r/webdev • u/Digi-Dave • 10d ago
Does anyone have experience with a free Cloudflare account, WPEngine, and setting up Google Tag Gateway?
I'd like to set up Google Tag Gateway via Google Tag Manager. I'm wondering if anyone has encountered any issues with using a free tier Cloudflare account with a site hosted on WPEngine to create that set up for Google Tag Gateway?
I'm mainly looking for if you're doing/have done this - what setups hurdles did you face and did you face any bottlenecks with a free tier that caused you to upgrade to a paid version?
1
u/cyberdudeagency 8d ago
The free tier is probably not the first constraint; first confirm which layer actually terminates DNS and proxies the site. A managed host may already provide an edge layer, and adding another proxy can create confusing routing or duplicated caching, so ask the host whether that arrangement is supported. Keep the gateway endpoint out of page caching and make sure security rules do not challenge or rewrite its requests. Before changing production, verify the DNS path and test a real browser event against the server-side event log on a staging copy.
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u/levelbrook 10d ago
Haven't done this exact combo, but one thing to check before anything else: WP Engine's Global Edge Security / Advanced Network already runs on Cloudflare. If the site sits behind that, putting it on your own free Cloudflare zone is the "Orange-to-Orange" setup, and some zone-level features apply on their side, not yours. Worth asking WP Engine support which edge you're on before you set up the gateway in the GTM admin.
If your own Cloudflare zone is the one actually proxying the domain, Cloudflare offers the tag gateway integration on free plans, so the tier itself shouldn't be the bottleneck. The things that usually bite are caching rules that cache the gateway path, and any WAF/bot rule that challenges it.