URL reports

The Google Ads API implementation of URL reports avoids ambiguity that occurred with aggregation in the FINAL_URL_REPORT in the AdWords API. The presentation in the Google Ads API is consistent with the UI and provides output related only to served ads.

Definitions

Final URL: The URL of the page that people reach when they click on your ad. The final URL isn't displayed on your ad.
Display URL: The URL displayed on your ad.
Unexpanded URL: The URL of the landing page. This is where people end up after clicking your ad and is usually the same as the final URL.
Expanded URL: The URL that people reach after contextual substitutions have been made and custom parameters have been added to the unexpanded URL.These can include keyword insertion, value tracking parameters, platform insertion, and more.

AdWords definitions

Final URL: The landing page for your ad, keyword, or sitelink. This must be what the user ultimately sees in the browser bar after clicking an ad.

See AdWords Final URLs.

Effective Final URL: The actual click URL that will serve, built from the tracking template with the final URL and custom parameters.

Google Ads definitions

Unexpanded Final URL: The advertiser-specified final URL for served ads.
Expanded Final URL: The final URL that clicks are directed to from served ads.

What has changed

AdWords has the following reports

Landing Page Report for unexpanded and expanded final URLs that served in ads.
Final URL Report for effective URLs. This includes all statistics aggregated at the _current _effective final URL level, one row per effective final URL.

In AdWords, the Final URL Report aggregates statistics for the effective final URL based on current settings and criteria, which may differ from the URLs that served in ads.

Google Ads has the corresponding views

Landing Page View for unexpanded URLs that served in ads.
Expanded Landing Page View for expanded URLs that served in ads.

Consult our Migration Guide for the Landing Page Report. It maps the fields from the Landing Page Report to the Google Ads fields.

Avoid mixing data by migrating to Google Ads API

The AdWords Final URL Report may obtain results that mix historical statistics with those of the current effective URL. To avoid this, migrate to Google Ads.

For example, the following AdWords API query reports the current URL attributes and historical stats.

SELECT
  Impressions,
  EffectiveFinalUrl,
  AdGroupStatus
FROM FINAL_URL_REPORT

If you have the following final URL as of 2021-01-01

https://www.examples.com/apples

and obtain the following output

Date         Impressions EffectiveFinalUrl ...
2021-01-01   50          https://www.examples.com/apples

then change the ad to have the following Final URL

https://www.examples.com/oranges

and run the report again before any ads have served on the oranges URL, you get the following output.

Date         Impressions EffectiveFinalUrl ...
2021-01-01   50          https://www.examples.com/oranges

This is misleading because the ads actually served on 2021-01-01 with the apples URL.

The Google Ads API Landing Page View and Expanded Landing Page View do not mix these statistics. They return the final URLs that served along with each historical impression.

SELECT
  landing_page_view.unexpanded_final_url,
  metrics.impressions,
  ad_group.status,
  ad_group.final_url_suffix
FROM landing_page_view

Check your current URL settings

To avoid mixing in historical data, retrieve the final URL attributes from ad_group_ad or ad_group_criterion.

SELECT
  /* tracking URL templates */
  customer.tracking_url_template,
  campaign.tracking_url_template,
  ad_group.tracking_url_template,
  ad_group_criterion.tracking_url_template,
  /* URL custom params */
  campaign.url_custom_parameters,
  ad_group.url_custom_parameters,
  ad_group_criterion.url_custom_parameters,
  /* final URL suffixes */
  customer.final_url_suffix,
  campaign.final_url_suffix,
  ad_group.final_url_suffix,
  ad_group_criterion.final_url_suffix,
  /* final URL */
  ad_group_criterion.final_urls
FROM ad_group_criterion

We suggest you do the following to get used to retrieving final URL data

Go to Reports.
Expand the Query Builder menu choice on the left.
Select Landing Page View or AdGroupCriterion and build a query.

Query migration tool

Migrating AdWords API services