The Breakdown section answers “where does this come from”: metrics laid out by the values of a chosen field — sources, campaigns, devices, pages. A row is a segment, a column is a metric.
What you see here
On the left is the breakdown column: the values of the field you laid the data out by. A row can
be expanded when a next level is set: its own values in the breakdown of the second field
appear beneath it — for example google » cpc » the campaign name. A chain can hold up to
five levels; the nesting is shown by indent and tone.
On the right are the metrics of the composition, one column per metric.
Special rows:
- Total — the value for the whole period across the whole table. This is a recalculation, not a sum of the rows: unique visits and rates lie when added up.
- Other · N — what did not make it into the shown top. This is the remainder from Total, not the sum of the hidden rows: base metrics are subtracted, derived ones (cost, conversion) are calculated again from the remainder — otherwise a row holding spend and leads would show dashes. Clicking the row loads the hidden segments of that parent.
- (not set) — a segment with no value for the field: the tag was not placed, the parameter did not arrive. The row is meaningful, not rubbish: often it is exactly what shows where the tagging is lost.
Set it up for your question
In the section toolbar:
- Breakdown — the levels of the chain. ＋ Level adds the next one, Remove level drops the selected one: it is pinned at the top of the list and does not scroll away. Any level can be removed except the last remaining one — without it there is no table. Fields are grouped the same way as the project’s field catalogue; from ten items a search appears.
- Metrics — the composition of the columns and the Heat map column.
- Period, Plan, Filter — as in the other sections. The plan here is one per table: targets are set for the project, not for a segment.
- View — how many rows to show, the Other row, pinning the totals, units, height, heat map, confidence.
- ··· — rename, duplicate, move, delete, Use report period.
Sorting is a click on the metric header. A click on the breakdown column sorts by the segment’s name. The order also affects the selection: the top-N is counted by the sorting metric, so “the first 25 rows” means the first 25 by the chosen metric, not a random 25.
How many rows to show applies to every level of the chain at once. Everything that does not fit is folded into “Other” — at its own level and under its own parent.
The levels you expanded are remembered by the browser, not by the report: the path
google » cpc » brand may no longer exist tomorrow, while the report’s settings are shared by
everyone who opens it. The composition, the breakdown, the period and the filter, on the
contrary, are stored in the report.
Which fields are missing from the level list
The list holds the fields of the project catalogue that have breakdown enabled. CRM fields (manager, stage, status) do not get in: in the data they are identifiers, and the rows would be numbers. A field enabled in the catalogue appears in the list on its own, without our involvement.
How to read it
The heat map runs down the column — segments are compared with each other inside one level, and children have their own scale inside their parent. The Total and Other rows stay out of the scale. For metrics where less is better the scale is inverted; a zero in a derived metric is not coloured — it means “there were no leads”, not “cheap”.
A parent does not equal the sum of its children. KO calculates each level as a separate run, because unique visits and rates do not add up from children. If the sum of the visible children is less than the parent, the rest is in that parent’s “Other”.
A tilde and a dot next to a number — an approximate value and a small sample; the rules are the same in every section (covered in the Metrics section overview).
Project segments appear in the filter after a recalculation: until the report’s data is marked with them, a filter by segment would give an empty table, and KO warns about that instead of showing emptiness.
If there are no numbers
- Nothing to break this field down by — there is not a single value of the chosen level for the period. Change the level or take a longer period.
- No data for this period — the whole section is empty: check the period and the filter.
- The “(not set)” row takes up nearly everything — the data arrives untagged. That is a question about the tags in your links and about source setup, not about the report: start with website tracking.
What’s next to this
- How a report works — the report’s period and filter, from which the section takes its defaults.
- The Plan vs actual section — the same metrics by period rather than by segment.