Data Overview

Google Analytics 4 in Coupler.io gives you access to a single, flexible report type that you customize with your choice of metrics and dimensions. Unlike some sources with fixed report types, GA4 lets you build exactly the report you need by selecting what to measure (metrics) and how to break it down (dimensions).

What data is available?

When you connect GA4, you're pulling data from one or more GA4 properties. Each property tracks a website or app. Your report is shaped by three things:

• Metrics — The numbers you want to measure (e.g., page views, sessions, users, revenue)

• Dimensions — How you want to slice the data (e.g., by date, country, traffic source, page path)

• Date range — The time period to cover

You can select up to 10 metrics and 9 dimensions per data flow. This is a GA4 API limitation, not a Coupler.io restriction. If you need more than 10 metrics, see the workaround using multiple sources and joins.

When to use it

• You need website or app traffic data in a spreadsheet or BI tool

• You want to track user behavior trends over time

• You need to combine GA4 data with ad spend or CRM data in a single destination

• You want to build custom reports that go beyond what the GA4 interface allows

Available metrics

GA4 offers a wide range of metrics. Here are the most commonly used ones, organized by category. The full list is loaded dynamically from the GA4 API based on your property — you can select exactly the columns you need when configuring your data source in Coupler.io.

Not all metrics are compatible with all dimensions. If you select an incompatible combination, GA4 returns an error like The request's dimensions & metrics are incompatible. Use the GA4 Dimensions & Metrics Explorer to check compatibility before configuring your data flow.

Traffic & Engagement

Metric	Description
Views	Total page views (or screen views for apps)
Sessions	Number of sessions started
Total users	Total number of unique users
New users	Users who visited for the first time
Active users	Users who had an engaged session
Bounce rate	Percentage of sessions that were not engaged
Engagement rate	Percentage of sessions that were engaged (inverse of bounce rate)
Average session duration	Average length of a session in seconds
Views per session	Average number of pages viewed per session
Sessions per user	Average number of sessions per user
Event count	Total number of events triggered
Key events	Total number of key events (formerly conversions)

E-commerce

Metric	Description
Purchase revenue	Total revenue from purchases
Total revenue	Total revenue including purchases, subscriptions, and ad revenue
Ecommerce purchases	Number of completed purchases
Add-to-carts	Number of add-to-cart events
Checkouts	Number of checkout events
Item revenue	Revenue from individual items
Transactions	Number of transactions
Average purchase revenue	Average revenue per purchase

Advertising

Metric	Description
Ads cost	Cost of linked advertising campaigns
Ads clicks	Clicks from linked ad campaigns
Ads impressions	Impressions from linked ad campaigns
Return on ad spend	Revenue generated per unit of ad spend
Cost per key event	Ad cost per key event

Available dimensions

Dimensions let you break your data down by specific attributes. Here are the most commonly used categories.

Time

Dimension	What it shows
Date	Daily breakdown (YYYYMMDD)
Date + hour	Hourly breakdown
Day of week	Which day of the week (0 = Sunday)
Month, Week, Year	Broader time periods

Traffic Source

Dimension	What it shows
Session source	Where the session originated (e.g., google, facebook)
Session medium	The marketing medium (e.g., organic, cpc, referral)
Session source / medium	Combined source and medium
Session campaign	The campaign name from UTM parameters
Default channel group	Google's auto-classified channel (Organic Search, Paid Search, etc.)

Geography & Technology

Dimension	What it shows
Country, City, Region	User location
Device category	Desktop, mobile, or tablet
Browser	User's browser (Chrome, Safari, etc.)
Operating system	User's OS (Windows, iOS, Android, etc.)

Content

Dimension	What it shows
Page path	The URL path of the page viewed
Page title	The title of the page viewed
Landing page	The first page of the session
Hostname	The domain name

E-commerce

Dimension	What it shows
Item name, Item ID	Product identifiers
Item category (1–5)	Product category hierarchy
Item brand	Product brand
Transaction ID	Unique transaction identifier

Common metric combinations

Here are some useful combinations depending on what you're tracking:

• Website traffic overview — Views, Sessions, Total users, New users, Bounce rate + Date dimension

• Traffic source analysis — Sessions, Total users, Key events, Engagement rate + Session source / medium dimension

• Content performance — Views, Average session duration, Engagement rate + Page path or Page title dimension

• Geographic analysis — Sessions, Total users, Key events + Country or City dimension

• E-commerce performance — Purchase revenue, Ecommerce purchases, Add-to-carts, Average purchase revenue + Date or Item name dimension

• Campaign analysis — Sessions, Key events, Ads cost, Return on ad spend + Session campaign dimension

Use cases by role

Marketers

Track which channels and campaigns drive the most traffic and conversions. Combine GA4 data with ad spend from Google Ads or Facebook Ads to calculate true ROI across channels.

Recommended metrics: Sessions, Key events, Engagement rate, Total users

Recommended dimensions: Session source / medium, Session campaign, Default channel group

Content Teams

Identify top-performing pages, monitor engagement metrics by landing page, and track how content drives key events over time.

Recommended metrics: Views, Average session duration, Engagement rate, Key events

Recommended dimensions: Page path, Page title, Landing page, Date

E-commerce Managers

Analyze the full purchase funnel from product views to transactions. Break down revenue by product category, traffic source, or device to optimize the shopping experience.

Recommended metrics: Purchase revenue, Ecommerce purchases, Add-to-carts, Average purchase revenue

Recommended dimensions: Item name, Item category, Session source / medium, Device category

Business Owners

Get high-level dashboards showing total users, sessions, and revenue trends without needing to navigate the GA4 interface.

Recommended metrics: Total users, Sessions, Purchase revenue, Key events

Recommended dimensions: Date, Default channel group

Platform-specific notes

• 10-metric / 9-dimension limits — GA4 restricts reports to 10 metrics and 9 dimensions per request. If you need more metrics, create multiple data flows with different metric sets and combine them using a data join.

• Dimension–metric compatibility — Not all dimension–metric pairs work together. For example, combining Referrer with Ads clicks triggers a 400 incompatible error. Always verify your combination using the GA4 Dimensions & Metrics Explorer before setting up your flow.

• Users are not summable — Total users broken down by a dimension (e.g., Default channel group) will not sum up to the overall total. A single user can appear in multiple channel groups across different sessions. This is normal GA4 behavior, not a data issue.

• Data freshness — GA4 data is typically available within a few hours, but some metrics (especially those tied to Google Ads or Search Console integrations) may take 24–48 hours to fully process.

• Data retention — GA4 properties have a configurable retention period (2 or 14 months). Coupler.io can only pull data within the retention window. For historical backfills beyond that window, export your data to BigQuery or another destination before it expires.

• Thresholding — GA4 may apply data thresholds to protect user privacy, especially when Google Signals is enabled. Rows representing too few users may be withheld. Adding high-cardinality dimensions (e.g., Landing page + query string) makes thresholding more likely.

• Unsampled data — Coupler.io pulls data through the GA4 Data API, which returns unsampled results. This means your exports may differ slightly from the GA4 interface (which sometimes applies sampling) but are generally more accurate.

• Event-based model — Unlike Universal Analytics (which was session-based), GA4 uses an event-based data model. Every interaction is tracked as an event. "Conversions" are now called "key events" and are counted per event, not per session.

• Key event names — GA4 key event names must only contain letters (A–Z), numbers (0–9), and underscores. If your GA4 property has key events with special characters (spaces, hyphens, brackets, non-Latin characters), the API will reject the request. Rename the events in your GA4 property settings before pulling them.

• "Returning users" metric — The GA4 API does not expose a dedicated "Returning users" metric. To get this value, create a formula column in Coupler.io's Transformations step: Total users − New users.