Consent management for Google Tag Manager
A cookie banner you install as a tag. Our official template sits in the Community Template Gallery, fires on Consent Initialization, and sets your Google Consent Mode v2 defaults before anything else in the container is allowed to run.
- Official gallery template
- No site deploy
- Consent Mode v2 built in
From €10 a month. No credit card, no per-visitor billing.
A cookie banner that works with Google Tag Manager
The tag is published in Google’s own Community Template Gallery, so you add it from inside Tag Manager rather than pasting a script anywhere.
Our official tag, from the gallery
Look for “Consent Studio CMP” by “Vallonic” in the Community Template Gallery and add it to your container. It is a real gallery template rather than a custom HTML tag, so it is versioned and it updates the way every other gallery tag does. Nothing goes into your site’s code.
- Community Template Gallery
- No site deploy
It fires before everything else
The trigger is “Consent Initialization - All Pages”, which is the slot Tag Manager reserves for exactly this. Your Consent Mode v2 defaults are set there, before any measurement tag is allowed to run, and the update follows the moment the visitor chooses. Google tags then use any trigger that fires after it.
- Consent Initialization
- Default then update
Tags that ignore Consent Mode get a trigger instead
Google’s own tags read Consent Mode signals without being asked. A third-party or custom tag may not, so we push a cookie_consent_update event into the dataLayer that you can trigger on. Between the two, every tag in the container has a way to wait for an answer.
- dataLayer event
- Works with custom tags
Certified CMP Partner with Google
Google runs a certification programme for consent platforms, and Consent Studio is on the published list. What gets vetted is the platform that collects the consent, which is a different thing from the Consent Mode signals any CMP can send.
- Listed by Google, not declared by us
- Google Consent Mode v2 and Microsoft UET, built in
- Included on every plan, from Essential up
One answer controls every tool on your site
A banner that only governs the platform leaves everything you added on top of it running. Consent Studio speaks to the tools around it as well, and by default holds anything it does not recognise until the visitor says otherwise.
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How to set up cookie consent for Google Tag Manager
Four steps, none of which touch your site’s code. The last one is the one people skip, and it is the one that catches a correctly installed banner still leaking.
Have a container on your site
Tag Manager has to be installed on the site before anything can be installed into it. If your container is already live and firing tags, you are past this step. If it is not, Google’s own documentation covers creating a container and getting its snippet onto your pages, and that is the one piece of code this route needs.
Turn on Consent Overview
Consent Overview is the screen that shows every tag in your container and which consent each one is waiting for. It is not switched on for a container by default, so this is a step rather than a check, and it is worth doing before you add anything: it is what you will use in step four, and it is the only place Tag Manager will tell you that a tag is running without permission.
Add the Consent Studio CMP tag
Find “Consent Studio CMP” by “Vallonic” in the Community Template Gallery, add it to your templates, then add it to the container with the trigger “Consent Initialization - All Pages”. The tag carries its own settings, including ads data redaction and URL passthrough. Note it also has its own Consent Mode toggle alongside the one in Web CMP: turning the signal off means turning it off in both places, which is the configuration people get half right.
Check the rest of your tags
Open Consent Overview and read down the list. The Consent Studio CMP tag and Google’s own tags should need no additional consent, because they already respect Consent Mode signals. Anything else is worth a decision: either require the consent types it needs on the tag itself, or trigger it on our cookie_consent_update dataLayer event. Do this again each time you add a tag.
A cookie banner alone is not enough
Most sites are leaking before anyone notices. Not through malice, but through a tag somebody added in a hurry, a vendor that changed its script, a plugin that phones home.
- Unconsented tracking
- Unwanted overseas transfers
- Consent records you cannot produce
- Scripts you never approved
The Full Consent Stack.
Three products, one consent record. What a visitor agreed to in the banner is what every downstream tag sees.
Which plan Google Tag Manager needs, and why
Essential covers this page end to end. Nothing about the Tag Manager route is gated, so one container on one site needs nothing more.
Essential is enough
€10/month
- The official Tag Manager tag template
- Google Consent Mode v2 and Microsoft UET
- Unlimited pages, 200,000 consent actions a month
What Professional adds
€36/month
Worth it once the container is more than one site and more than one region.
- More depth: HTTP consent cookies, accessibility, re-prompting
- First party delivery, from your own domain
- On-demand scans, right after you publish
- Unlimited region rules, Essential includes one
Every plan includes
Trusted by organisations that care about privacy
Frequently asked questions about Google Tag Manager
Does Google Tag Manager have a built-in cookie banner?
No. Tag Manager has consent settings and a Consent Initialization trigger, both of which assume something else obtained the consent. It can hold tags back once a decision exists, but it never asks the visitor and keeps no record, so a container on its own leaves you without a banner and without proof.
Can Google Tag Manager block tags until a visitor consents?
Yes, once something tells it what was decided. Each tag can declare which consent types it requires, and Tag Manager holds it until those are granted. What Tag Manager does not do is collect that decision, so the signals have to come from a consent platform running inside the container.
How do I add a cookie banner with Google Tag Manager?
Add the “Consent Studio CMP” template from the Community Template Gallery, put it in your container on the “Consent Initialization - All Pages” trigger, and publish. No code goes into your site. Your Google tags then use any trigger that fires after Consent Initialization, such as All Pages.
Will an ad blocker stop the banner if I install it through Tag Manager?
It can. Some ad blockers block Google Tag Manager, and a tag inside a blocked container never runs, so the visitor sees no banner. The tags that needed consent are blocked with it, so nothing tracks them either. Installing the snippet directly in your site’s head avoids it entirely.
Do I still need Google Consent Mode v2 if I use Tag Manager?
Yes, and our tag sets it up for you. Consent Mode is how Google’s tags learn what was decided; Tag Manager is where those tags live. The Consent Studio CMP tag sets the denied defaults on Consent Initialization and sends the update the moment your visitor chooses.
Get Started with the Full Consent Stack
Everything you need in one bundle. Consent Studio provides you with a consent banner, scanner and client-side tag manager that guarantees no data ever gets transferred overseas.
Read the documentation
Our help center walks through every integration, plugin and template step by step, with screenshots. It is written and kept current by the people who build Consent Studio.