Session Manual Creative Format and the Newer GA4 UTM Parameters

Session manual creative format is the GA4 dimension for the value you put in utm_creative_format. It sits beside Session manual source platform (utm_source_platform) and Session manual marketing tactic (utm_marketing_tactic). Google's documentation disagrees with itself about these parameters. Its URL-builder article says utm_creative_format and utm_marketing_tactic "isn't currently reported in Google Analytics properties." Meanwhile, the Data API and BigQuery export schemas list fields for all three. The short version: utm_source_platform is documented consistently everywhere. Treat creative format and marketing tactic as optional extras that Google may not show you in reports.

This guide builds a status table for October 2026 using only Google's own documentation. It quotes the places where those pages contradict each other and gives a cautious way to use the parameters. UTMCraft has not tested this behavior in a GA4 property. Everything below comes from Google's published docs, and each claim links to its source.

2026 status at a glance

This table shows what each Google source lists for each parameter as of October 12, 2026. "Listed" means the documentation names the field. It does not guarantee that your property shows values in it.

Sources: URL builders, Traffic-source dimensions, manual tagging, and auto-tagging, Dimensions & metrics reference, Data API schema, BigQuery Export schema.

What each parameter is for

GA4 recognizes nine manual campaign parameters. The core set is covered in our UTM parameters guide. The three below are newer and less widely known. Google's URL builder article defines them as follows.

utm_source_platform

Google defines it as "The platform responsible for directing traffic to a given Analytics property (such as a buying platform that sets budgets and targeting criteria or a platform that manages organic traffic data)." Google's examples are "Search Ads 360 or Display & Video 360."

Put another way, utm_source says where the click came from (facebook, newsletter). utm_source_platform says which system bought or managed that traffic. One buying platform can send traffic from many sources.

utm_creative_format

Google defines it as "Type of creative, for example: display, native, video, search." This is the format of the ad, not the specific creative. The specific creative or link variant still belongs in utm_content.

utm_marketing_tactic

Google defines it as "Targeting criteria applied to a campaign, for example: remarketing, prospecting." It describes who you targeted, not which channel or creative you used.

What Google's documentation says, and where it disagrees

You will find conflicting answers about these parameters online because Google's own pages conflict. Here is what each page says.

The "not currently reported" notes

The URL builders article has two separate notes:

• "utm_creative_format isn't currently reported in Google Analytics properties."
• "utm_marketing_tactic isn't currently reported in Google Analytics properties."

The traffic-source dimensions article repeats this: "The utm_creative_format and utm_marketing_tactic parameters are not currently reported in Google Analytics properties." Neither note covers utm_source_platform.

The schema pages list the fields anyway

• The Dimensions & metrics reference lists Session manual creative format under Traffic source: "The manual Creative Format that led to the session. Identifies the creative format used in the ad. Populated by utm_creative_format URL parameter." It also lists First user manual creative format and Manual creative format (Attribution, event scope). We found no marketing tactic dimension in that reference.
• The Data API schema lists sessionManualCreativeFormat and sessionManualMarketingTactic. The second is described as "The manual Marketing Tactic that led to the session... Populated by utm_marketing_tactic URL parameter." It also lists their first-user and event-scoped versions.
• The BigQuery Export schema has manual_creative_format and manual_marketing_tactic fields in collected_traffic_source ("collected with the event") and in session_traffic_source_last_click.manual_campaign.

Naming inconsistencies to watch for

• The traffic-source article calls the dimensions "Creative format / Session creative format / First user creative format". The Dimensions reference and the Data API use "manual" in the name (Session manual creative format). In the GA4 dimension picker, search for "creative format" so that either naming turns up.
• In the Dimensions reference, several of these rows also say "Populate this dimension by manually tagging the destination URLs in your ads with the utm_content parameter." That sentence contradicts the same row's "Populated by utm_creative_format URL parameter" and looks like a copy-paste error. Use the parameter-specific line. utm_content fills Session manual ad content, not creative format.

Which GA4 dimensions each parameter populates

GA4 offers each manual campaign dimension at three scopes. Google's scopes article explains them. User-scoped ("First user") dimensions "show you where your new users are coming from". Session-scoped dimensions "show you where both new and returning users are coming from when they start new sessions". Event-scoped dimensions (no prefix) "help you attribute credit for a key event."

The UI names for marketing tactic in this table come from the Data API schema, because the UI dimension reference does not list them. The same scope logic applies to the older manual dimensions. Our guide to finding utm_content and utm_term in GA4 walks through it with Session manual ad content and Session manual term.

Session manual source platform vs Session source platform

These are two different dimensions. Session source platform is a cross-channel dimension. The reference says the attribution version, Source platform, shows "the platform where you manage buying activity," and gives example values such as Google Ads, Manual, SA360, SFMC and Shopping Free Listings. The Data API adds a warning: "Don't depend on this field returning Manual for traffic that uses UTMs; this field will update from returning Manual to returning (not set) for an upcoming feature launch."

Session manual source platform is the dimension that shows your own utm_source_platform value. Google's docs do not say whether your UTM value also flows into the cross-channel Session source platform. To read what you tagged, use the "manual" dimension.

BigQuery export fields

If you export GA4 to BigQuery, the export schema lists two places to find these values:

• collected_traffic_source holds the raw values "collected with the event": manual_source_platform, manual_creative_format and manual_marketing_tactic.
• session_traffic_source_last_click.manual_campaign holds the last-click attributed session values: source_platform, creative_format and marketing_tactic.

The user-level traffic_source record only documents name, medium and source. It has no field for these three parameters.

This query checks whether any values are arriving. It does not prove that GA4 reports them anywhere else. Replace the project and dataset names with your own.

SELECT
  collected_traffic_source.manual_source_platform,
  collected_traffic_source.manual_creative_format,
  collected_traffic_source.manual_marketing_tactic,
  COUNT(*) AS events
FROM `your-project.analytics_123456789.events_*`
WHERE _TABLE_SUFFIX BETWEEN '20261001' AND '20261011'
  AND collected_traffic_source.manual_creative_format IS NOT NULL
GROUP BY 1, 2, 3
ORDER BY events DESC;

How to view Session manual creative format in GA4

Google's dimension reference lists Session manual creative format as a Traffic source dimension. It does not say which standard reports offer it as a primary dimension, so a free-form exploration is the most dependable place to look. The steps below follow Google's Explorations instructions.

1. Send at least one test visit through a link that includes utm_creative_format, along with utm_source, utm_medium and utm_campaign. Data takes time to process, so check after a day, not straight away.
2. Click Explore in the left navigation and open a blank free-form exploration.
3. In Variables, click + next to DIMENSIONS. Search for "creative format", select Session manual creative format, and click IMPORT. Import Session manual source / medium or Session manual campaign name too, for context.
4. Click + next to METRICS and import Sessions, plus any key event metric you care about.
5. Double-click the dimension to add it to ROWS, and double-click the metric to add it to VALUES. In Google's words, "double-clicking a dimension applies it to the ROWS section of a free form exploration."
6. Set a date range that covers your tagged traffic.

There are three possible results:

• You see your values (for example video, display). The dimension is populated for your property, and you can use it with the cautions in this guide.
• Everything shows (not set), or no rows appear even though the tagged visits are in Session manual campaign name. That matches Google's "not currently reported" note. Fall back to BigQuery, or keep format in your naming convention.
• The dimension is not in the picker. The docs do not guarantee UI availability for every property. Use the Data API (sessionManualCreativeFormat) or BigQuery instead.

For Session manual marketing tactic, Google's UI dimension reference has no entry. You may not find it in Explorations. The Data API name sessionManualMarketingTactic and the BigQuery fields are the documented ways to reach it.

How they differ from source, medium and campaign

Channel grouping depends mainly on source and medium, as covered in our default channel grouping reference. None of the three newer parameters fixes a wrong medium. They add descriptive detail on top of a correct core set. See the complete GA4 UTM parameters guide for how all nine parameters fit together.

Should you use them?

Use utm_source_platform when you can

Google's own advice leans toward it. Both the URL builders and traffic-source articles say: "If you're setting one UTM parameter, we strongly recommend that you set all relevant UTM parameters, especially utm_source, utm_medium, utm_campaign, utm_id, and utm_source_platform. Missing UTM parameters will result in (not set) values being present in reporting." The parameter is most useful when several buying tools send traffic through the same source. One example is Meta traffic bought directly and also through a reseller platform.

Creative format and marketing tactic: optional, low risk

These two are worth adding when all of the following are true:

• You export to BigQuery, or you have confirmed that the dimension fills in your property.
• You want to compare formats or tactics across campaigns without parsing campaign names.
• Your team will use a fixed vocabulary consistently.

Skip them, or keep the information in utm_campaign or utm_content as well, when:

• Your reporting runs only in standard GA4 reports or Looker Studio on top of them.
• Your links are already long and get shared by hand.
• Nobody owns the vocabulary, so values will drift.

Google's docs do not say that extra UTM parameters harm the core ones. Even so, every extra parameter is one more thing to keep consistent.

Naming suggestions

Google's URL builder article points out that values are case sensitive ("utm_source=google is different from utm_source=Google") and recommends lowercase. Apply the same rule here and pick from a short, approved list. The values below are suggestions, not a Google standard. Google's own examples are "display, native, video, search" for creative format and "remarketing, prospecting" for marketing tactic.

Write the list into your UTM naming conventions document so everyone tags the same way. A complete link looks like this:

https://www.example.com/spring/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=paid_social&utm_campaign=spring_sale_2026&utm_id=ss26&utm_source_platform=meta_ads&utm_creative_format=video&utm_marketing_tactic=prospecting

Adding them to links with UTMCraft

The UTMCraft builder does not have dedicated fields for these three parameters yet. Its custom-parameter fields under Advanced are meant for non-UTM keys and reject names that start with utm_, so build the core link first, then append &utm_source_platform=… (and the other two, if you use them) to the finished URL with lowercase values from your approved list. Paste the result into the UTM checker to confirm every parameter appears exactly once.

To sum up: tag utm_source_platform as part of your standard set. Add creative format and marketing tactic only where you can confirm the values, and use them as extra detail, not as the only place that information is recorded.

For the broader setup, read Complete UTM Parameters Guide for GA4: Manual Campaign Dimensions & Best Practices. Browse the UTM Parameters guides to choose another troubleshooting task.