10 GA4 Custom Reports That Actually Answer Your Questions (Not Google’s)

This content originally appeared on DEV Community and was authored by Drew Madore

Let me guess: you've logged into GA4, stared at the default reports, and thought "this tells me nothing useful."

You're not wrong.

GA4's standard reports were designed to showcase what Google thinks matters. Which is great if you're Google. Less great if you're trying to figure out why your landing page converts at 0.8% instead of the 3% your boss keeps asking about.

Here's the thing though—GA4's custom reports are actually powerful once you stop trying to make sense of the interface. (Who designed this? Seriously.) I've spent the last year building reports for clients who range from solo consultants to mid-size B2B companies, and I keep coming back to these 10 templates.

They're practical. They answer real questions. And you can set them up today without a data analytics degree.

Why GA4's Default Reports Miss the Mark

GA4 replaced Universal Analytics with a completely different data model. Events instead of pageviews. Engagement rate instead of bounce rate. It's like Google decided to rearrange your kitchen and forgot to mention where they put the coffee.

The default reports show you broad patterns. User acquisition. Engagement overview. That sort of thing. But they don't answer the specific questions that keep you up at 2am:

• Which blog posts actually drive conversions?
• Where do people drop off in my checkout flow?
• What's my actual ROI on that LinkedIn campaign?
• Why is mobile traffic up 40% but conversions are flat?

You need custom reports for that. The good news? Once you build them, they're there forever. The better news? I'm going to give you the exact templates.

Template 1: The Content Performance Report That Actually Shows ROI

Start here. This report connects your content to actual business outcomes instead of just pageviews (because who cares if 10,000 people read your blog post if zero of them did anything useful).

What it shows: Every page on your site with sessions, engagement rate, conversions, and conversion value.

How to build it:

• Go to Explore > Create a new exploration > Free form
• Dimensions: Page path and screen class, Session source/medium
• Metrics: Sessions, Engaged sessions, Engagement rate, Conversions, Total revenue
• Add filters if you want to isolate blog content (/blog/) or landing pages

Why it matters: You can finally answer "which content actually makes us money?" Instead of celebrating that viral post that drove traffic but zero conversions, you'll focus on the boring-titled article that quietly generates 15 leads a month.

I built this for a SaaS client last spring. Turned out their most-trafficked blog post (about industry trends) converted at 0.2%. A technical tutorial with one-tenth the traffic converted at 4.7%. Guess which one they're updating and promoting now?

Template 2: The Landing Page Diagnostic

This one's for when your paid campaigns are burning budget but not delivering results.

What it shows: Landing page performance broken down by traffic source, with bounce rate proxies and conversion paths.

How to build it:

• Exploration type: Free form
• Dimensions: Landing page, Session source/medium, Device category
• Metrics: Sessions, Engagement rate, Average engagement time, Conversions, Cost per conversion (if you've linked Google Ads)
• Rows: Landing page
• Columns: Session source/medium

Why it matters: You'll spot when a landing page works great for organic traffic but bombs for paid. Or when mobile users engage completely differently than desktop.

The pattern I see most often? Landing pages that work fine for branded search but have terrible engagement rates for cold traffic. Because branded searchers already want your thing. Cold traffic needs actual persuasion.

Template 3: The Checkout Flow Reality Check

If you run e-commerce, this report will hurt. But it'll also make you money.

What it shows: Exactly where people abandon your checkout process, with drop-off rates at each step.

How to build it:

• Exploration type: Funnel exploration
• Steps: Add your checkout events in order (begin_checkout > add_shipping_info > add_payment_info > purchase)
• Breakdown dimension: Device category or Session source
• Make sure you're tracking these events properly first (most people aren't)

Why it matters: You might think people abandon at payment. Turns out they're actually leaving when they see shipping costs. Or when your form asks for 17 fields of information.

One client discovered 62% of users dropped off when the checkout required account creation. They added a guest checkout option. Revenue increased 28% in six weeks. The report cost them nothing. The insight was worth quite a bit more.

Template 4: The Campaign Performance Breakdown

Because "sessions" is not a business metric your CFO cares about.

What it shows: Every campaign with actual business outcomes, not just traffic numbers.

How to build it:

• Free form exploration
• Dimensions: Session campaign, Session source/medium, Session manual term (if you use UTM parameters properly)
• Metrics: Sessions, New users, Conversions by type, Revenue, ROAS
• Filter: Session campaign does not contain (not set)

Why it matters: You'll see which campaigns drive revenue versus which ones just drive clicks. These are not always the same campaigns.

Protip: This only works if you're actually tagging your campaigns consistently. If your UTM parameters are a mess (and statistically, they probably are), fix that first. Nothing says "we're data-driven" like having 47 variations of the same campaign name because three different people built links.

Template 5: The Mobile vs Desktop Deep Dive

Mobile traffic is probably 60-70% of your total traffic. Mobile conversion rate is probably 40% of desktop. Let's figure out why.

What it shows: Behavioral differences between device types that explain conversion gaps.

How to build it:

• Free form exploration
• Rows: Device category
• Columns: Page path or Event name
• Metrics: Sessions, Average engagement time, Conversions, Conversion rate
• Values: Compare metrics side by side

Why it matters: You'll discover that mobile users engage with completely different content. Or that your mobile checkout is secretly terrible. Or that your site loads in 2 seconds on desktop and 11 seconds on mobile.

I've seen companies pour money into mobile advertising while their mobile site was basically unusable. This report makes that visible. Sometimes uncomfortably visible.

Template 6: The User Journey Path Exploration

This one's less about numbers and more about understanding how people actually navigate your site (versus how you think they navigate your site).

What it shows: The actual paths users take from entry to conversion.

How to build it:

• Exploration type: Path exploration
• Starting point: session_start event
• Ending point: Your conversion event (purchase, lead_form_submit, whatever)
• Show intermediate steps

Why it matters: You'll discover that nobody follows your carefully designed user journey. They do something completely different. And that's fine—but you should probably optimize for what they actually do.

Most common discovery: People visit your pricing page way earlier than you think. Stop hiding it in the footer.

Template 7: The Engagement Quality Report

Because not all traffic is created equal, and your boss needs to understand this.

What it shows: Traffic sources ranked by engagement quality, not just volume.

How to build it:

• Free form exploration
• Dimensions: Session source/medium, Landing page
• Metrics: Users, Engaged sessions per user, Average engagement time, Events per session, Conversion rate
• Sort by: Engaged sessions per user (descending)

Why it matters: You'll stop celebrating traffic spikes from sources that send garbage visitors. You'll double down on the traffic sources that send people who actually care.

That viral Reddit post that sent 5,000 visitors with an average engagement time of 11 seconds? Not actually helpful. The industry newsletter that sends 200 visitors who spend 4 minutes and convert at 3%? That's the one you want more of.

Template 8: The New vs Returning User Report

Your acquisition and retention strategies should be different. This report shows you if they're working.

What it shows: How new and returning users behave differently on your site.

How to build it:

• Free form exploration
• Dimensions: New vs returning (it's under User attributes)
• Breakdown: Session source/medium
• Metrics: Users, Sessions per user, Engagement rate, Conversions, Revenue

Why it matters: If returning users aren't converting better than new users, your nurture strategy isn't working. If new users never come back, your first impression is the problem.

The ideal pattern: new users explore, returning users convert. If you're not seeing that pattern, something's broken in your funnel.

Template 9: The Event Tracking Validation Report

This is the boring one that saves you from making decisions based on broken data.

What it shows: All your events firing (or not firing) so you can spot tracking problems.

How to build it:

• Free form exploration
• Dimensions: Event name, Page path
• Metrics: Event count, Total users
• Sort by: Event count (descending)
• Date range: Last 7 days

Why it matters: You'll discover that the conversion tracking you set up three months ago stopped working two months ago. Or that someone added a button that doesn't track anything. Or that you're tracking the same event twice with different names.

I check this weekly for every client. You'd be surprised how often things break. Google Tag Manager updates. Site redesigns. Developers who don't know GA4 exists. All of these cause tracking problems.

Template 10: The Revenue Attribution Report

For when you need to justify your marketing budget to people who only care about dollars.

What it shows: Which channels actually contribute to revenue, including assisted conversions.

How to build it:

• Exploration type: Free form
• Dimensions: Session source/medium
• Metrics: Conversions, Total revenue, Purchase revenue, First-time purchaser conversion, Returning purchaser conversion
• Add secondary dimension: Default channel group

Why it matters: Last-click attribution is dead. This report shows the full picture. That blog post from organic search might not close the deal, but it starts the journey. Your retargeting campaign might get credit for the conversion, but it only works because email warmed them up first.

Pair this with GA4's attribution modeling (under Advertising > Attribution) for an even clearer picture. Though fair warning: attribution modeling is where things get genuinely complicated. Start with this simpler version.

Making These Reports Actually Useful

Here's what nobody tells you about custom reports: building them is the easy part. Using them consistently is the hard part.

Set up a dashboard rotation. Monday morning, check the content performance report. Wednesday, review campaign performance. Friday, validate your event tracking. Pick a schedule that matches your actual decision-making rhythm.

Share them with your team. Custom reports sitting in your GA4 account that nobody else sees are just expensive screenshots. Export them. Present them. Make them part of your weekly meeting.

Update them as your business changes. That checkout flow report? Rebuild it when you redesign your checkout. The campaign performance report? Adjust it when you launch new channels.

And here's the thing about GA4 that everyone complains about but nobody wants to admit: it's actually more powerful than Universal Analytics once you learn it. The learning curve is real. The interface is confusing. But the data model is better for understanding actual user behavior.

You just need to build reports that answer your questions instead of Google's questions.

What to Do Right Now

Pick two of these templates. Not all ten. Two.

Build them today. Use them for two weeks. See what you learn.

Then come back and build two more.

The goal isn't to have ten custom reports sitting unused in your GA4 account. The goal is to have the specific reports that answer your specific questions. Maybe that's three of these. Maybe it's seven. Maybe you'll modify them completely for your situation.

GA4 is a tool. These templates are starting points. Your business questions should drive which ones you actually need.

And if you're still staring at the GA4 interface thinking "I have no idea what I'm doing"—that's normal. Everyone felt that way in 2023. Most people still feel that way in late 2025. The difference is that some people built the reports anyway.

Start with the content performance report. It's the most immediately useful for most businesses. You'll see which pages actually matter. Then build from there.

Your data is already sitting in GA4. These reports just make it visible.

This content originally appeared on DEV Community and was authored by Drew Madore