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How to Build Google Analytics 4 Dashboards

Eric Huguenin

Creating dashboards in Google Analytics 4 (GA4) facilitates how you analyze data.

While tools like Looker Studio are excellent for creating visually appealing dashboards, the built-in features in GA4 are versatile, particularly for users who spend significant time within the GA4 interface.

This guide will take you through customizing reports, navigating the Report Library, and leveraging advanced tools like Explorations.

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By the end, you’ll have a clear understanding of how to build Google Analytics 4 dashboards and GA4’s dashboard capabilities.

We’ll cover:

Let’s dive in!

1. How to Build Google Analytics 4 Dashboards: Customize Report Feature

If you frequently use GA4’s standard reports, you’ll appreciate the ability to customize them. Often, these reports provide most of what you need, except for a few missing dimensions or metrics.

Customizing reports not only saves time but also reduces repetitive tasks.

Let’s take the Traffic Acquisition report as an example.

This report helps you understand where your traffic comes from and how your channels perform. Suppose you want to include the Bounce Rate metric to assess underperforming sources better. Follow these steps:

  1. Open the Traffic Acquisition report (or another report of your choice).
  2. Click the pencil icon in the top-right corner.
Clicking the pencil icon on any report
  1. Under Report data, click Metrics.
Clicking Metrics in Customize Report
  1. Use the Add metric search bar to find and select the desired metric (e.g., Bounce Rate).
  2. Click Apply to confirm your changes.
Apply changes to add metrics to reports

Once added, the Bounce Rate metric will appear in the table. Always click Save before leaving, and choose to save the changes to the current report or as a new report.

Saving changes to current or new reports

The newly added metric should be visible in your table:

The bounce rate column added to the report’s table

2. Other Features of the Customize Report

Continuing with the Traffic Acquisition report example, you can take your customizations further. This report includes a chart showing Sessions by Session Primary Channel Group (Default Channel Group).

If you need to tailor these to fit your analysis better, you can modify its contents to include the metrics or dimensions most relevant to you. What you can do:

  • Hide and unhide the Line Chart or Bar chart from the report. You can do this by clicking the eye icon.
  • Modify the content of the chart by clicking the arrow:
Line and bar chart customization options

Since this report is based on a GA4 template, you also have the option to unlink it from the template. Unlinking gives you complete control over the report, but it also means you won’t receive updates from Google.

Unlink report template option

🚨 Note: If you need to revert to the original template later, you’ll have to recreate the report from scratch.

Unlinked report message

These additional features allow you to fully customize the Traffic Acquisition report, making it more effective for your needs.

3. Report Library

The Report Library is your starting point for organizing and managing reports in GA4. Before diving into dashboard creation, it’s important to understand two key components:

  • Collections — Groups of related reports, such as Business Objectives or Lifecycle.
  • Topics — Subcategories within collections that organize reports further.

4. Collections

Collections are overarching categories of reports, displayed in the left-hand navigation panel. For example, the User collection contains two main topics:

  1. User Attributes — Includes reports like Overview, Demographic Details, and Audiences.
  2. Tech — Covers reports such as Overview and Tech Details.
User collection in GA4

You can customize collections by adding, removing, or rearranging reports, thus tailoring the navigation panel to your needs.

5. Topics

Topics function as subcategories within collections. Consider collections as folders and topics as dividers that group similar reports together. For example:

  • The User Attributes topic focuses on demographic and audience data.
  • The Tech topic provides insights into technical details like devices and browsers.

Refer to this image for a clear visualization of the hierarchy between collections and topics:

Understanding Topics in GA4

6. Permissions

Customizing GA4 dashboards requires specific permissions. If you see a message about insufficient access, contact your administrator for Editor or Administrator privileges.

Missing permissions message

To access the Report Library:

  1. Navigate to Reports → Library in the navigation panel.
Accessing the Library section
  1. If the Library isn’t visible, search for it in the top bar by typing Library and selecting Reports → Library.
Alternative method to accessing the Library section

🚨 Note: Occasionally, the Library may not appear due to temporary glitches. Refreshing the page can often resolve this issue. Or use step 2 above.

7. Let GA4 Give You a Quick Tour

When accessing the Report Library, GA4 may prompt you to follow a quick tour introducing its features. This is a great way to familiarize yourself with the interface if you’re new to the tool.

If you’re not automatically invited to take the tour or want to revisit it later, you can manually access it by following these steps:

  1. Use the top search bar in GA4.
  2. Type Library and select Reports Library Tour.
Accessing the Reports Library Tour

This tour provides a helpful walkthrough of how to navigate and use the Report Library. This ensures you’re equipped to manage and customize your reports effectively.

8. How to Edit, Manage, and Create Reports in the Library

Editing and managing reports in the Library is straightforward. Premade templates allow actions such as:

  1. Unpublish — Hides a collection from the navigation panel without deleting it.
  2. Edit — Enables adding or removing reports from a collection.
  3. Make a Copy — Duplicates a report for further customization.
  4. Rename — Updates the report name.

For example, to remove a report or a Topic from the User collection:

  1. Click the three vertical dots on the Collection card.
  2. Click Edit.
Editing a collection
  1. On the left card, click the X next to the Topic or Report name.
Removing topics and reports from collections
  1. Drag and drop additional reports from the right card to add other reports.
  2. Click Apply and Save.

9. Explorations

Explorations in GA4 offer unparalleled flexibility for deep data analysis.

Unlike standard reports, Explorations include additional dimensions and metrics, providing advanced insights. They also offer various techniques to customize how data is presented, including:

  • Free-form exploration
  • Cohort exploration
  • Funnel exploration
  • Segment overlap
  • User exploration
  • Path exploration
  • User lifetime

Each technique serves a unique purpose. For example, Cohort exploration is ideal for analyzing user retention trends, while Path exploration helps visualize user journeys. You can learn more in this documentation.

Example: Total Users by Traffic Source

  1. Navigate to Explore in the left-hand navigation panel.
  2. Select Blank or a predefined template like Free-form.
Accessing GA4 Explorations
  1. In the Variables pane, add a dimension (e.g., Session Source/Medium) and metrics (e.g., Total Users) using the + sign.
Adding dimensions and metrics in Explorations
  1. Search or type the dimension or metric name in the search bar.
  2. Select and click Confirm.
Finding, selecting, and confirming data to Explorations
  1. Double-click the dimensions and metrics to show them automatically in your reports. Alternatively, drag dimensions to the Rows section and metrics to the Values section.
Adding dimensions and metrics values to Explorations

Alternatively, you can change the visualization in your dashboard to a donut chart in the Visualization section.

In the Settings pane:

  1. Go to the Visualization section.
  2. Select the Donut chart.
Table chart switching to a donut chart

This is the change you should expect:

Donut chart in Explorations

Since Explorations is a powerful and versatile feature, covering every detail in one post isn’t feasible. However, with the steps above, you’ll have the foundation to explore further.

Looker Studio

Looker Studio complements GA4 by offering advanced data visualization capabilities across multiple sources, including GA4.

Unlike GA4’s default interface, Looker Studio allows you to create attractive dashboards that simplify data interpretation for decision-makers.

This is one example:

MeasureSchool dashboard in Looker Studio

For beginners, our Looker Studio Basics tutorial is an excellent starting point.

Summary

In this guide, we explored how to build Google Analytics 4 dashboards, from customizing reports to leveraging advanced features like Explorations.

While GA4’s built-in tools are powerful, tools like Looker Studio can offer additional flexibility for those who prefer highly customizable, cross-platform dashboards.

Ultimately, the best tool for you depends on your goals, the tools you use most often, and your unique circumstances.

For a practical next step, explore our guide on the Top 10 GA4 Exploration Reports with Use Cases to maximize your analytics potential.

Which dashboards or customization techniques do you find most helpful in GA4? Share your experiences in the comments!

Eric Huguenin

Eric is a web analytics content creator at MeasureSchool. He holds certifications in Google Analytics and Google Tag Manager at the CXL Institute. He enjoys breaking down marketing topics into easier-to-understand articles.

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