This blog is going to be very informational for you. It is the most common question we all are getting.

What exactly is a “dimension” in Google Analytics?

The simplest definition of dimension is it is an attribute of data.

In google analytics, dimensions tell about the user and their requirements.

What is a dimension in google analytics?

Because of the dimension you can learn more detail about your user detail. Like which device they use to open your site, which language they speak, where they live, and much more. You get all the detailed information through this.

This helps you to know which audience you’re targeting and who they are.

Some of the examples are:

• Page 
• Campaign 
• Source
• Country
• Browsers
• Product
• Device category
• Language
• Gender
• Keyword
• Ad Content
• Age
• Day of week
• Month of year

Primary and secondary dimensions in GA:

GA reports include a pre-selected primary dimension that gives high-level insight into how the dimension performs against a set of metrics.

Using one default dimension in a Google Analytics report is known as working with a primary dimension. It appears by default. 

To narrow down the results you can also add secondary dimensions. Narrowing means the data is more detailed and divided.

Just click the secondary dimension button to apply it. Changing and adjusting the dimension is not a very difficult task.

What are custom dimensions?

Google Analytics also offers the option of custom dimensions to its users. It allows you to work with data that the tool doesn’t automatically track and focus on what really matters. How each author is performing, the tags that bring heavy traffic, the categories that perform well, and many more.

In the google analytics report, you will see dimensions and metrics.

Dimensions are the traits of visitors to your website such as they are from which city, which page they viewed, or the source

If we talk about the metrics they are the measurements such as the number of page views, sessions, or pages per session.

Dimensions are always viewed in rows while metrics are in the columns.

To track more dimensions the customer dimension option is for you. Custom dimensions are similar to default dimensions. But you create them by yourself while the other ones are present already. The key function is to collect the data that is important for your website.

The key benefit of custom dimensions is it tracks the performance of extra data that is important to your website such as the WordPress tags and categories, author, and much more.

What is metric in GA:

You can see metrics in a GA report through numbers. They are quantitative measurements of data that show how a website is performing.

Here’s an example: The users of desktop, tablet devices, and mobile and the average duration are the metrics you will see in the device category dimension.

Common GA metrics:

Common metrics are the default metrics in GA. When you log in it appears first. They are divided into Acquisition, behavior, and conversions.

How dimensions and Metrics work:

Dimensions and metrics work together. They show the whole story of data. In Google Analytics, you cannot simply combine any dimension with any metric because of the scope. There are three forms of data scope depending on the way it is calculated:

1) Hit level dimensions and metrics:

A hit-level dimension and metric show the individual interactions a user makes during a session.

Examples of Hit level dimensions:

• Hostname
• Page
• Event Category

Examples of Hit level Metrics:

• Time on page 
• Pageview
• Total Events

2) Session-level dimensions and metrics

It shows the collection of hits in the whole session.

Examples of Session-level Dimensions:

• Source
• Medium
• campaign
• Landing page

Examples of Session-level metrics:

• New users
• Bounce Rate
• Average session duration

3) User-level dimensions and metrics

It shows the collection of all sessions.

Examples of user-level dimensions:

• Age
• Location
• Gender

Examples of user-level metrics:

• Existing users
• New users

WRAP UP!

This blog contains the dimensions in google analytics including primary, secondary, and custom dimensions. And how dimensions and metrics work with their examples. Hope you enjoyed this blog and got some juicy nuggets from it. Also, share your comments regarding dimensions in GA. love to hear from you.