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How comparison periods work in your metrics

How Comparison Periods Work in Metricool

Metricool explains how comparison periods are calculated and what percentage changes mean, so you can interpret your data accurately and understand trends in your social media performance.

Before diving in, it's important to know that the comparison logic is not the same in Analytics and in downloadable Reports:

In Analytics, the comparison always uses a period of equal duration (e.g., “Last 30 days” compares to the previous 30 days).
In Reports, when selecting a full month, the comparison is full month vs. previous full month, even if the months have different lengths.

With this distinction in mind, here’s how comparison periods work depending on your selection.

Reports

Full Months

When selecting a full month from the dropdown, Metricool automatically compares it to the previous full month.

Example: A report for May (31 days) compares to April (30 days).

Reports always compare full calendar months and do not match day counts.

Custom Ranges

When selecting a custom date range, Metricool compares it to the immediately previous range of equal duration.

Example: June 15 to July 14 (30 days) compares to May 16 to June 14 (30 days).

Analytics

Analytics filters (“Last 7 days”, “Last 30 days”, etc.) always compare with the exact previous days of the same duration.

This ensures equal-length comparisons in real time, while reports prioritize month-to-month comparisons.

Understanding Trends and Percentages

The arrows indicate whether your results have increased or decreased compared to the previous period.

Up arrow: growth
Down arrow: decrease

Hovering over a metric shows the exact breakdown:

Absolute value (e.g., +2026 followers)
Percentage (e.g., +1.80%)

This helps you quickly identify trends and understand how your performance evolved.

It is not possible to manually change the comparison period.

Advanced Custom Comparisons

For non-consecutive date comparisons (e.g., May 2024 vs. May 2023), we recommend our Looker Studio Connector (Advanced and Custom plans), which allows fully custom comparison periods.

Among its main options:

Compare your current range with the previous period (for example, last 30 days vs. previous 30 days).
Compare with the same period last year to detect seasonality.
Define a custom date range for both the current and comparison periods.
Apply it at the report, page, or chart level (e.g., scorecards, tables, or time series).

This allows you to create more flexible reports: quarter-to-quarter, year-to-year, or any specific combination of dates.

To learn how to configure these comparisons, see the official Looker Studio documentation here.

Updated on: 26/11/2025

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