What is a pixel?

A pixel is a small piece of html code embedded on site pages or in the markup of an e—mail message that allows you to track impressions. The tracking pixel got its name because it is most often executed in the form of a transparent GIF image with a size of 1x1 px

Who uses the pixel?

The pixel is used to track the effectiveness of advertising, gather audiences for retargeting in contextual advertising, and track the number of E-mail messages read. In CPA networks, the pixel is used to get up-to-date information about clicks on the landing page or the page of the completed order.

Visualization of the pixel log of one of our projects


Types of pixels
1px gif
The simplest type of tracking that allows you to collect a minimum of information about the user, but it works almost everywhere and always. The GIF format is used because of the minimum size of the output image - only 43 bytes in uncompressed form

It can collect the following information:

- Time and date of the visit

- The page where it is located, including utm tags

- the user's IP address (allows you to calculate the city and provider)

- User-agent (you can find out the device type, browser and operating system of the user)

- The selected browser language (operating system)

- User actions on the site (provided that the pixel is installed on all pages)

It is implemented in two types:

Synchronous - A pixel request runs a script that processes and stores information at the time of the request.

Asynchronous - implemented on the basis of a web server, when each pixel request is recorded in a log file, which is analyzed later. Its advantage over the previous method is that the pixel loads almost instantly (thereby does not slow down the loading of the page on which it is located), does not load the server at the time of the request (processing of information can be postponed at the time of "decline", or even transferred to another server)

Pixel configuration for asynchronous mode


JS tracking
The page contains a small javascript code that collects information and sends it to the server. It can collect the same information as a 1px gif, as well as:

- Screen resolution

- The time zone selected in the system

- Perform a variety of logic, for example, collect and send some information from a page (for example, a list of products in a shopping cart)


Server tracking
The tracking code is executed at the time of the request on the server, usually used to notify CPA networks about the completion of the target action.


Should I trust the data from the pixel?
When processing data from a pixel, 100% can only be trusted with the data that was obtained by server tracking, since all other data is sent in plain text and can be intercepted and forged.

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