The GA4 Landing Page Report: Where It Is and How to Use It
The Landing page report shows the first page of each session in GA4: the pages your search results, ads and emails send people to. This guide covers where to find it, what its dimension and metrics count, how to put it back in the menu, and how to customize it.
This guide is built from Google's Analytics Help article on the Landing page report, plus the Help pages on report navigation, detail report customization and filters linked below. Building your own free-form or path reports is covered in our explorations guide, and empty landing page rows are covered in our (not set) guide. This page is about the standard report: where it is, what it counts and how to make it answer real questions.
What the report shows
Google calls the Landing page report "a pre-made detail report" that "shows you the first page a visitor lands on when they visit your website and how many visitors land on each page." Each row is a page where sessions started, with engagement, user, key event and revenue numbers for those sessions.
That makes it different from the Pages and screens report, which counts every page view. A page can get plenty of views from people already on the site and still start very few sessions. The Landing page report shows the pages that make the first impression: the ones search results, ads, emails and social posts send people to.
Where to find it
Google's steps are short:
- Sign in to Google Analytics.
- From the left menu, select Reports.
- Click Engagement > Landing page.
If it is not there, Google says the report "may have been removed or isn't in your default view," and that Editors and above can add it back to the left navigation. The steps for that are further down.
The Landing page dimension
The report is built on one dimension. The Help article defines Landing page as "the page path and query string associated with the first pageview in a session." Its example: a visitor who lands on www.example.com/homepage1 shows up as /homepage1. The dimension is populated automatically, so there is nothing to set up beyond a working Google tag that sends page views.
Two details matter when you read it:
- Path and query string. Google's Data API schema lists two separate dimensions: landingPage, "the page path associated with the first pageview in a session," and landingPagePlusQueryString, "the page path + query string associated with the first pageview in a session." In the dimension picker they appear as Landing page and Landing page + query string. If campaign links or site search add parameters to your URLs, the query string version splits one page into many rows, so check which one your report uses before comparing numbers.
- It is session-scoped. Google's FAQ says the report shows "session-scoped dimensions", so a returning visitor who enters through a different page counts again: "if someone lands on page A in one session and then lands on page B in another session, then page A and B each have a visit." The same person can appear under several landing pages in one date range. Our users vs sessions guide explains why users and sessions in the same row tell different stories.
Because the value comes from the session's first page view, a session with no page view has no landing page. Those rows show as (not set); the causes and fixes are in our (not set) guide.
Metrics in the report
The default table has six metrics. Editors and Administrators can add or remove them.
| Metric | Google's definition, in short | What it needs |
|---|---|---|
| Sessions | "The number of sessions that began on your website or application" | Automatic |
| Active users | "The number of distinct users who visited your website or application" | Automatic |
| New users | Users who logged first_open or first_visit, i.e. first-time visitors | Automatic |
| Average engagement time per session | Average time the site was "in focus in a user's browser" per session | Automatic |
| Key events | "The number of times users triggered a key event" | Events marked as key events |
| Total revenue | Purchases, in-app purchases, subscriptions and ad revenue | Purchase events or ad revenue integrations |
Key events stay at zero until you mark events as key events; our key events guide covers that. Total revenue needs ecommerce purchase events, which our ecommerce tracking guide explains. For a lead-generation site, Sessions, Average engagement time and Key events are usually the three columns that matter; our engagement rate guide covers engagement metrics you can add.
Putting it back in the menu
Reports in GA4 live in a Library and appear in the left menu only when they belong to a published collection. According to Google's report navigation article, you add a report like this:
- In the left navigation, click Library (at the bottom). You must be an administrator or editor to see it.
- In the Reports section, find the report.
- In the Collections section, find the collection you want, for example Life cycle, and make sure it is published.
- Click Edit collection, drag the report from the card on the right under a topic, and click Save.
The limits in that article: up to 7 collections per property, 5 topics per collection and 10 reports per topic. If you only see a list of reports in the Library, Google says you have View permission and need the Editor role from a property admin. Our user permissions guide explains the roles.
Filters, secondary dimensions and saved changes
Narrowing to some pages
Google suggests a filter or the search bar above the table, for example searching "/store" to see pages that start with it. Report filters support exact matches, partial matches (contains, begins with, ends with and their negatives) and regular expressions. Partial matches and regex are case sensitive, and regex is limited to 250 characters. To keep a filter in the report for everyone, save it through customization, below.
Seeing where the traffic came from
The Help article gives two ways to see the traffic sources for each landing page:
- In the Landing page report, add the secondary dimension Session source / medium. This lists the sources for each landing page.
- In the Traffic acquisition report, set the primary dimension to Session source / medium and add Landing page + query string as the secondary dimension. This lists the landing pages for each source.
Use the session versions of source and medium here, not the First user ones. Google's article on traffic-source scopes says session-scoped dimensions get "new values" each time users return, which is what matches a session-scoped landing page. How sources group into channels is in our channel groups guide, and tagging campaign links in our UTM guide.
Saving a custom version
Editors and Administrators can change the report itself through the detail report customization panel (an icon in the top right of the report): add dimensions to the picker and set a default, add up to 12 metrics and set the default sort, save a report filter, and change or hide the two charts. Then click Save > Save changes to current report. Google allows up to 150 custom reports per property. A report based on a Google template stays linked and receives Google's updates; you can unlink it, but "Unlinked objects cannot be linked in the future."
Questions it answers
- Which pages bring people in? Sort by Sessions. The top rows are the first impression for most visitors and deserve the most care.
- Which entry pages hold attention? Compare Average engagement time per session across pages with similar traffic. A page that starts many sessions with little engagement is a candidate for a better headline, a faster load or a closer match to the ad or search result.
- Which entry pages lead to enquiries or sales? Add a key event column for your form or purchase and compare pages.
- Does organic search land where you expect? Filter or add Session source / medium. For the search queries behind each page, link Search Console; our Search Console integration guide covers its own landing page report.
- What do people do next? Google points to path exploration: choose the landing page as the starting point, and STEP +1 shows "the top 5 screens that your users viewed or events they triggered after that starting point."
How we use the report
This is our own practice, not Google guidance:
- We add Landing page + query string to the dimension picker but keep Landing page as the default, so campaign parameters do not split a page into many rows unless we ask for them.
- We add the site's main key event, such as a form submission, as a column and save the report, so nobody has to rebuild it each month.
- We read new landing pages against the landing page basics: one goal, a headline that matches the ad or search result, and a form people can finish.
- After a redesign or a new campaign, we compare the same pages before and after, with an annotation on the change date.
Frequently asked questions
Where is the landing page report in GA4?
Go to Reports, then Engagement > Landing page. If it is missing, an Editor or Administrator can add it back to a collection in the Library.
What is a landing page in Google Analytics 4?
It is the page of the first page view in a session. GA4 fills the Landing page dimension automatically from that page view.
Is the landing page report session-scoped or user-scoped?
Session-scoped. A person who enters through page A in one session and page B in another counts once for each page.
How do I see the traffic source for each landing page?
Add Session source / medium as a secondary dimension in the Landing page report, or use the Traffic acquisition report with Landing page + query string as the secondary dimension.
Why does my landing page report show (not set)?
The session had no page_view event, so there is no first page to report. Our (not set) guide covers the usual causes.
For more on measurement, see our guides to GA4 basics, the Realtime report, custom dimensions and monthly website reporting.