Google Ads conversions missing or not recorded: 12 causes and how to check them in an hour
Why Google Ads suddenly shows fewer conversions than your shop or CRM, how to narrow down in ten minutes where they are missing and how to check all 12 causes one after another in an hour.
Fabian Weiss The ad account has shown fewer orders than the shop for days and nobody knows whether tracking or revenue has collapsed
A ten-minute triage with the right column, then 12 causes in four groups with symptom, check and fix, ticked off one after another
Fewer conversions rarely means fewer sales
The typical trigger: you open the ad account, conversions have been below their usual level for a week, the campaigns are running as always. In the shop or in the CRM the same period looks normal. Both numbers cannot be right.
In almost every case we check, revenue has not collapsed. The report to Google has. That is the good news. The bad news: as long as the report is missing, Google optimises your bids on a false picture. That costs money every day.
This guide takes you through the check in an hour. First a ten-minute triage so you know which group to search in. Then 12 causes, each with symptom, check and fix. At the end a protocol that proves the repair.
If you have not set up conversion tracking at all yet, the guide Google Ads conversion tracking setup is the better starting point.
Ten-minute triage: where are the conversions missing?
Three steps before you touch anything.
1. Read the right column
The standard “Conversions” column attributes every order to the day of the click, not the day of the order. Google describes this in its help page on the conversion columns: a click from last week that leads to an order this week is written back into last week. For troubleshooting this is fatal. Tracking that fails completely on a Tuesday looks in this column like a slow decline over two weeks, because the clicks of the previous days keep receiving orders after the fact.
So add the column “Conversions (by conv. time)”. It counts every order on the day it happened. Put the orders per day from the shop or the leads per day from the CRM next to it. Where the two lines diverge, the outage began. Note the date. Almost every one of the 12 causes has a date on which something changed. That date is your strongest lead.
Important: only orders that follow an ad click land in Google Ads at all. So do not expect the numbers to be equal. Expect the ratio to stay stable.
2. The status list of the conversion actions
Under goals and conversions you find every conversion action with a status. Google is currently changing the labels, so depending on your account you see one of two versions. The older version distinguishes:
| Status | Meaning according to Google | What it means for you |
|---|---|---|
| Unverified | Google has never seen the tag | Tag not installed or on the wrong page |
| No recent conversions | Google sees the tag but has recorded no conversion in seven days | Tag alive, counting fails or traffic is missing |
| Recording conversions | Tag seen, conversions within the last seven days | All good, move on to the next action |
| Tag inactive | Google no longer sees the tag and has recorded nothing in seven days | Tag disappeared after a change |
The newer version says Active, Needs attention, Misconfigured, Awaiting conversions and Removed. “Misconfigured” corresponds to the old “Tag inactive”, “Awaiting conversions” to the old “No recent conversions”.
The word “Inactive” on its own, which turns up constantly in forums and agency emails, is not a status of its own. It lumps together the two cases where nothing arrived for seven days. The difference is decisive: with “Tag inactive” you search in group 1, with “No recent conversions” in group 2.
Next to the status Google shows when the tag was last seen and when a conversion was last recorded. Compare these dates with the date from step 1.
3. The conversion window
Every conversion action has a click-through conversion window, 30 days by default. If someone shortened the window, every order that came later after the click than the new window disappears. Changes only apply going forward, Google never counts anything retroactively. Open the settings of the action and the change history of the account. If there is an entry on the outage date, you are done after ten minutes and in group 4.
Group 1: the tag does not fire
Signature: status “Tag inactive” or “Unverified”. In Tag Assistant or in the browser’s network tab you see no call to Google on the thank-you page.
1. A theme or plugin update removed or moved the tag
Symptom: the outage starts exactly on a day someone worked on the shop. With WordPress and WooCommerce the date is in the update history, with Shopify in the theme history.
Check: open the thank-you page after a test order with Google Tag Assistant. If neither the Google tag nor the conversion call fires there, the tag is gone. If it fires on the homepage but not on the thank-you page, it sits on the wrong page. Often a new theme has replaced the order confirmation template or a caching plugin loads scripts late and the conversion tag no longer gets its turn.
Fix: install the tag through Tag Manager or the platform integration, not by hand in a theme file. Then it survives the next update. After installing, verify with Tag Assistant so the status in the ad account jumps back to “Recording conversions”.
2. Shopify switched off the old scripts on 26 August 2026
Symptom: Shopify shop without Plus, the decline starts at the end of August and looks like a gentle slope in the standard column. Meta shows a hard drop at the same time.
Check: for shops without Plus, Shopify ended script tags on the order status page on 26 August 2026, together with the additional scripts field. If your conversion tag was entered there, it has not run since. Look under Settings, Checkout, whether old code is or was still there.
Fix: reinstall the tag through the Google & YouTube app, a custom pixel or a server-side report. The article Google has seen fewer orders than your shop for two weeks walks through the three routes.
3. The Tag Manager container is not published
Symptom: everything looks right in Tag Manager, preview mode works, yet nothing arrives in the ad account. Or: someone recently worked in the container.
Check: open the version list in Tag Manager. If the current version is a draft or the last publication is before the outage date while changes were saved later, the cause is found. A second classic: the container was published, but the conversion tag has a trigger that only matches an old URL of the thank-you page.
Fix: publish, then test order, then Tag Assistant. Write down who is allowed to publish in the container.
Group 2: the tag fires but Google does not count
Signature: status “No recent conversions”, the call to Google is visible in the network tab, yet nothing arrives in the account. This is the group where most hours are lost, because the tag is obviously running.
4. The transaction ID is missing or always the same
Symptom: orders arrive, but far fewer than in the shop. Or a drop after a checkout change.
Check: Google uses the transaction ID to sort out duplicate reports. If a second conversion with the same ID arrives for the same action, Google treats it as a duplicate and does not count it. If your tag carries a fixed ID, an empty value or a number the platform does not assign anew per order, Google counts exactly one order and discards the rest. Look at two test orders in the network tab: the transaction parameter must differ.
Fix: pass the order number from the shop system as the ID. On Shopify the custom pixel provides the order number, on WooCommerce the order ID. What is missing retroactively cannot be added later. From the fix onwards every order counts.
5. The cookie banner denies the advertising cookie
Symptom: after introducing or changing a cookie banner the count collapses while orders stay normal. Google Ads may then show modelled conversions instead of observed ones.
Check: if the signal for advertising storage in consent mode is set to “denied”, the Google tags store no cookies. That means the click ID is not stored either and the tag only sends a ping without an identifier. If your banner denies everything by default and never passes the consent on to the Google tags, every order looks as if consent had been refused. Check the consent state in Tag Assistant before and after clicking “Accept”.
Fix: the consent from the banner has to reach the Google tags as an update before the conversion tag fires on the thank-you page. Which consent mode variant fits your situation is covered in the guide Consent Mode Basic vs Advanced.
6. The click ID does not survive the way to the thank-you page
Symptom: tag fires, ID is unique, consent is granted. Orders are still missing, especially with payment through an external provider or after a domain change.
Check: Google only recognises an order as the result of an ad click if the click ID from the landing page URL sits in a cookie on your domain. That is the job of the Conversion Linker in Tag Manager or of the Google tag running on every page. If both are missing, there is no cookie. Second case: a redirect strips the parameter from the URL. Google names this explicitly as a cause in its help page on sitewide tagging. Third case: the customer pays on the payment provider’s domain and returns to a thank-you page on a different domain where the cookie does not apply. Check three things: does the gclid parameter land in the address bar after the click? Is there a cookie named _gcl_aw on the domain afterwards? Is the thank-you page on the same domain?
Fix: Conversion Linker on all pages, redirects configured to pass parameters through, thank-you page on your own domain or cross-domain measurement set up.
Group 3: the uploads have stopped
Signature: the affected conversion action has “Import” or “Google Analytics” as its source, not “Website”. You cannot check anything in the browser here, because the orders were never reported through the browser.
7. The upload tool lost its access
Symptom: the action fed with orders from the shop system or leads from the CRM has shown nothing since a cut-off date. Website actions run normally.
Check: two changes at Google hit exactly these tools. Since 15 June 2026 the Google Ads API no longer accepts offline conversions from new integrations, for new connections this route only runs through the Data Manager API. Anyone who uploaded nothing between December 2025 and May 2026 counts as new. And on 9 September 2026 Google sunset developer tokens, access has since been determined by the Google Cloud project the credentials come from. A tool whose vendor has not switched over has been uploading into the void since. Open the tool and see whether it reports errors or an expired connection. In the ad account the action shows under uploads when the last upload arrived.
Fix: reauthorise the connection, ask the vendor whether they have moved to the Data Manager API. The article Google switched off the old access to the ads API on 9 September describes the ten-minute check.
8. The import from Google Analytics 4 is broken
Symptom: the action with source “Google Analytics (GA4)” shows nothing any more, while the key events keep arriving in GA4 itself.
Check: the import requires that the GA4 property and the ad account are linked and that auto-tagging is switched on. If the link is removed, for instance because someone tidied up the property or lost access, the conversion action remains in the ad account but no longer receives data. Check in GA4 under Admin, Product links, whether the ad account is still listed and whether auto-tagging is active.
Fix: set the link again. And decide once and for all: if the website action and the GA4 action are both called “Purchase”, only one of them may be primary, otherwise you count twice.
Group 4: the numbers are right but look wrong
Signature: tag fires, ID unique, uploads running, still fewer conversions than expected. Here it is not the measurement that changed, but the rule by which Google counts.
9. Attribution or conversion window was changed
Symptom: the decline starts on a day when nobody worked on the shop, but someone worked in the ad account.
Check: open the change history of the account, filter for conversion settings. A shortened conversion window or a switch of the attribution model shifts which orders are credited to a click. The orders are still there, they just hang on other clicks or on none.
Fix: if the change was intentional, document it and adjust the comparison periods. If not, set it back. Google never counts anything retroactively.
10. A second conversion action is set to secondary
Symptom: the “Conversions” column has collapsed, the “All conversions” column has not.
Check: secondary conversion actions appear only in “All conversions”, not in “Conversions”. If someone set the action that counts your orders to secondary or a website action was replaced by an imported GA4 action that Google sets to secondary by default, the orders vanish from the main column. Look under goals to see which action is primary.
Fix: exactly one action per goal set to primary, the rest deliberately secondary.
11. The AI Max upgrade in September shifts where conversions land
Symptom: Search campaigns that used campaign-level broad match or automatically created assets show different numbers per campaign, ad group or keyword since September. The total in the account is stable.
Check: between 1 and 30 September 2026 Google automatically upgraded these campaigns to AI Max. Since then Google also shows ads for search queries outside your keyword list and the orders come in through new search terms and partly different landing pages. Anyone evaluating conversions at keyword level sees shifts. Compare the account-level total in “Conversions (by conv. time)” with the shop. If it is stable, nothing is missing.
Fix: read reports at campaign or account level, check the search terms report. What had to be checked before the upgrade is in the article Google is upgrading your Search campaigns to AI Max in September.
12. Ad blockers and Safari with browser-only measurement
Symptom: no cut-off date, but a permanent gap between shop and ad account that is larger for customers on iPhone.
Check: if your conversion tag runs exclusively in the browser, every report depends on the browser loading the script and keeping the cookie long enough. Ad blockers block the call, Safari limits the lifetime of cookies set by script. This is not a fault in your setup and cannot be configured away. Check whether the gap between shop and ad account has been roughly the same for months. Then it is this cause and none of the eleven before it.
Fix: switch on enhanced conversions so Google can match orders through hashed customer data or send the report server-side from the shop system. Both are part of the web tracking service.
Symptom to cause
| What you see | Likely cause | Number |
|---|---|---|
| Status “Tag inactive” or “Unverified” | Tag removed, moved or never published | 1, 3 |
| Shopify without Plus, decline from late August | Script tags switched off | 2 |
| Status “No recent conversions”, tag visible in network tab | ID, consent or click ID | 4, 5, 6 |
| Drop after checkout rebuild, number far too small | Fixed or missing transaction ID | 4 |
| Collapse after a new cookie banner | Advertising cookie denied | 5 |
| Payment at external provider, orders missing | Click ID gets lost | 6 |
| Import action empty, website actions normal | Upload tool without access | 7 |
| GA4 action empty, GA4 itself counts | Link broken | 8 |
| Decline on a day without a shop change | Window or attribution changed | 9 |
| ”Conversions” falls, “All conversions” does not | Action set to secondary | 10 |
| Shift between campaigns since September | AI Max | 11 |
| Permanent gap without a cut-off date | Ad blockers, Safari | 12 |
The closing protocol
A repair without proof is not a repair. After every fix:
- Trigger a real test order or a real test lead, not in preview mode. Note the order number.
- Check in the network tab that the call to Google leaves with this order number as the ID.
- Wait. Website conversions usually appear within a few hours, uploads and GA4 imports take longer. Only assume an error after 24 hours.
- Look in the ad account to confirm the test order sits in “Conversions (by conv. time)” on the right day and the status has switched to “Recording conversions”.
- Document: date of the outage, date of the repair, cause by number, what was changed and who changed it. For the time in between you cannot add anything at Google, but you can exclude it when evaluating the campaigns.
- Repeat after every theme update, every plugin update and every container publication. That takes five minutes and saves the hour you have just invested.
If you do not want to do this by hand every time, run the orders per day from the shop against the conversions per day from the ad account and get a message as soon as the ratio tips. That is the core of the monitoring service.
What FW Delta does here
If after this hour you are not sure which of the 12 causes it is or whether several apply at once, FW Delta takes over the check as a Tracking-Check. Within two working days you receive a written finding: what is missing, since when, why and what the fix costs. No repair without prior approval, no subscription.
Then you decide whether you fix it yourself or we do. The web tracking service builds the report so that it survives the next update. Monitoring makes sure you know about the next outage after a day and not after two weeks.