How to Make a Circle Chart in Google Analytics

Thinking about making a circle chart in Google Analytics? You're in the right place. While Google Analytics 4 doesn't have a button labeled "Create Circle Chart," it does have the tools you need - namely, pie and donut charts. This article will guide you through exactly where to find them and how to build a clear, useful visualization to understand the proportions of your key business metrics.

What Exactly is a Circle Chart?

When most people say "circle chart," they're usually talking about one of two things: a pie chart or a donut chart. Both are used for the same purpose: to show how different parts make up a whole.

Imagine your website's traffic is a whole pizza. A pie chart slices that pizza to show you how big each piece is. Maybe 50% of your traffic comes from Organic Search, 30% from Direct, 15% from Social, and 5% from Referral. A pie chart is a perfect, at-a-glance way to see which slices are the biggest.

Pie Chart: A full circle divided into slices, where each slice represents a category's percentage of the total.
Donut Chart: Essentially a pie chart with the center cut out. It functions the same way but can sometimes be easier to read, as humans are better at judging the length of the arcs than the area of the slices. GA4 offers both.

When to Use a Circle Chart (and When to Avoid It)

Circle charts are powerful, but they have a very specific job. Use them when you want to show a composition or a proportional breakdown of your data at a single point in time. Here are some classic examples perfectly suited for a circle chart in Google Analytics:

Traffic Sources: What percentage of your sessions come from each channel group (Organic Search, Paid Social, Direct, etc.)?
Device Breakdown: How many of your users are on a Desktop, Mobile, or Tablet?
User Demographics: What is the distribution of your audience by Country, Age, or Gender?
New vs. Returning Users: What portion of your audience has been to your site before?

However, circle charts aren't a one-size-fits-all solution. Here’s when you should use a different type of chart:

Avoid them for showing trends over time. If you want to see how your Organic traffic changed month-over-month, a line chart is your best friend. A series of pie charts for this would be very difficult to interpret.
Avoid them if you have too many categories. A pie chart with 15 tiny slices is cluttered and impossible to read. If you have more than 5-6 categories, a bar or column chart is usually a much clearer option.
Avoid them for comparing different data sets. Trying to compare traffic sources for the USA vs. Canada using two side-by-side pie charts is tough. A grouped bar chart will make the comparison much easier to see.

Step-by-Step: How to Make a Pie Chart in GA4

The magic happens inside GA4's reporting powerhouse: the Explorations hub. This is where you can move beyond standard reports to build custom tables and visualizations. Here’s how to do it step-by-step.

For our example, let's create a common and useful chart: a pie chart showing user sessions broken down by device category (Desktop, Mobile, Tablet).

Step 1: Navigate to the Explorations Hub

Log in to your Google Analytics 4 property. On the left-hand navigation menu, look for the icon that looks like a small chart with a magnifying glass. Click on Explore.

Step 2: Create a New, Blank Exploration

You'll land in your Explorations hub, where you can see any explorations you've saved previously. At the top of the page, click on the large plus sign labeled Blank to start a fresh report from scratch.

Step 3: Name Your Exploration

This is a small but important step for staying organized. In the top-left corner, click where it says "Untitled Exploration" and give your report a descriptive name. Something like "Sessions by Device Category - Last 30 Days" works great.

Step 4: Add Your Dimensions and Metrics

This is where you tell GA4 what data you want to use. You'll see a panel on the left called "Variables." We need to import the categories (Dimensions) and the numbers (Metrics) we want to analyze.

To add your Dimension (the "what"):

Under the Dimensions section, click the plus sign (+).
A window will pop up with a searchable list of all available dimensions. In the search bar, type "Device category".
Check the box next to Device category.
Click the blue Import button in the top-right corner. You'll now see Device category listed in your Dimensions library.

To add your Metric (the "how many"):

Under the Metrics section, click the plus sign (+).
In the search bar, type "Sessions".
Check the box next to Sessions.
Click the blue Import button. Now Sessions will be available in your Metrics library.

Step 5: Build the Report in "Tab Settings"

Now that you've imported your ingredients, it's time to build the report. Look at the second column, titled "Tab Settings." This is where you bring your data to life.

Drag your Device category dimension from the "Variables" panel and drop it into the Breakdowns box.
Drag your Sessions metric from the "Variables" panel and drop it into the Values box.

Almost instantly, you'll see a data table appear on the right side of your screen. It will show you the exact number of sessions from Desktop, Mobile, and Tablet users. This table is the foundation for your chart.

Step 6: Change the Visualization to a Pie Chart

This is the final step! Just above your new data table on the right, you'll see a series of small icons representing different chart types. By default, the Table icon is selected.

Next to the table icon, click on the Pie chart icon.

That's it! Your data table will immediately transform into a beautiful pie chart. You can also click the Donut chart icon right next to it if you prefer that style.

You can now hover over each slice of your chart to see the device category name, the exact number of sessions, and its percentage of the total. You've successfully created a circle chart in Google Analytics!

Beyond GA4: For More Complex Visualizations

GA4's Explorations are great for answering quick questions right inside the platform. However, you might find their customization options a bit limited. If you need precise control over colors, labels, chart sizes, or want to combine Google Analytics data with information from other sources (like your Shopify sales or Facebook Ads spend), it's time to look at a dedicated dashboard tool.

Using Google's Looker Studio

Looker Studio (formerly Google Data Studio) is Google's free and more advanced data visualization tool. It integrates seamlessly with Google Analytics and opens up a new world of possibilities. You can easily connect your GA4 property as a data source and then build pie charts, donut charts, and any other visualization you can imagine with full control.

The process is similar in concept:

Connect GA4 as a data source in Looker Studio.
Create a new report canvas.
Add a chart, selecting "Pie" or "Donut" from the menu.
In the chart settings, select Device category as your dimension and Sessions as your metric.
Customize the colors, fonts, and labels to your heart's content.

This path offers more features but also comes with a steeper learning curve compared to the quick and simple charts in GA4 Explorations.

Final Thoughts

Creating circle charts in Google Analytics 4 is a straightforward process once you know your way around the Explorations hub. By turning your data table into a pie or donut chart, you can get a quick and memorable snapshot of how your key metrics are divided. Just remember to use them for the right job - visualizing parts of a single whole - and to use bar and line charts for comparisons or trends over time.

While GA4's explorations are handy for simple reports, manually building them can become a drag, especially when your data is scattered across platforms like Shopify, Google Ads, and your CRM. We built Graphed because we believe there's a better way. Instead of clicking and dragging, you can simply ask questions in plain English, like "Show me a pie chart of my Shopify sales by traffic source" or "Compare sessions from last month for my top 5 acquisition channels," and get a live, automated dashboard in seconds.