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How to Revert to Old Google Analytics

Cody Schneider••7 min read

Missing the simplicity of the old Google Analytics? You're not alone. While you can't go back to Universal Analytics (UA) now that it's been discontinued, you can take steps to make the newer Google Analytics 4 feel much more familiar. This guide will walk you through exactly why you can't revert and, more importantly, how to recreate your favorite and most useful reports from UA inside of GA4.

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So, Can You Actually Switch Back to Universal Analytics?

Let's get the bad news out of the way first: it is no longer possible to revert to Universal Analytics. As of July 1, 2023, Universal Analytics properties officially stopped processing new data. All new data collection and analysis must be done in Google Analytics 4.

While some historic UA data was accessible for a time, that window has also closed. For all intents and purposes, Universal Analytics is a thing of the past. The only path forward is to get comfortable with GA4. The good news is that you can customize GA4's interface to bring back some of the clarity and ease of use you might be missing from the old version.

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Why GA4 Feels So Different (and Often, So Confusing)

Your frustration with GA4 is completely valid. It’s not just a facelift of the old system, it’s a complete rebuild based on a fundamentally different way of measuring user behavior. Understanding this core difference is the first step to mastering it.

  • From Sessions to Events: Universal Analytics was built around the idea of a "session." A session was like a container for everything a user did on your site within a specific timeframe. GA4 scraps this model in favor of an "event-based" model. Now, everything is an event - a page view, a scroll, a click, a form submission. While more flexible, this can make standard reports feel abstract and less intuitive.
  • Where Did All The Reports Go?: UA was famous for its vast library of pre-built reports. You could find almost anything you needed under the Audience, Acquisition, Behavior, and Conversions menus. GA4 has far fewer standard reports, encouraging a "build-your-own" approach using the ‘Explore’ section. This is powerful for data analysts, but often frustrating for marketers and business owners who just want a quick look at their landing page performance.
  • The Metrics Have Changed: One of the biggest complaints is the disappearance of familiar metrics. Bounce Rate is technically back but has been largely replaced by Engagement Rate, and Goals have been completely restructured as Conversions. It feels like learning a new language.

Instead of fighting this new model, you can work with it to get what you want. Let's make GA4 easier to use by rebuilding the views you know and love.

How to Rebuild Your Favorite UA Reports in GA4

This is where things get actionable. By investing a little time upfront, you can configure GA4 to make your day-to-day analysis much faster and more familiar. You'll primarily be using the "Explore" tab to create custom "Free form" explorations which you can then save as reports.

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1. Recreate the Classic "Landing Page" Report

For most marketers, the inability to quickly see which landing pages are performing best is one of GA4's biggest oversights. Here's how to build your own definitive Landing Page report.

  1. Go to the Explore tab in the left-hand navigation.
  2. Start a new exploration by clicking on the Free form blank template.
  3. Give your exploration a name, like "Landing Page Report."
  4. In the Variables column on the left, you'll need to import the Dimensions and Metrics you'll use.
  5. Now, do the same for Metrics.
  6. Now, build the table. In the Tab Settings column, drag "Landing page + query string" from your Variables into the Rows section.
  7. Drag all the Metrics you imported from Variables into the Values section.
  8. Your report will now populate in the main window! You can resize columns and sort by your preferred metric, just like you could in UA. Be sure to save this report by clicking the save icon in the top right.

2. Rebuild the "All Pages" Report

Similar to landing pages, seeing a simple list of your most popular pages is a daily requirement. While a version of this exists, creating your own offers more flexibility.

  1. Start another new Free form exploration in the Explore section.
  2. Name it something like "All Pages Performance."
  3. In the Variables column, add your Dimensions. Click the "+" and search for and import "Page path and screen class" (to see the URL slug) and/or "Page title and screen class" (to see the page's title tag).
  4. For Metrics, import useful engagement stats like Views, Total users, Average engagement time, and Conversions.
  5. In the Tab Settings column, drag your chosen Page dimension (e.g., "Page path and screen class") into the Rows field.
  6. Drag your chosen Metrics into the Values field.
  7. You'll now have a clean, familiar table showing your top pages. You can sort by views to immediately see your most popular content.

3. Find the Source / Medium Report

Fortunately, GA4 has a traffic acquisition report that is very similar to UA's classic Source / Medium report. You just need to know where to find it and how to adjust it.

  1. Go to Reports > Acquisition > Traffic acquisition.
  2. By default, the table's primary dimension is set to "Session default channel grouping." This is a broad overview.
  3. To see the Source/Medium detail, simply click the drop-down arrow on "Session default channel grouping" and select Session source / medium.
  4. The report will refresh, showing you the familiar data, such as google / organic, facebook.com / referral, etc. You can sort this table by Users, Sessions, or Conversions to quickly analyze channel performance.

The Final Touch: Add Your New Reports to the Main Navigation

This is the step that ties it all together and truly makes GA4 feel like your own. Instead of having to navigate to the "Explore" section every time, you can add your custom-built reports directly to the main Reports menu on the left.

  1. In the main Reports tab, look for Library at the very bottom of the menu. Click it.
  2. You'll see your saved Explanations listed under "Reports." Find the Landing Page and All Pages reports you just built.
  3. Let's create a new section for them. Under Collections, click Create new collection.
  4. Choose a Blank template. Name your collection something intuitive, like "My Custom Reports" or "UA Favorites."
  5. On the left, you can drag and drop reports into your new collection. Find the Landing Page and All Pages reports you saved and drag them in.
  6. Once you're happy, click Save.
  7. Back in the Library view, find your newly created collection and click the three-dot menu on the card. Select Publish.

And that's it! Refresh your page, and you will now see "My Custom Reports" (or whatever you named it) in your main navigation, with one-click access to the reports you know and use every day.

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Final Thoughts

You can't go back to the classic Google Analytics, but you can definitely tame the GA4 beast. By recreating your most essential reports and organizing the navigation to fit your workflow, you can spend less time fighting with the tool and more time focused on the marketing insights that actually drive growth.

We built Graphed because we believe getting those insights shouldn't require this much manual setup or a deep understanding of data analytics tools. Instead of wrestling with explorers and custom reports in GA4, we allow you to simply connect your account and ask questions in plain English. Want to see your top landing pages? Just ask, "Show me my top 10 landing pages by conversions this month," and Graphed instantly builds the report for you, pulling live data. It eliminates the steep learning curve and helps you and your team get answers in seconds, not hours.

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