How-Tos
October 23, 2024
Thomas Bosilevac

How to create and use date filters on a group of Google Data Studio reports

Understanding the performance of your data over a series of time is pretty much the most popular way we look at out Web Analytics, and most other digital data as well. Google Data Studio has many ways to slice and dice by date, check them out here.

How to create a Date Filter for a select group of reports within Google Data Studio

In many of our Google Data Studio templates, we have a set of key metrics at the top of the page, usually showing both a % change and longer-term trend.  Below we show a few other more static table views.  When first loaded, these follow the default data range.  However, 97% of your clients or team members will ask for the data daily, weekly, last month, this month ....

How can I allow my users to get weekly, daily, monthly, any data range in my Data Studio report?

You will never make everyone happy all the time - so make your reporting more self-serve.  Here is how to provide a nice Dashboard while also allowing users to slice and dice data.

Step 1 - Group desired Reports together

Highlight of Date Range selection in Google Data Studio
  1. Create Group by selecting more than one report (by holding down the CTRL button and clicking on reports), including the date range
  2. Right Click and select Group

Step 2 - Set Group Defaults

Highlight of Date Range selection in Google Data Studio
  1. Make sure a data source is selected
  2. Make sure a default date range is selected

Step 3 - Change all reports to AUTO date range

Highlight of Date Range selection in Google Data Studio
  1. Click on a single report
  2. Make sure the date range is on Auto
  3. OPTIONAL: The report can still be used as a filter for other reports

Step 4 - Go to View Mode to test out

Highlight of Date Range selection in Google Data Studio
  1. Once complete, click on View on the upper right-hand side

Step 5 - Click Date Dropdown

Highlight of Date Range selection in Google Data Studio
  1. Click on the date filter

Step 6 - Apply Date Range

Highlight of Date Range selection in Google Data Studio
  1. Select from the list of ranges or use Custom
  2. Click Apply

View Data!

Highlight of Date Range selection in Google Data Studio

Select and View any date range you want!What functionality do you put in your dashboards to make them more accessible?  Please leave a comment here and follow us on Linkedin and Twitter!