Measuring and reporting AI traffic in GA4: here's what you need to know

How to easily check your AI traffic directly in ga4

The quickest way to 'just' check how much traffic comes from AI tools is to look at the referral traffic in your traffic acquisition report in GA4, choosing 'session source/medium' instead of the default channel group.

Choose session source/medium here 

If you have chosen session source/medium, you can search for "chat/chatgpt" in the search bar. This will show you the measurable traffic from in this case so Chat GPT. If you get any traffic from this of course.

Here you see traffic from chat GPT after entering the search function 

The challenge of measuring AI traffic in GA4

The challenge: there are of course a lot of Large Language Models (LLMs). Think Gemini, Claude, Grok and so on, and it is difficult to easily filter them into an overall view in the way described above.On top of that, most of the AI traffic ends up in the referral channel group, which means you have to start filtering and looking for the traffic from AI in that group.

(Re)categorizing your AI traffic data in GA4

There are several possible solutions to see all your AI traffic in one row. But the best and most powerful way is to work with a "custom channel group." Sounds complicated, but it's not too bad. What we can do with this is indicate in GA4 that some of the referral traffic should not be under referral but under AI.

The advantage of a custom channel group

An important reason to choose a custom channel group is that it allows you to add many more conditions than with a regular filter option. This allows us to distinguish more AI traffic.

Een custom channel group aanmaken 

To create a custom channel group, go to: management > Channel groups and choose "Create new channel group". By the way, there is always a default group, and it is possible to create up to 2 custom groups. For the example, I give the channel group data the group name 'custom channel group'.

Here I give the channel group data the group name 'custom channel group 

Add AI channel

The next step is 'add new channel'. Here we have the option to give a name to the channel. An obvious choice is to name the channel 'AI'. Which is fine. But in some cases there may be overlap with other channels. Which can make filtering awkward. Therefore, it is convenient to call the channel "Artificial Intelligence," for example, which is what we will do here.

Setting channel conditions with a regex source

After choosing a logical name, we move on to 'channel conditions', and choose regex as source. This allows us to add a piece of code that can be used to add all the AI traffic known so far. You can find the regex code here. If all goes well, your screen now looks like this;

Here you see the entered name and source regex as an example, don't forget to hit save! 

Reorganize your channel list

To make sure Google looks at traffic from AI first and classifies it somewhere other than referral traffic, we need to adjust the channel list a bit. Google looks at channels in order. And by default, the new channel shows up at the bottom. So our new channel we need to adjust to above referral. Click 'reorder' and move the new channel to above referral.

Check if it works

To check if everything we have set up so far works, we need to go back to the reports. In doing so, go to aquisition > traffic acquisition and instead of the primary channel group, select the custom channel group. If all goes well, you now have insight into how much traffic is coming from all ai channels and you can see that reflected between the channels:

Here you see the newly created channel, in this case 'Artificial intelligence'. 

Understanding different AI sources

After implementing the above step, you can now see the total incoming traffic from AI. So if that's enough for what you want to see, you can stop here. But to create even more insight, we can go one step further - by creating a custom copy of the traffic acquisition report.

Customize session source as default in the copy

You should still be in the traffic acquisition report. Click the pencil at the top right ('customize report') and go to dimensions. Here, customize the session source by setting it as default, and dragging it to the top of the list. Then select apply.

Creating an artificial intelligence report in GA4

The next step is to create a filter. Click create filter, and choose 'custom channel group for session' as the dimension. And then choose 'matches exactly,' and 'Artificial Intelligence' (if you named your channel that way). After that, click apply. And then click 'save as new report'. After that, name the report, for example, 'AI traffic'

The last step; customizing your library collections in GA4

The new report has now been created. But it is not visible by default among the rest of your reports. We need to make 1 more setting for this. To do this, go to your library, and then choose where you want to add this report. I choose to add it to the traffic acquisition under 'Life cycle', simply click on Edit collection (via the three dots on the top right), search for ai and drag the report to the desired location. A quick save, and voila - we're there.

Within your desired collection, drag and drop your report to where you want it! 

More insight into AI traffic and your SEO? Start with a free scan 

After adding this report, you can easily measure and view AI traffic in GA4. Credits for this go to Analytics Mania. This is a strong first step, but the real difference you'll make by translating those insights into action. Want to know how your website is performing in AI search results and organic traffic? Then do a free SEO scan or discover your opportunities with our free GEO scan. That way you'll know exactly where you stand and where you can grow.