GA4 Channel Group Predictor
Test any UTM combination against GA4's Default Channel Group rules in real time. See exactly which of the 18 channels your traffic will land in — before you launch the campaign.
GA4 Channel Group Predictor
Predict which Default Channel Group GA4 will assign to your traffic
What is the GA4 Default Channel Group?
The Default Channel Group is GA4's pre-defined classification of every visit into one of 18 buckets — Direct, Organic Search, Paid Search, Email, Organic Social, Paid Social, Referral, Affiliates, Display, and so on.
Instead of digging through raw utm_source + utm_medium values, you can pivot reports by Channel and instantly see how each marketing motion performs.
GA4 evaluates the rules in priority order — the first matching rule wins. The predictor above runs the same logic locally so you can validate any UTM combo before launching a campaign.
How GA4 classifies traffic into channels
- Direct — no UTMs, no referrer, no campaign cookie → "(direct) / (none)" → channel: Direct.
- Cross-network — Performance Max and similar campaigns where Google itself sets the source.
- Paid Shopping — utm_medium contains "cpc/ppc/paid" AND source matches a shopping platform.
- Paid Search — paid medium + a search-engine source (google, bing, yandex, etc.).
- Paid Social / Paid Video — paid medium + social/video source.
- Display — utm_medium = display / banner / cpm.
- Organic Shopping / Search / Social / Video — same source families, but without a paid medium signal.
- Email · SMS · Affiliate · Referral · Audio · Mobile Push — direct medium-name match.
- Unassigned — fallthrough when nothing else matches.
Read the deeper attribution mechanics in the attribution glossary.
5 reasons your traffic ends up in "Unassigned"
× Non-standard utm_medium
GA4 looks for specific medium values (cpc, email, paid_social). paidsearch, link, or post all fall through to Unassigned.
× Missing utm_medium
If only utm_source is set, GA4 has no channel rule to evaluate and either drops the visit into Direct or Unassigned. Always tag both source and medium.
× Uppercase / mixed-case values
"Facebook" and "facebook" become two separate sources in your reports. Lowercase everything — the UTM Builder enforces this by default.
× Invented utm_source
GA4 recognises specific source patterns for each channel. "google", "bing", "facebook" are matched; "Google.com Search" or "fb-mobile" are not. Stick to known names.
× Auto-tagging conflicts
Google Ads adds gclid automatically. If you also add manual UTMs that contradict the gclid (different source/medium), GA4's behaviour is unpredictable. Either trust auto-tagging or override consistently.
Channel grouping questions
What is the GA4 Default Channel Group?
GA4 Default Channel Groups are pre-defined buckets that classify every visit (Direct, Organic Search, Paid Search, Email, Organic Social, etc.) based on rules applied to utm_source, utm_medium, and the page referrer. There are 18 channels in GA4, and the rules are evaluated in priority order.
Why does my traffic show as "Unassigned"?
A visit becomes Unassigned when its source/medium combination doesn’t match any GA4 channel rule. The most common causes: non-standard utm_medium (e.g. paidsearch instead of cpc), missing utm_medium altogether, uppercase values (Facebook vs facebook), or invented sources.
Can I customise GA4 channel rules?
Yes. In GA4 Admin → Channel Groups you can create a Custom Channel Group that overrides the default rules — for example, splitting "Paid Other" into branded vs non-branded, or treating a specific affiliate network as its own channel.
Are GA4 channel rules case-sensitive?
GA4 evaluates utm_medium and utm_source case-insensitively for the default channel rules, but the values are stored case-sensitive in your reports. Always tag in lowercase to keep your reports clean.
How is Default Channel Group different from Source/Medium?
Source and medium are the raw values your tagging sends. Default Channel Group is GA4’s classification of those values into a higher-level bucket. One channel can match many source/medium combos (e.g. google/cpc and bing/cpc both → Paid Search).