The Ultimate Tutorial on How to Import Reports From Google Analytics to Google Sheets

With Google Analytics Universal, you could get a detailed report on who, when, and how they navigated through your pages. This, in turn, allows you to understand the online behavior of your website’s audience. Google Analytics 4 or GA4, its successor, kept the same value and even expanded it with a new event-based tracking model. 

Although GA Universal stopped processing new data from July 1, 2023, you may still make use of the historical data for your analytics. At the same time, exporting data from GA4 property is more in demand so far. So, we decided not to limit ourselves to one option but to cover both of them.

Google Analytics add-on for Google Sheets does not support GA4

For many years, Google Analytics users have enjoyed a great way to get their data to Google Sheets – the Google Analytics add-on. It’s still working and we even introduce it below in the text but it does not support GA4. So, I totally agree with the review of one of the users who wrote the following:

It’s not great anymore because it doesn’t support GA4, so it’s useless now.

Nevertheless, it does not mean that you cannot export Google Analytics 4 data to Google Sheets.

You CAN with the help of either a web app or an add-on by Coupler.io. Let’s check it out!

How to import data from Google Analytics 4 to Google Sheets

Coupler.io is a data automation and analytics platform that is designed to turn your data into meaningful reports. It’s one of the best ways to import data to Google Sheets from Google Analytics 4 since it allows you to automate data flow on a schedule. So, you can create reports that will refresh automatically.

You can connect GA4 to Google Sheets using either the web app or the add-on. We’ll demonstrate both options.

Import Google Analytics data to Google Sheets using the web app

Sign up for Coupler.io – you can do this with your Google account. A 14-day free trial is available for you to try it out.

Click Add new importer, and select Google Analytics 4 as a source app and Google Sheets as a destination app. 

After that, you only need to complete 3 simple steps:

Step 1. Extract data from Google Analytics

Connect your Google account, and select one of your analytics accounts and GA4 property. Then choose up to 9 dimensions and up to 10 metrics for your report. 

Optionally, you can specify the start/end dates for your report, and add a separate row with the total, maximum, and/or minimum values of the selected metric.

Note: If you want to add more metrics/dimensions to your report, you can click Add one more source and configure it accordingly. Coupler.io allows you to add multiple sources. So you can increase the number of metrics/dimensions to load, or even combine GA4 data with information from other sources like Google Ads, HubSpot, etc.

Step 2. Transform data before loading it to Google Sheets

Before the Google Analytics data is loaded to Google Sheets, you can preview and even transform it. The available transformations include:

• Columns management – you can hide, rename, and reorder columns, and change their data type.
• Calculable columns – you can add new columns using supported calculation formulas.
• Data filtering – you can filter data based on the selected criteria and specified values.

Step 3. Manage data to load to Google Sheets

For the last step, you need to connect your Google account and select a spreadsheet and a sheet where to load data. You can create a new sheet if you type a new name. 

Optionally, you can specify the first cell/exact cell range for importing data, change the import mode from replace to append and switch on/off other valuable features. 

The major feature that you’d likely want to turn on is Automatic data refresh. It allows you to set a schedule to automate importers of Google Analytics data to Google Sheets. 

It’s far more efficient and time-saving than exporting reports from GA4 manually. The last thing to do is click the Save and Run button.

Import Google Analytics data to Google Sheets using the add-on

Coupler.io with all its features and integrations is also available as an add-on for Google Sheets. You can install it from Google Workspace Marketplace.

After the installation, run the add-on from the Extensions tab and open its dashboard. Here you will see the active importers and a button to create a new one.

Click on it and complete the setup in the same way as we described above. 

We’ve covered the part about importing data from Google Analytics 4 property. However, you may need to analyze historical data that has been generated in your Google Analytics Universal properties. In this case, you can either export information manually or use the Google Analytics add-on that we mentioned above.

How to export Google Analytics to Google Sheets 

The native export function in Google Analytics is quite simple. Choose the report you need, click the “Export” button and select Google Sheets as the file format. Additionally, you can export GA reports as CSV, Excel, and PDF files. Check out our guide on how to export Google Analytics data to learn more.

Once you have selected Google Sheets, you will be asked whether you want to import data to Google Sheets.

Click Import the data and welcome your Google Analytics report in a new spreadsheet created on your Google Drive. For example, this is what the Audience Overview report looks like in Google Sheets:

Which reports from Google Analytics you can import to Google Sheets

You can export you custom reports, as well as the following ones:

Report	Category
Audience	Overview Active Cohort Analysis Audiences User Explorer Demographics Interests Geo Behavior Technology Mobile Cross Device Custom Benchmarking
Acquisition	Overview All Traffic Google Ads Search Console Social Campaigns
Behavior	Overview Site Content Site Speed Site Search Events Publisher
Conversions	Goals Ecommerce

Flow reports (Users Flow, Behavior Flow, etc.) can be exported as PDF only; Multi-Channel Funnels reports can be exported as PDF and CSV files. 

You can’t export any realtime reports, or Experiments (Behavior) or Lifetime Value (Audience). You can easily calculate the latter yourself – here is the customer lifetime value calculation guide.

How to automate Google Analytics reports importing into Google Sheets

The option above is good, but it’s manual. At the same time, you can automate import of Google Analytics to Google Sheets on a schedule without any coding or advanced manipulation. For this, you’ll need to complete three steps:

• Install the Google Analytics add-on from Google Workspace Marketplace.
• Create a report according to the parameters you want.
• Enable your report to run automatically.

Add-on to pull Google Analytics data into Google Sheets

On the Google Workspace Marketplace, you can find the Google Analytics Sheets Add-on. It’s a free tool to connect Google Sheets to GA and query specific report data automatically on a schedule. Install it and then open the spreadsheet you want to export Google Analytics data to.

How to create a Google Sheets report based on Google Analytics data

In your spreadsheet, go to the Add-ons menu, select Google Analytics and click Create new report.

The dashboard for creating a new GA report will open on the right of your spreadsheet. It contains fields you’ll need to fill out to configure your Google Analytics report.

1) Name your report

Enter the name of your report

2) Select a view

Select your Google Analytics account, property and view. If you are unsure if you know them, go back to your Google Analytics dashboard and click All accounts. You’ll see the list of these parameters in a single window:

 3) Choose configuration options

Google Analytics reports consist of dimensions and metrics.

• Metrics include specific measurements, such as New Users, Unique Events, Page Load Time, Sessions, etc. 
• Dimensions break down metrics by specific criteria. For example, the New Users metric can include the User Type dimension; the Sessions metric can include the Session duration dimension; and so on.

The third field to configure is Segments. A segment is a subset of data based on dimensions and metrics. If you don’t want to segment users, leave this field blank, and the Google Analytics add-on will import All users. 

Otherwise, you’ll have to specify a segment just like when you add a segment to your report in Google Analytics. 

For example, if your metric is Users, you can specify one segment for users from the USA, another segment for users who visited your FAQ page, and so on. 

Note: You can create a Google Analytics report with these fields empty and configure them later once the report is created.

Click Create Report and the add-on will add a Report Configuration sheet in your Google Sheets doc.

How to configure a Google Analytics report on the Report Configuration sheet

A Report Configuration sheet is not the report itself, but the sheet where you can change the configuration of your reports. It is used only to change the configuration of the created reports. To create additional reports, you’ll have to repeat the steps described above; or, just fill out the parameters in the respective cells in the next column to the right. The configuration of each new report will be added as a new column on the Report Configuration sheet. 

Unlike the add-on dashboard with drop-down parameters, here you’ll have to insert parameters manually. So, if you want to add some metrics or change the time range of your report, the Report Configuration sheet is the only place where you can do this. Let’s check out which parameters you can configure.

Report Name [Required parameter]

You can change the name of your report. This parameter is also the name of the sheet (tab) where the Google Analytics data will be imported to.

View ID [Required parameter]

You can change the Google Analytics view of your report. For this, insert the View ID you want to report. You can find it by clicking All Accounts on the Google Analytics dashboard.

Start Date/End Date [Required parameter]

By default, the start and end dates in a new report have the following values:

• Start Date=30daysAgo
• End Date=yesterday

You can change these values using one of the following options:

• YYYY-MM-DD format, for example 2020-10-23
• Relative date such as today, yesterday, or NdaysAgo (N can be only a positive integer)
• One of the Google Sheets date functions to return the date value automatically. For example, this formula =EDATE(TODAY(), -1) will return the month ago date, and this formula =EOMONTH(TODAY(), -1) will return the last day of the previous month.

Metrics [Required parameter]

Enter the IDs of the metrics to query in your report. Separate them using commas; or enter each metric ID on a new line. For example,

ga:users, ga:sessions 

We advise you to use a Google Analytics tool called Dimensions & Metrics Explorer. It lists and describes all possible options, and excludes the dimensions and metrics that cannot be queried together. For example, if you choose the metric 7 Day Active User, such dimensions as User Type or User Bucket, as well as metrics Users and Number of Sessions per User become inactive. 

The following parameters are options, i.e. you can leave these fields blank.

Dimensions [Optional parameter]

You can enter the IDs of dimensions to query in your report. Separate them using commas, or enter each dimension ID on a new line. For example,

ga:userType, ga:sessionDurationBucket 

Dimensions & Metrics Explorer will help you here as well.

Order [Optional parameter]

You can specify the sorting order by column and direction. To sort by column, enter the metric/dimension IDs in the order you want them to return. For example, 

ga:sessions, ga:bounces – the Sessions metric goes first

ga:bounces, ga:sessions – the Bounces metric goes first 

The sort order direction is ascending by default. To change the direction to descending, use a minus sign (-) prefix on the field you want. For example,

ga:sessions, ga:bounces – the Sessions metric will return in ascending direction

-ga:sessions, ga:bounces – the Sessions metric will return in descending direction

Filters [Optional parameter]

You can specify conditions to filter out a dimension or metric in your Google Analytics report. This will let you exclude the rows that you don’t need in the report. Use the following syntax to tailor a filter query:

ga:{metric/dimension} {operator} {expression}

• {metric/dimension} – name of a metric or dimension to filter. For example, sessions, userType, etc.
• {operator} – a symbol that defines the type of filter to use. There are six operators for metrics and six operators for dimensions.
• {expression} – a case-insensitive regular expression that can not be longer than 128 characters. For example, ^New* is the regular expression for strings starting with New.

Operators for metrics 

Operator	Description	Filter example
==	Equal to	ga:sessionDuration==10
!=	Not equal to	ga:sessionDuration!=10
>	Greater than	ga:sessionDuration>10
<	Less than	ga:sessionDuration<10
>=	Greater than or equal to	ga:sessionDuration>=10
<=	Less than or equal to	ga:sessionDuration<=10

Operators for dimensions

Operator	Description	Filter example
==	Exact match	ga:country==USA
!=	Does not match	ga:country!=USA
=@	Contains substring	ga:city=@New
!@	Does not contain substring	ga:city!@New
=~	Contains a match for the regular expression	ga:city=~^New* (regular expression is the city starts with New)
!~	Does not match the regular expression	ga:city!~^New* (regular expression is the city starts with New)

Multiple filters 

If you need to apply multiple filters using OR logic, separate the filters using a comma (,). For example, to filter out by countries either Germany or France, use

ga:country==Germany,ga:country==France

If you need to apply multiple filters using AND logic, separate the filters using a semicolon (;). For example, to filter out by countries Germany and France, use

ga:country==Germany;ga:country==France

Segments [Optional parameter]

Specify segments (set of users or sessions) to request. For example, the following segment string will select users from Berlin that have visited using the Firefox browser:  

users::condition::ga:city==Berlin;ga:browser==Firefox

For more on segment syntax and usage, read the Google Analytics API documentation. 

Limit [Optional parameter]

You can specify the maximum number of rows to return for your GA report. The default value is 1000. This parameter is recommended to use for reports that return thousands or millions of rows. If you leave this field blank, the Google Analytics add-on will make queries until all rows are returned (this can waste your API quota, which is 50,000 requests per project per day). 

Spreadsheet URL [Optional parameter]

You can import the GA report to an external Google Sheets document. To do this, specify the spreadsheet URL in this field and make sure that you have edit permissions for it. By default, the report will be imported to the current Google Sheets document. 

Skip Report [Optional parameter]

You can skip the import of a certain report or reports if you enter TRUE for this parameter. This option is useful when you have multiple reports and do not need to import all of them. 

You can also apply Google Sheets formulas to set up this field. For example, the following expression will return TRUE (skip the report), if the value in B5 cell is less than 10:

=IF(B5 < 10, TRUE, FALSE)

Hidden parameters

The following parameters are hidden, so you need to click on the arrows to expand them. These include

• Report Type – if you enter mcf in this field, you can query the Multi-Channel Funnels Reporting API instead of the Analytics Reporting API v4 which is set by default. Why would you do this? MCF Reporting API provides a different set of metrics and dimensions that are not available in Analytics Reporting API v4; for example, mcf:adwordsPlacementUrl (URLs where your ads on the content network were placed), and many others.
• Sampling Level – you can change the sampling level (the number of sessions used to calculate the result) for a reporting query. Available options are:
  • DEFAULT — the default sampling level that uses balanced speed and accuracy to return the response.
  • FASTER — the sampling level that uses a smaller sample size to return a fast response.
  • HIGHER_PRECISION — the sampling level that uses a large sample size to return a more accurate response. This slows down the response.
• Use Resource Quotas – the field to enable the Resource Based Quota system – a feature available for Analytics 360 customers. If you’re one of them, set the parameter to TRUE.
• Exclude Empty Rows – set the parameter to TRUE if you need to exclude empty rows from your report. 

That’s it for configuration!

Get data from Google Analytics to Sheets

Once you’ve configured your GA report, you can run it manually. Go to the Add-ons menu => Google Analytics => Run reports

Your Google Analytics report will be imported into a new sheet named accordingly.

How to automate Google Analytics reports into Google Sheets

The best thing about the Google Analytics add-on is that you can automate data importing. For this, navigate to your usual path, go to the Add-ons menu => Google Analytics, and select Schedule Reports.

Then check “Enable reports to run automatically” and choose the schedule.

Click Save and that’s it. All your configured reports will be imported according to the specified schedule! 

How to remove reports from the schedule

If you need to ignore some of the created reports, you can either use the Skip Report parameter, or simply delete all the data from the respective columns of your reports. After that they won’t be available. 

Google Analytics in Google Sheets: Combine your reports with other imported data

The Google Analytics add-on only imports data from GA to Google Sheets. But you can enhance your spreadsheet with other add-ons and solutions to import a variety of other data. 

With Coupler.io, you can import data to Google Sheets from Airtable, WordPress, Clockify, ProfitWell and many other sources. This will let you accumulate data in one place and manipulate it much more efficiently. 

Additionally, Coupler.io provides a Google Sheets importer – an advanced alternative to the native IMPORTRANGE function in Sheets. The Google Sheets importer lets you automate import of data from one sheet or spreadsheet to another on a schedule, without any of the errors associated with IMPORTRANGE. 

If you’re interested in your search data, Coupler.io also features a handy Google Search Console to Google Sheets integration.

How to use Google Sheets for analytics

Having your GA data in spreadsheets opens wide opportunities for processing. You can monitor website performance, create custom dashboards, sales trackers or monitors, as well as visualize data in the way you need. For example, our team uses the Website Traffic Monitor built atop the report imported from Google Analytics. Here is the report configuration we use:

The traffic data from GA is then filtered using the Google Sheets FILTER function. The final view of the monitor is based on a pivot table that lets you see how many views each page had every week historically. 

This is only one use case of how you can analyze your GA data in Sheets and there are many more!

Are there other options to connect Sheets to Google Analytics? 

Actually, the Google Analytics add-on is not a single option to import data. You can go to Google Workspace Marketplace, enter “Google Analytics” into the search bar and check out the alternatives. Are they good enough? To answer this question, just pay attention to the number of installs compared to the GA add-on.

Moreover, the Google Analytics add-on is free, while its alternatives that provide import from multiple sources, including Google Analytics, are paid options. Anyway, it’s up to you to decide.

If you want to visualize your GA4 data, check out our guide on how to connect GA 4 with Looker Studio.

Good luck with your data!

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