Universal Analytics → Matomo
Move events, properties, identities, conversions, attribution, ecommerce, reports, audiences, consent, collection, and historical evidence from Universal Analytics into Matomo with an explicit exception ledger and evidence-based cutover.
Should you make this move?
Both platforms have a case. Compare what you gain with what you give up before scheduling the cutover.
Universal Analytics
- Its session-based reports remain familiar to a generation of web analysts
- Established reporting patterns make recurring measurement easier
- Processing has ended, making it unsuitable as an active measurement platform
- Tracking quality still depends on disciplined implementation and governance
Matomo
- Data ownership, self-hosting, and privacy controls support compliance-sensitive teams
- Established reporting patterns make recurring measurement easier
- Operating it well requires infrastructure, upgrades, and analytics expertise
- Tracking quality still depends on disciplined implementation and governance
Matomo: Data ownership, self-hosting, and privacy controls support compliance-sensitive teams. This removes a major source-side concern: Processing has ended, making it unsuitable as an active measurement platform.
What you lose: Its session-based reports remain familiar to a generation of web analysts. What you inherit: Operating it well requires infrastructure, upgrades, and analytics expertise.
Know the shape of the move.
This timeline assumes
- Up to 50 properties, 500 events, and five years of retained reports
- A signed measurement plan defines the metrics and conversions that must remain comparable.
- Both collectors can run in parallel for at least one representative business cycle.
- Imported history is labeled separately from destination-native collection.
- The migration team records evidence for every blocking verification check.
What survives the move.
“Partial” and “manual” are not footnotes. They are work that must be scheduled and verified.
| Item | Outcome | Impact | What happens | Mitigation |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Previously exported reports, dimensions, goals, ecommerce evidence, and historical baselines | partial | critical | Core previously exported reports, dimensions, goals, ecommerce evidence, and historical baselines can move, but Universal Analytics and Matomo use different models, limits, identifiers, and import behavior. | Pilot every feature class, preserve source IDs, and reconcile accepted, transformed, rejected, and excluded items. |
| Raw event history, session continuity, audiences, attribution parity, and active data collection | lost | critical | Universal Analytics processing has ended, and archived reports cannot recreate its original hit stream as native Matomo history. | Inventory every active dependency, approve its destination disposition, and test the replacement before source writes stop. |
| Historical reports and aggregate metrics | partial | critical | Supported importers can preserve selected aggregates, but destination definitions and dimensions differ. | Record source baselines and annotate imported versus native periods. |
| Raw events and visitor-level history | lost | critical | Report import does not recreate the original event stream or user journey. | Archive lawful raw exports separately when they are required. |
| Users, sessions, and identity stitching | partial | critical | Identifiers, session boundaries, consent behavior, and deduplication differ. | Approve metric definitions and never expect exact cross-platform parity. |
| Events, goals, and conversions | manual | critical | Names may import while triggers and conversion configuration require destination setup. | Create an event dictionary and test every business conversion. |
| Properties, custom dimensions, and user properties | partial | high | Types, cardinality, reserved fields, and query semantics differ. | Map every active property and reject unmapped critical values. |
| Attribution and channel grouping | partial | high | Traffic-source, campaign, and attribution models are platform-specific. | Publish the destination attribution definition and expected breaks. |
| Dashboards, explorations, and saved reports | lost | high | Visualization and query configuration does not become destination-native content. | Rebuild only the signed reporting set. |
| Audiences, cohorts, and segments | manual | high | Dynamic membership rules must be re-expressed against destination data. | Test known members and exclusions for each active audience. |
| Tracking code and data collection | manual | critical | Tags, SDKs, server events, consent, domains, and filters require a new implementation. | Run both collectors in parallel and verify live payloads. |
| Ecommerce and revenue | partial | critical | Revenue events and product schemas can have unsupported or different fields. | Reconcile transaction IDs, currency, tax, refunds, and totals. |
Where each thing goes.
| Source | Destination | Method | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Universal Analytics account, property, or project | Matomo site, property, or project | manual | Record timezone, currency, domain, and ownership. |
| Page view or event | Destination page view or event | transform | Map name, timestamp, URL, and properties. |
| User identifier | Destination user identifier | transform | Apply approved privacy and identity rules. |
| Session | Destination session | manual | Document definition differences rather than forcing parity. |
| Goal or conversion | Destination goal or conversion | manual | Recreate the trigger and test it live. |
| Custom dimension or property | Destination property | transform | Map type, scope, cardinality, and allowed values. |
| Source, medium, campaign, or channel | Destination attribution fields | transform | Record model differences. |
| Ecommerce transaction | Destination revenue event | transform | Preserve transaction ID, currency, value, tax, and refund state. |
| Saved report or audience | Destination report or segment | manual | Rebuild from the signed measurement plan. |
Make the move recoverable.
Create the source-of-truth backup
Preserve Universal Analytics data, configuration, and operating evidence before any destination write.
- Export Universal Analytics account, property, event, goal, property, audience, report, tag, integration, and privacy configuration.
- Save dated metric, conversion, attribution, ecommerce, and traffic baselines.
- Record timezone, currency, retention, filters, consent, and data-deletion settings.
- Hash raw exports and the signed measurement plan.
Proof to capture: A signed manifest reconciles every scoped record class, runtime dependency, export file, count, and hash.
Measurement and taxonomy map
Define events, properties, conversions, identity, and metric breaks.
- Inventory source values and exceptions.
- Define explicit destination mappings.
- Reject unmapped critical records.
Proof to capture: Save the input, output, command or tool settings, warnings, and final item counts.
Parallel collection and historical import
Build trustworthy destination data while preserving supported history.
- Normalize encoding, dates, identifiers, and blanks.
- Run a representative pilot.
- Reconcile accepted, rejected, and transformed rows.
Proof to capture: Save the input, output, command or tool settings, warnings, and final item counts.
The things most likely to hurt.
These are operating limits. Treat every “Stop if” condition as a blocked migration, not a suggestion.
Metric differences are mistaken for data loss
Sessions, users, attribution, consent, and bot filtering produce different totals.
- Consequence
- Teams reject valid data or make bad decisions.
- Mitigation
- Approve definitions and expected variance before cutover.
Stop if: A critical metric lacks an owner-approved interpretation.
Conversions silently stop
Pages load while events, server calls, consent, or revenue payloads fail.
- Consequence
- Business reporting and optimization become blind.
- Mitigation
- Test every conversion end to end in live traffic.
Stop if: A critical event has no verified destination receipt.
Collection continues in both tools unintentionally
Old tags remain active beyond the comparison window.
- Consequence
- Privacy scope and operating cost exceed approval.
- Mitigation
- Keep a dated parallel-run plan and remove old collectors only after sign-off.
Stop if: An unowned source collector remains active.
Do the work in this order.
- Days 1–3 · inventory
Inventory and decisions
6–12 hours active2–3 days elapsedOwner review waiting- Inventory Universal Analytics data, features, users, domains, and integrations.
- Approve scope, owners, mappings, and exclusions.
Depends on: Universal Analytics and Matomo administrator access
Stop / go checkpointExport?
Go when: Every critical item has an owner and disposition.
Stop when: Consent, billing, access, or system ownership is unclear.
- Days 3–5 · backup
Backup and reconcile
5–10 hours active1–3 days elapsedExport processing waiting- Create immutable exports and configuration evidence.
- Reconcile counts, totals, and hashes.
Depends on: Approved inventory
Stop / go checkpointTransform?
Go when: Source totals and export manifests agree.
Stop when: Any critical dataset or configuration is absent.
- Days 5–12 · pilot
Map and pilot
10–35 hours active3–8 days elapsedDestination processing and review waiting- Configure Matomo and transform representative data.
- Run a pilot containing normal records and every critical edge case.
Depends on: Verified backup
Stop / go checkpointScale?
Go when: Pilot mappings, behavior, access, and evidence pass.
Stop when: Any critical check fails or produces unexplained variance.
- Days 10–20 · cutover
Final delta and switch
5–25 hours active1–5 days elapsedDNS, import, or sync propagation waiting- Freeze production writes in Universal Analytics.
- Apply the final delta, switch ownership, and run blocking checks.
Depends on: Passed pilot and approved rollback
Stop / go checkpointOpen production?
Go when: Counts reconcile and one destination system owns production.
Stop when: A source writer remains active or a blocking check fails.
- Days 12–40 · observe
Observe and close
3–18 hours active3–10 days elapsedOperating-cycle evidence waiting- Monitor one complete operating cycle.
- Sign the verification report and close rollback only after stability.
Depends on: Verified cutover
Stop / go checkpointClose rollback?
Go when: No trigger occurs during the agreed observation period.
Stop when: Data, access, delivery, routing, or business results regress.
Cut over with a way back.
Cutover
Make Matomo the only production system without losing the final Universal Analytics delta.
- Freeze production writes and scheduled actions in Universal Analytics.
- Export, transform, and reconcile the final delta.
- Apply the approved delta to Matomo.
- Switch domains, forms, integrations, sending, or sync ownership as applicable.
- Run every blocking verification check and keep the source intact.
Proof to capture: Matomo owns production, totals reconcile, and every blocking check has durable evidence.
Rollback
Return production ownership to Universal Analytics without losing destination-era changes.
- Stop new writes and scheduled actions in Matomo.
- Restore the prior Universal Analytics routing, forms, integrations, sending, or sync ownership.
- Export the Matomo post-cutover delta.
- Review and apply safe destination-era changes to Universal Analytics.
- Run the same blocking checks against the restored source.
Proof to capture: Universal Analytics again owns production with current data and no duplicate destination action.
- Unexplained critical count or value variance
- Missing or exposed critical data
- Duplicate production action
- Failed access, routing, delivery, or integration check
- A critical feature has no safe destination replacement
Prove the migration worked.
Every blocking check must pass. Capture the evidence before cleanup begins.
| Pass | ID | Check | Method | Expected result | Evidence |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
V-01Blocking | Live event receipt | Trigger every critical client and server event. | One valid destination event with approved properties. | Event log. | |
V-02Blocking | Business outcome tracking | Complete every approved conversion path. | Conversion and revenue values reconcile. | Conversion report. | |
V-03Blocking | Event and property mapping | Compare the signed schema with live payloads. | No critical event or property is unmapped. | Schema diff. | |
V-04Blocking | Parallel-run interpretation | Compare daily metrics for the approved overlap window. | Variance is explained and owner-approved. | Metric comparison. | |
V-05 | Imported-report coverage | Compare available dates, dimensions, and totals. | Every supported period is imported or explicitly archived. | History ledger. | |
V-06Blocking | Campaign and channel behavior | Run tagged journeys and inspect destination reports. | Source, medium, campaign, and conversion resolve as designed. | Attribution test. | |
V-07Blocking | Consent, retention, and deletion | Test opt-out, deletion, access, and retention configuration. | Collection and lifecycle match policy. | Privacy evidence. | |
V-08Blocking | Reporting ownership | Inspect tags, SDKs, APIs, exports, and dashboards. | Matomo owns approved production measurement. | Ownership checklist. |
Remove the scaffolding safely.
Safe after: One complete operating cycle, at least seven stable days, and owner sign-off on every blocking check.
- Create final Universal Analytics exports and archive verification evidence.
- Revoke temporary credentials, API keys, webhooks, and elevated roles.
- Remove obsolete embeds, forms, jobs, integrations, and DNS records.
- Keep the source intact through the approved retention window.
- Cancel paid plans only after billing, legal, and recovery review.
- Schedule the next Matomo backup, access, and migration-playbook review.
Built to be reviewed.
Tested 2026-07-19. Next scheduled review: 2026-10-19.
- Universal Analytics: official migration documentationAccessed 2026-07-19
- Matomo: official migration documentationAccessed 2026-07-19