Use GA4 BigQuery data instead of GA4 API data in reporting
Ben Z
Allow us to choose whether to use GA4 BigQuery data over GA4 API data in all reporting that uses GA4 data.
Currently all of the data models that use GA4 data must use data from the API. There's no option to use BigQuery.
If I have a GA4 BigQuery integration and no GA4 API integration, use that data in all downstream data models that currently are set up to use the GA4 API data.
If I have both a GA4 BigQuery integration and a GA4 API integration for the same property, give me the option to choose which one to give preference to in any data models that use GA4 data.
This would benefit us because of the oddities documented in session counts for API data that aren't an issue with the BQ data. It would also open up for more dimensions to be included in reports, since extracting data from the BigQuery export doesn't have the same dimension limits as the API reporting.
Note from Daasity:
The GA4BQ export does have its own quirks. Primarily, some dimensions & measures will never match between the GA4 reports & the GA4BQ export data. See Google's documentation on the subject here.
The biggest differences:
- Session totals will not match exactly. That is because the reporting interface and UI use estimations, while the GA4BQ export will be exact counts.
- Traffic attribution will not match exactly.
- Google's data-driven attribution model is not replicable using GA4BQ data