might be missing out on key insights about what’s attracting people and what’s not.
Understanding where your traffic is coming from, and specifically where image search traffic is coming from, can influence how you optimize your image SEO — things like alt tags, image file names, descriptive captions, and structured data — all of which help Google understand what your images represent.
What You Can’t Easily Track
It’s worth being honest: you can’t get a perfect, built‑in metric for every single Google Images click directly in Google Analytics or Google Search Console. That’s because Google Images doesn’t always report detailed referral data in the same way that web search clicks are reported. Sometimes those clicks are recorded as generic organic search sources without a clear label. (Search Engine Land)
In short, there’s no magical switch in analytics that says: “Here are all your Google Images clicks!” — at least not without relying on specific changes in how Google reports referral data.
Conclusion: Realistic Expectations
Tracking Google Images search clicks is a mix of art and science. You can’t always get a perfect count, but you can use the tools available — like Google Search Console and Google Analytics with Tag Manager — to infer and measure key aspects of image traffic.
Start with Search Console to see overall search performance and clicks. Use Analytics to measure visitor behavior once they arrive. And if you want precise image interaction tracking on your own site, set up events through Google Tag Manager.
By combining these approaches thoughtfully, you’ll paint a more complete picture of how your images contribute to traffic and engagement — even if the raw click count isn’t always perfectly visible.
Related Questions & Answers
1. What is Google Images search click tracking?
Google Images search click tracking monitors how users interact with your images in search results, revealing which images drive traffic to your website. It helps optimize visual content strategy and understand user behavior to increase engagement and conversions from image searches.
2. Why track clicks from Google Images?
Tracking clicks from Google Images shows which visuals attract visitors, enabling targeted content improvements. It helps measure ROI of image SEO efforts, discover high-performing images, and understand audience interests. Without tracking, it’s difficult to quantify the impact of visual content on website traffic.
3. How to use Google Search Console for tracking?
Google Search Console provides insights on image clicks, impressions, and CTR. By enabling performance reports and filtering for “Image” search type, you can monitor which images bring traffic, analyze trends, and identify opportunities to optimize metadata, alt text, and image relevance for higher engagement.
4. Can Google Analytics track image search traffic?
Yes, Google Analytics can track image-driven traffic by examining referral sources or landing pages. Using UTM parameters for image links or monitoring landing page entrances helps identify the volume of users originating from Google Images, offering a clearer understanding of visual content performance.
5. How to filter image traffic in Analytics?
In Google Analytics, filter traffic by “Source/Medium” or set a custom segment for Google Image traffic. You can track landing pages receiving clicks from image searches, analyze user behavior, and correlate image optimization efforts with engagement metrics, enabling data-driven SEO decisions.
6. What role does image SEO play in tracking?
Optimizing image SEO, including alt text, titles, and structured data, increases visibility in Google Images. Better visibility directly affects clicks and engagement, making tracking more accurate and valuable for measuring the effectiveness of your visual content strategy and search performance.
7. Are UTM parameters useful for tracking clicks?
Yes, adding UTM parameters to image URLs allows precise tracking of clicks and traffic sources. By creating custom UTM tags for different images, marketers can measure the performance of individual visuals, campaigns, or galleries, providing actionable insights to improve user engagement.
8. How to track clicks without direct URL access?
If images are embedded on external platforms, tracking can be done using Google Analytics event tracking or by monitoring landing page visits. This indirect method helps estimate image-driven traffic when direct click tracking is not possible, ensuring insights into audience behavior.
9. Can third-party tools help in tracking?
Third-party tools like Ahrefs, SEMrush, or Hotjar can analyze image search traffic. They provide click data, rankings, and engagement metrics for images, supplementing native tools. These tools offer a broader view of image SEO performance and competitor benchmarking for more informed strategies.
10. How to measure click-through rate (CTR) for images?
CTR is calculated by dividing the number of clicks by impressions and multiplying by 100. Google Search Console reports CTR for individual images, helping identify which visuals attract users and which require optimization to improve engagement in image search results.
11. What common mistakes to avoid while tracking?
Common mistakes include ignoring image-specific data, not using proper UTM tags, and misattributing traffic sources. Failing to track landing pages or engagement can lead to inaccurate conclusions about image performance, reducing the effectiveness of your image SEO strategy.
12. How to improve tracking insights over time?
Regularly analyze trends, test image optimizations, and refine UTM tagging. Combine Google Analytics and Search Console data to track patterns, adjust strategies, and measure the long-term impact of visual content. Continuous monitoring ensures actionable insights for better traffic and engagement from Google Images.