Do Tags Inside of Google Tag Manager still work when Javascript is disabled?

Will Tags Inside of Tag Manager Fire For Users With JavaScript Disabled?

Do Tags Inside of Google Tag Manager still work when Javascript is disabled?We were recently working with a client to clean up all of their tracking and conversion code. Part of that task involved taking all of the code which was placed directly on their site, and moving it inside of Google Tag Manager. (We love it when everything is all neat and tidy, and inside of Tag Manager).

Their web development team was very helpful in taking the old code off and installing Tag Manager for us, from there it was rather easy to implement the new tags, set them up to fire properly, and everything was working just fine. Except for one thing, our client, and their web team, had just one question:

Will our tracking tags fire for users that have JavaScript disabled?

That’s a pretty valid concern. Tag Manager itself is JavaScript, so it would logically make sense that when your site loads, and the user has JavaScript disabled, that the tags inside would also not fire. We decided to reach out to Google to find out the answer.

At first, the person that answered my question said no, then after a few follow-up questions, said, yes. It seemed like perhaps we should dig a little further. So I asked for someone in their coding division to reach out and help answer.

Nate responded (You know Nate right? He said everyone would know him) and said that Yes, it will work.

The reason is due to the fact that there are 2 different parts of a conversion tag that are taken into consideration, the first part is JavaScript and the second is a tracking pixel set up as an image.

Here’s an example of Conversion Tracking Code that Nate Provided:

<!– Google Code for conversion value Conversion Page –>
<script type=”text/javascript”>
/* <![CDATA[ */
var google_conversion_id = {Account-Number};
var google_conversion_language = “en”;
var google_conversion_format = “2”;
var google_conversion_color = “ffffff”;
var google_conversion_label = “{Label-ID}”; <–This section is JavaScript, if a page or user has JavaScript disabled then it won’t run.
var google_remarketing_only = false;
/* ]]> */
</script>
<script type=”text/javascript” src=”//www.googleadservices.com/pagead/conversion.js”>
</script>
<noscript>
<div style=”display:inline;”>
<img height=”1″ width=”1″ style=”border-style:none;” alt=”” src=”//www.googleadservices.com/pagead/conversion/{Account-Number}/?label={Label-ID}&amp;guid=ON&amp;script=0″/>    <–This section isn’t JavaScript and should track the conversion if the JavaScript above doesn’t execute.
</div>
</noscript>

As you can see from the above example code, the green script is a JavaScript enabled code, which fires under normal circumstances. However, if a user has JavaScript disabled, Tag Manager tries to fire that code and fails, so they in turn, it fires the orange script, which fires the conversion tracking pixel to properly track conversions.

So Yes, Conversions will be tracked with JavaScript disabled.

Unfortunately there is no other documentation provided by Google to link to, so if you need further clarification, the only thing you can do is to either Test it yourself, or Call Google at 1-866-246-6453 and ask for Nate.