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GA4 Custom Channel Grouping Override

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Related article

For general GA4 connection setup and dimension/metric reference, see Google Analytics 4.

Overview

NinjaCat supports overriding the GA4 channel grouping used in reports. When a custom channel grouping override is configured, NinjaCat uses that custom grouping in place of GA4's default channel grouping when running reports for the connected property.

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In the UI this setting is labeled Custom Channel Group.

Custom channel grouping definitions are pulled live from the GA4 metadata API each time a report runs — they are not cached or stored statically inside NinjaCat.

Timing & Behavior

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Important: Changes apply going forward only.

Changing the custom channel grouping override takes effect on the next report run or sync. It does not retroactively rewrite data that was already fetched and stored.

  • Historical rows already pulled into NinjaCat's Data Cloud keep their prior grouping — the grouping that was in effect when those rows were originally fetched.
  • Only data fetched after the override change is applied will reflect the new custom channel grouping.

This mirrors GA4's own channel-grouping behavior, where changes to channel group definitions apply going forward and do not restate historical data.

In practice, this means:

ScenarioResult
You change the override todayTomorrow's report run and all future runs use the new grouping
Data fetched before todayRetains the channel grouping that was active at fetch time
You want historical data re-groupedA re-fetch of the affected date range is required

How to set the override

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This setting is not hidden behind any feature flag — it appears on the GA4 data source form regardless.

  1. Navigate to the advertiser's data sources and create or edit the GA4 data source. (To add a new one, use the Add Data Sources button.)

  2. On the data source form's general settings, locate the Overrides section. Within it you will find the Custom Channel Group field (a dropdown).

    Helper text shown for this field: "The Channel Group to use for this account. If not provided, the default channel group will be used."

  3. Select the GA4 Property first. The Custom Channel Group dropdown only populates after a property is selected — the available channel groups are fetched live from GA4 once the property is chosen.

  4. Pick a channel group from the dropdown, or leave it set to Default to use GA4's default channel grouping.

  5. Save the data source. The selection takes effect on the next report run. As noted above, this is forward-only — it does not rewrite data that was already fetched.

Updated about 19 hours ago

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