Tracking traffic from AI tools such as ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, and Gemini in Google Analytics has become critically important. By default, this traffic is often misclassified: it may appear under “Referral” or even be grouped as “Direct,” making it difficult to accurately analyze user sources and assess the impact of AI on audience acquisition.
With the growing popularity of AI tools as a traffic source, ignoring this channel leads to distorted analytics. You miss the true picture of your traffic, underestimate content performance, and lose the opportunity to optimize pages for new types of search behavior.
To properly track website visits by traffic source, here is a guide on how to create a dedicated channel for accurate AI traffic tracking and obtain more reliable data in your reports.
Step 1: Create a new channel group
- Go to Administrator (gear icon at the bottom left).
- In the View Data column, select Channel Groups.
- Click the three dots next to “Default Channel Group” and select Create a copy (this will keep all the default rules and just add a new one).
- Name the new group, for example, Custom AI Grouping .
Step 2: Adding an AI Traffic Channel
Inside the new group settings:
- Click Add New Channel .
- Channel name: AI Traffic .
- Setting up conditions:
- Select the option: Session source .
- Match type: Matches regex.
- Value (copy this list of relevant domains):
chatgpt\.com|chat\.openai\.com|perplexity\.ai|claude\.ai|gemini\.google\.com|copilot\.microsoft\.com|bing\.com\/chat|poe\.com|deepseek\.com|grok\.com
- Click Apply Channel .
Step 3: Setting Priority
This is the most important step. GA4 checks conditions from top to bottom. If your AI add-on is below the “Referral” rule, traffic will go to referrals before reaching the AI rule.
- In the list of channels, find your new AI Traffic channel .
- Drag it up , above the Referral and Organic Search channels.
- Click Save Group .
Step 4: How to view reports
Now in standard reports (for example, Reports > Traffic Sources > Traffic Attraction ) you need to switch the main parameter:
- Click the arrow above the first column of the table (Default Channel Group for Session).
- Select your new group from the list – Custom AI Grouping.
- Now you will see a separate line for traffic from neural networks.
Tips
Historical data: The new set of channels will also apply to historical data, so you’ll immediately see trends from previous months.
Dark AI traffic: Keep in mind that mobile apps (such as the ChatGPT app on iOS/Android) often “truncate” the referrer, and such traffic ends up in Direct. It’s impossible to fully track it through the GA4 interface, but highlighting visible transitions will give you an understanding of the overall trend.
Regular expressions: The list of AI services is growing. Update your Regex once a quarter by adding new domains separated by a vertical bar |