Google Ads tracking template: how it works, how to set it up, and the hijack sign

A tracking template is a field in the URL options of Google Ads. When someone clicks your ad, what it contains is added to your final URL to build the landing page URL. You can set it at 6 levels: account, campaign, ad group, ad, keyword or sitelink. When several levels have one, the most specific wins: keyword, then ad, ad group, campaign and account.

By the stopfakeclicks team. Google's help pages checked on Oct 16, 2026.

How it works today: parallel tracking

With parallel tracking, people go straight from your ad to your final URL while the tracking template loads in the background.
Parallel tracking is mandatory for Search, Shopping, Display, Video and Performance Max campaigns. For hotel campaigns it is optional.
The tracking template and every redirect after it must use HTTPS and be server-side redirects.

Setting it up

1At account, campaign or ad group level, the template must contain a parameter that inserts your final URL, such as {lpurl}. Without it, your landing page URL breaks.
2Add ValueTrack parameters after a question mark and join them with &, for example {lpurl}?matchtype={matchtype}&device={device}. After a click, Google replaces each parameter with a value from that click, such as b, p, e or a for {matchtype}, and leaves it empty when there is no value.
3For parameters that should simply go on the end of the landing page URL, use the Final URL suffix field. It works at account, campaign, ad group, ad, dynamic ad target, keyword and sitelink level.
4Use the Test button. Google combines your final URL with the tracking you set and checks that the ad still leads to a landing page.
5Changes at account, campaign or ad group level don't send your ads back for review. Changes at ad, keyword or sitelink level do.
6Changes to tracking templates take 24 to 48 hours to show in your ads.

Google's own example

Tracking template tracker.com/redirect={lpurl} and Final URL suffix x=y. With parallel tracking, someone who clicks the ad lands on https://example.com/?x=y while the tracking runs in the background.

tracker.com/redirect={lpurl}
https://example.com/?x=y

GCLID and auto-tagging

{gclid} is the ValueTrack parameter for the Google click ID. Auto-tagging is on by default in new accounts and is needed, among other things, to track conversions on your website.

A changed tracking template can give away a hijack

When our own Google Ads account was taken over on the night of 17 to 18 September 2026, two campaigns we never made appeared, with daily budgets of £15,000 and £5,000. One of them had bing.com as its final URL and a tracking template that redirected through Bing to a foreign domain. Google disapproved the ad for “Destination mismatch”.

Google's rule is that your landing page and display URL share the same domain, and cross-domain redirects aren't allowed in the final URL.

To check yours, open Change history, filter by the type of change and look for tracking template edits you didn't make. The User column shows the email address of whoever made a change through the Google Ads interface, and Change history goes back 2 years. If you find one, follow our steps for a hacked Google Ads account.

How stopfakeclicks catches it

Account guard checks your Google Ads account every hour through a script in your own account. A new campaign, a budget that jumps, ads that lead to a site your account hasn't used, or a tracking template at account, campaign, ad group or ad level that sends clicks to such a site: each one is paused until you confirm it was you. In our case, Search-1 would have been paused for three reasons at once.

Tracking templates you already use are recorded as trusted the first time the script reads them, so your own tracking tools never pause anything. Template checks need the script copied from your dashboard on or after 17 October 2026, and keyword-level templates aren't checked.

Start your 14-day free trial

Account guard is part of the one $9.99 plan, together with click fraud protection.