GA4 BigQuery Tutorial (Part 1) - How to circumvent the Looker Studio API limits

[@florianschoel1588]

Thank you for your time: To record the video first of all. I have a question: Custom Dimensions I set in GA4 -> Where do I find those in BigQuery? Moreover which dimension do i need to pull into lookerstudio. I cant find the dimension by name of my Custom Dimension that I set in GA4... Any ideas?

[@DataDrivenU]

the event_params.key holds all the params (default and custom) sent alongside your events.. when you UNNEST make sure to find the proper value column (integer, string etc...)

[@ryanwanx]

Do you think that is the most efficient? I know queries can be run within BQ, but also run AFTER within Looker Studio. What your thoughts? Better to run queries within the cloud, or after connected to LS?

[@DataDrivenU]

Great question Ryan - running the Looker studio queries doesn't give you as much control over incurring costs in BQ because you don't see good ole "This query will process xyz MB when run". The other thing you might wanna take into consideration is whether reports in Looker are for analyzing or presentational purposes - the former implies more data slicing i.e. running more queries, whereas the latter can rely on a single BQ query/table export most of the times.

[@ryanwanx]

@@DataDrivenU Thanks for the response. I think the challenge for me, is deciding whether queries to stay/run in BQ or LS. The idea that all query related things stay in BQ is favourable, plus the advantage of being much quicker. Dashboards are more for presentations.