Blog Post

Microsoft SharePoint Blog
2 MIN READ

Establishing a new Site usage page in SharePoint Online

Mark-Kashman's avatar
Mark-Kashman
Icon for Microsoft rankMicrosoft
Jun 29, 2017

We are establishing a new, dedicated page for Site usage in SharePoint Online. This applies to both team sites and upcoming communication sites. Previously, a site owner would see site usage information at the top of the Site contents page. We have moved that analytics portion to a dedicated page. The Site contents page maintains focus on access and management of content (lists, libraries, pages, etc.). And to gain insights into how your site is being used via this new Site usage page.

 

New Site usage page in SharePoint Online (Office 365)

It’s easy to get to the new Site usage page. When you are visiting a team or communication site, click the gear button in the upper-right portion of the site, and select Site contents. Once on the Site contents page, click the Site usage button in the top-right action bar.

Click Site usage button from the Site content page

The new Site usage page is broken down into five insightful sections:

  • Site visits – easily view the number of visits to your site within a rolling 7-day period.
  • New items – see front-and-center the number of items that have been added within the last 7 days. This information previously lived behind the click to the ‘trending content’ report.
  • Tips – get guidance on how to increase the reach and effectiveness of your site.
  • Trending files – view the list of most popular content on your site - over a rolling 2-week period. This used to be a limited card view only able to show four items.
  • Shared externally – see what’s accessible to authenticated external users outside of your organization to give you confidence that sharing is done properly.

 

Note: Everyone on the site can see the new Site Usage page, not just site owners; and content on Site Usage is security trimmed to the person who is logged in.

 

To reference the previous combined experience, please reference the graphic below where site usage information sat on the top of the Site contents page with limited real estate:

Previous Site content page experience when site usage information was included at the top 

Learn more about viewing usage data for your SharePoint Online site.

 

Thanks,

Mark

 

Easter egg prize: first person to tweet me (@mkashman) with the technical .aspx string name of the Site usage page gets a FREE SharePoint hat 😊. #happyurlhunting

Published Jun 29, 2017
Version 1.0
Product Updates
  • Abhimanyu Singh's avatar
    Abhimanyu Singh
    Steel Contributor
    Jun 30, 2017

    Hi Mark-Kashman, can these usage sections be available as web parts? 

     

    I actually asked a question here: https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/SharePoint/WebParts-for-Trending-Content-on-Modern-Pages/td-p/71054 

     

    We don't want users to go to the site contents / site analytics page at all. Especially those users who have limited permissions. But, we certainly do want to popularize the site analytics so that people can see high level stats like usage activity, most popular documents etc. So, I was wondering if those sections could be made available as web parts so that they can be included selectively in home page or any other custom page?

  • Mark-Kashman's avatar
    Mark-Kashman
    Icon for Microsoft rankMicrosoft
    Jun 30, 2017

    Hi Abhimanyu Singh. Great feedback. There are things you can do today with existing web parts, and adding a few "usage" specific ones are great to consider (Cc: Jeff Smith (SHAREPOINT)). There are list and library webparts that can be programmed with specific views, making them dynamic per activity and growth of content. There, too, is the Highlighted Content web part that has a lot of configurable settings to truly make pages and news come to life, and stay alive; more here on the Highlighted Content web part.

     

    Cheers, Mark.

  • Dean_Gross's avatar
    Dean_Gross
    Silver Contributor
    Jul 05, 2017

    Will this page provide the ability to differentiate external and internal visitors? e.g., show how many external visitors there have been? 

  • Denis Moquin's avatar
    Denis Moquin
    Copper Contributor
    Jul 07, 2017

    Will this also be available on Publishing sites or just Team and Communication sites?

     
     
  • Joan Nelson's avatar
    Joan Nelson
    Copper Contributor
    Jan 11, 2018

    I'd like to echo earlier questions about not seeing page metrics in Communications sites.  When is this coming? I can't tell how effective my website is if I can't see what pages people are viewing. How about seeing data longer than 7 days ago and the ability to export it?  Will page information be available in Delve?

    It looks like it's been awhile since we've heard anything back from anyone at Microsoft, but I'm hoping someone will eventually respond.

  • Heather Lader's avatar
    Heather Lader
    Icon for Microsoft rankMicrosoft
    Feb 15, 2018

    Like others have mentioned, I'm interested in page access and breadcrumbs (i.e., clicked and closed, clicked and followed links, etc.).  Any updates on that front?

  • Jon Sanders's avatar
    Jon Sanders
    Copper Contributor
    Apr 10, 2018

    Not to sound ungrateful, Microsoft but this doesn't really give any insights at all.  A little green bar without any numbers attached to it doesn't give me any data regarding which documents are popular.

    Also it would be beneficial to be able to track individual page views, not just site views.

  • sunny rajpal's avatar
    sunny rajpal
    Copper Contributor
    Jun 30, 2017

    We don't see the site usage option on our site content page. It there any setting that needs to be enabled to get thie option.

  • Ivan54's avatar
    Ivan54
    Bronze Contributor
    Jun 30, 2017

    Hi Mark-Kashman , is the new Site Usage Report live yet for everyone? I don't want to waste time looking for something that is not there yet :P

    Also, does it have to be Twitter :P ?

  • Mark-Kashman's avatar
    Mark-Kashman
    Icon for Microsoft rankMicrosoft
    Jun 30, 2017

    Hi Ivan54. Not yet. The new page just started to rollout into First Release earlier this week, and like all SharePoint service updates, doesn't hit everyone all at once. We start with First Release (typically "select users" and then "all tenant; different options when you opt into First Release), and then we move into worldwide production once we've met initial scale thresholds with success.

     

    Cc: Jeff Smith (SHAREPOINT) who can possibly share more granular details if you need them.

     

    Thx,

    Mark