data usage by google analytics

Question

I've created an app for the market on Android and ready to be released in the market. I have used Google Analytics to track custom events that'll help me in upgrading the ap in the future.

I wanted to know how much data will Google Analytics consume to report back the events that I have defined? My concern is it should not consume a significant amount of data for reporting that would adversely affect the app from a end user's perspective.

Does anybody know the consumption of data by google analytics in tracking? Can it be reduced by increasing the dispatch period?

Answer 1

The data sent to Google Analytics is typically very small in size so as long as you aren't over tracking your app (reporting the location of every touch, silly, but I've seen it) you shouldn't have anything to worry about. If you do want the limit the data sent you can set a sample rate on the reporting to only send some events back to GA.. This will reduce your accuracy if you only have a small pool of active users but it is required by Google if you are reporting more than ten million events per month.

The most important thing to consider with GA is your dispatch time for battery life. If your app isn't already constantly accessing the internet then every time you report to GA you just drained a bit of extra battery by activating the wifi or cell antenna of the device.. the cool down on these is about 60 seconds so if your dispatch is set to 60 then you would slowly drain the users battery for no good reason.