Average time on page VS Average visit duration on Google Analytics

Question

I am reading the analytics of my website for the past two days.

On the Audience -> Overview screen, it says Average Visit Duration 00:00:19

On the Behavior -> Overview screen, it says Average Time on Page 00:02:04

Looking at the individual content pages, it seems that the second average is correct, so I am wondering what does Average Visit Duration stand for? To me both these metrics sound the same.

Answer 1

The definitions of these metrics depend heavily on the way Google Analytics measures how long a user stays on a page or on a site. Unfortunately there is no way for GA to measure these precisely. This article can help you understand how these metrics are measured and what they represent (and what the pitfalls are). Ultimately, there is no correlation between these two metrics.

Here are the basic points:

1. Don’t obsess over Time on Page or Time on Site. Unfortunately, the metrics are flawed and can skew your analysis. Keep the limitations in mind while analyzing site performance.
2. Time on Page does not include exits (or bounces), and can inaccurately report actual time on the page. It can be much lower or much higher than reported.
3. Time on Site does include bounces, but still cannot determine the actual length of time spent on exit pages. Therefore, this number can also be way off.