Every tracking tag runs in the visitor’s browser, which means anything published is visible to anyone who looks. You do not need access to the site’s accounts to see what is installed on it, including your own site when the login has been lost.
Five methods, in order of effort. Each shows something the one before it misses.
Right-click the page and choose View Page Source, then search the text for the identifiers that give tags away: G- for Google Analytics 4, GTM- for a Google Tag Manager container, AW- for Google Ads, UA- for the retired Universal Analytics, and fbq or connect.facebook.net for the Meta pixel. This is the quickest look and the least complete one, because it only sees the HTML the server sent.
Shows: Anything hardcoded into the page's HTML.
Misses: Tags injected later by JavaScript, which today is most of them.
Open the browser's developer tools, go to the Network tab, and reload the page. Filter the list by domain to see who is being contacted: google-analytics.com, googletagmanager.com, facebook.net, doubleclick.net, linkedin.com. This is the honest view, because a request in this list is a request that genuinely happened. Repeat it on a product page and on the checkout, since sites rarely run the same tags everywhere.
Shows: Every request the page actually makes, including tags added dynamically.
Misses: Tags that only fire on other pages, or on actions you did not perform.
A published GTM container is served as a public file, which means it can be read without access to the account. Our free GTM Inspector takes a website address or a GTM ID and lists the full contents. This is the only method on this list that shows tags configured but not triggered by your visit, which is usually where the surprises are.
Shows: Every tag, trigger and variable inside a published Google Tag Manager container, including ones that did not fire on the page you loaded.
Misses: Anything not managed through the container, and unpublished draft changes.
Google's Tag Assistant connects to a site and reports on the Google tags it detects as you browse. It is the right tool for confirming a Google Analytics or Google Ads tag is working, and it will tell you nothing about Meta, LinkedIn, TikTok or any of the utility scripts.
Shows: Whether Google's own tags fired correctly, and what they sent.
Misses: Everything that is not a Google tag.
Listing tags tells you what is installed. It does not tell you whether they respect consent, whether two of them are counting the same purchase twice, or whether a conversion stopped recording after a site update. That comparison needs the analytics property as well as the container, which means signing in.
Shows: Every tag cross-referenced against the analytics property it reports to, scored for consent, duplication and conversion accuracy.
Misses: Nothing at this level, but it needs read-only access to the accounts.
Most tags announce themselves with a recognisable identifier. Searching the page source for these will find the majority of what is installed.
| Search for | What it means |
|---|---|
| G-XXXXXXXXXX | Google Analytics 4 measurement ID |
| GTM-XXXXXXX | Google Tag Manager container |
| AW-XXXXXXXXX | Google Ads conversion tracking |
| UA-XXXXXXX-X | Universal Analytics, retired in 2023 and worth removing |
| fbq / connect.facebook.net | Meta (Facebook) pixel |
| _linkedin_partner_id | LinkedIn Insight Tag |
| ttq / analytics.tiktok.com | TikTok pixel |
| clarity.ms | Microsoft Clarity session recording |
| static.hotjar.com | Hotjar session recording and heatmaps |
Tags fire on conditions, not on whole sites. A conversion tag usually exists only on the order confirmation page, and a product tag only on product pages. A review that looks at the homepage and stops there will report a clean setup on a site whose checkout is not tracked at all. Walk the path that matters to the business, which is normally the one that ends in a purchase or an enquiry.
Listing tags is the easy half. Tracking Auditor cross-references every tag against your GA4 property, flags consent gaps, duplicates and broken conversions, and scores the result A–F. Your first audit is free.
Run a free audit →For what these tags are and what each type does, start at what website tags are. For how they are controlled, see tag management. For the full review process rather than an inventory, use the website tracking audit guide or the container-specific GTM audit guide. If you have lost the login entirely, see lost access to your GTM account.
The fastest method is to view the page source and search for identifiers such as G-, GTM-, AW- or fbq. A more complete method is to open the browser's network tab and reload the page, which shows every request the page actually makes, including tags added by JavaScript. To see everything configured in a Google Tag Manager container, including tags that did not fire on your visit, read the published container directly.
Yes. Tags run in the visitor's browser, so anything published is visible to anyone who loads the page. Viewing the source, watching the network tab and reading a published Google Tag Manager container all work on any public site without access to its accounts.
View Page Source and the developer tools Network tab are both built into every modern browser and need nothing installed. Between them they cover hardcoded tags and dynamically added tags.
Because tags are attached to conditions rather than to the site as a whole. A conversion tag may only exist on the order confirmation page, and a product tag only on product pages. Checking a homepage alone is the most common reason a tag review misses something.
No. Finding them tells you what is installed. Auditing them establishes whether they fire at the right moment, wait for consent, avoid counting the same event twice, and match the analytics property they report into. The second needs access to the accounts, not just the public page.