[GA4] What is Sampling? Explanation of cases that occur and how to avoid them

What is sampling?

GA4 sampling occurs when a large amount of data is used in an exploratory report and the number of events required to aggregate the report exceeds a certain upper limit. When this limit is exceeded, a representative sample is taken and a report is generated based on that sampled data.

Quote Limit

10 million" events in the free version
1 billion" events in the paid version of GA360

 

Type of report where sampling occurs

Sampling does not occur on all GA4 reports. It occurs only in exploratory reports, as shown in the figure below. Therefore, exploratory reports should be used for personal analysis, and internal and external reporting, which requires data accuracy, should use other means that do not involve sampling.

Comparison table	Reports	Explore	Looker Studio	Big Query
Purpose	monitoring	ad hoc	reports monitoring	advanced analysis
Cost	free	free	free	fee
Target Users	beginner	middle	beginner~middle	Senior
Historical data	no limit	2months or 14months	no limit	no limit
Customize	can	very high	very high	very high
Design Flexibility	low	high	high	depend on BI tool
Share	can	can't	flexible	depend on BI tool
Data Accuracy	Without sampling With threshold	With sampling With threshold	Without sampling With threshold	Without sampling Without threshold

Measures to be taken when sampling occurs

If sampling does occur, it can be avoided by

Use standard reports, Looker Studio, and BigQuery

As mentioned above, these three options are not sampled. The features of each function are explained in the "Guide to Using GA4 Reports! A Clear Explanation of the Features of Each Reporting Function", so if you are unsure of the differences between each report, please check it out.

Shorten the aggregation period of the report.

Fewer data will reduce the number of events required, thus making sampling less likely.

Delete unnecessary report items

Deleting unnecessary dimensions and indicators will reduce the number of required events, making sampling less likely.

88 studio for GA4 report generation without sampling

If you want to create reports for reporting with highly accurate data, we recommend Looker Studio, provided by Google, which requires no sampling, has a flexible design, and offers many ways to share.

In the article below, you will find a free trial version of the GA4 Looker Studio template, one of the most popular 88studio templates used by over 2,000 companies. It is completely free and available immediately, so if you are having trouble creating a GA4 report that does not require sampling, please give it a try.

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