Drilling into custom fields in reports

Ref: D03 · Track: Admin & Reporting · Time to complete: ~5 min

Why this matters

Out of the box, Explore reports on standard fields (priority, status, group, channel). But most orgs add custom fields — product line, issue category, customer tier, root cause — and the real insight lives there. Getting custom fields into reports is a few clicks once you know how.

Custom fields in Zendesk — a quick recap

Custom ticket fields are added in Admin Center → Fields. Common types: - Drop-down — categorical (product = Core / Add-on / Integrations). - Checkbox — boolean (escalated = yes/no). - Text / numeric / date — open-ended. - Lookup — pointing to another object (user / org / custom object).

Each field has an admin name and a customer-facing label. Reports use the admin name.

Making a custom field available in Explore

Not every custom field is available by default. For drop-downs and checkboxes:

1. Admin Center → Ticket fields → open the field.
2. Check the box "Include in reports" (may be worded as "Available in Explore" depending on plan).
3. Save.

Give Explore 1–2 hours to sync. The field then appears in the attributes/metrics pickers.

Text/numeric custom fields usually reportable by default; some need explicit enabling.

Building a report segmented by a custom field

Say your custom field is Product, with values Core, Add-on, Integrations.

In Explore: 1. Open a Support dataset query. 2. Set Metric = Tickets (count). 3. Set Rows or Columns = Ticket custom field: Product. 4. Run.

Result: a table or bar chart showing ticket counts per product.

Add a date attribute for trend: Ticket created - date as Column → pivot showing product volume over time.

The common tile patterns

"Which product gets the most tickets"

• Metric: Tickets
• Attribute: Ticket custom field: Product
• Visualisation: Bar chart, descending.

"Resolution time by product"

• Metric: Full resolution time (median)
• Attribute: Ticket custom field: Product

"Root cause breakdown — last quarter"

• Metric: Tickets
• Attribute: Ticket custom field: Root cause
• Filter: Date range = last quarter, Status = Solved

"CSAT by product"

• Metric: Good satisfaction %, Bad satisfaction %
• Attribute: Ticket custom field: Product

Combining custom fields with standard ones

Explore lets you combine freely. Examples:

• Product × Priority — see if one product has a skew towards urgent tickets.
• Product × Group — confirm routing is correct (Billing product only reaches Billing group).
• Custom field × agent — individual agents' work distribution.

Two-dimensional pivots expose patterns a single filter can't.

Dashboards with custom field widgets

Once a query is useful, drop it on a dashboard (D02):

1. Open your dashboard.
2. Click Add widget → your saved custom query.
3. Resize and position.

Add filters to the dashboard so users can toggle product, date, etc., and all widgets refilter together.

Gotchas

• Include-in-reports isn't on by default. If a field isn't showing in Explore, start here.
• Renaming field values breaks historical data. Old tickets retain the original value; new ones get the new. Reports will show both unless you migrate. Avoid renaming — add new values and retire old instead.
• Deleting a custom field = historical data loss in reports. Archive or deactivate instead.
• Drop-down field options deserve care. Too many options makes reports noisy; too few loses signal. Aim for 5–10 per field.
• Lookup fields report differently. You can report on the referenced object's attributes (e.g. pull product name from a linked org record). Syntax varies.

A discipline: document your custom field schema

Keep a short doc listing: - Field name - Type - Purpose - Values (for drop-downs) - Who sets it (agent / trigger / customer) - Included in reports: yes/no - Last reviewed

Makes reporting requests much easier to fulfil accurately.

Quick check — have you got this?

• A new custom field isn't appearing in Explore. What's the first thing to check?
• You rename a drop-down value. What happens to historical tickets with that value?
• You want CSAT broken out by product. Which attributes and metrics?

Related articles

• D02 — Explore: the Support dashboard
• D04 — Scheduling and sharing dashboards