Funnel (legacy) report types

You can create and add funnel reports to your dashboard to monitor your sales and marketing team's progress. Default funnel reports will have a default funnel type.

Please note: your HubSpot account requires certain subscriptions to build custom funnel reports and select between funnel report types for a report. Otherwise, a default funnel report will have a default funnel type that cannot be changed.

Transition from legacy funnel reports to journey funnel reports

Your subscription will transition from the legacy funnel report builder to the new journey funnel report builder. You may notice differences in your data. Learn how the two report types differ and how these changes could impact your analysis.

Overview

Below are the four key changes that may impact your reporting data:

• Event ordering requirements
• Date range limitations
• Object creation time handling
• Merged contact processing

The following sections will cover these differences more thoroughly.

Event ordering requirements

Event ordering requirements will change in the following ways:

• Legacy funnel reports:
  • Events only need to occur within a specific date range.
  • There is no requirement for sequential ordering.
• Journey funnel reports:
  • Stage completion must follow a chronological order. 
  • Each subsequent stage must be completed after the previous one.

Example scenario for event ordering

Below is an example of the changes to event ordering for the transition from legacy funnel reports to journey funnel reports:

• Scenario A - Legacy funnel report: Out of order stage completion
  1. Four stages (S1-S4), One contact
  2. Contact completes stage in this order: S1 > S3 > S2 > S4
• Scenario B - Journey funnel report: Sequential stage completion 
  1. Four stages (S1-S4), One contact
  2. Contact completes stages sequentially: S1 > S2 > S3 > S4

The event ordering results are as follows:

• Scenario A - Legacy funnel report: Completed all four stages (S1, S2, S3, S4)
• Scenario B - Journey funnel report: Contact completed two stages (S1 and S2)

The difference between the two event ordering journeys are as follows:

• Scenario A - Legacy funnel report: Verified all stages were completed within the date range
• Scenario B - Journey funnel report: Found the longest path of sequentially completed steps 

Date range limitations

The following date range changes will apply:

• Legacy funnel reports:
  • No date range restrictions apply.
  • You can analyze data from any time period.
• Journey funnel reports:
  • There is a maximum five year look back period.
  • The range may be smaller for accounts with higher event volumes.

Example scenario for date range limitations

Below is an example of the changes to date ranges for the transition from legacy funnel reports to journey funnel reports:

• Scenario:
  1. Four stages (S1-S4), 2 contacts
  2. Report configured for All time in legacy funnel report
  3. Contact 1: Completed all stages in 2018
  4. Contact 2: Completed all stages in 2025
• Results for each report:
  • Legacy funnel report: two contacts completed all the stages
  • Journey funnel report: one contact completed all the stages. Only Contact 2 counts due to Contact 1's data exceeding the five year limit.

Object creation time handling

The following object creation time handling changes will apply:

• Legacy funnel reports: 
  • They use the createdate property value.
  • The property can be manually modified by users.
  • Filters are based on pipeline settings.
• Journey funnel reports:
  • They use the actual object creation timestamp in your account.
  • They do not use the manually modified createdate property value.
  • They more accurately represent when objects were truly created.

Example scenario of object creation time handling changes

Below is an example of the changes to object creation time handling for the transition from legacy funnel reports to journey funnel reports:

• Scenario
  • 2 stages: Created and Stage 1 (S1)
  • 1 contact created in 2022
  • S1 completed in 2023
  • createdate property manually changed to 2024
• Results
  • Report from 2023-2025:
    • Legacy funnel report: Contact completed both stages
    • Journey funnel report: Contact completed no stages. The creation event occurred before the report date range.
  • Report for 2022-2023:
    • Legacy funnel report: Contact completed no stages. The user modified the createdate property
    • Journey funnel report: Contact completed both stages. The user used the actual creation timestamp.
  • Report for 2022-2025:
    • Legacy funnel report: Contact completed both stages
    • Journey funnel report: Contact completed both stages

Merged contact processing

The following merged contact processing changes will apply:

• Legacy funnel reports:
  • They rely on contact properties that get reordered during merges.
  • They maintain forward lifecycle progression through property manipulation.
  • They may show contacts in funnels due to merge-induced property changes.
• Journey funnel reports:
  • They use original event timestamps without reordering.
  • They more accurately represent the actual customer journey.
  • The contacts may not appear if their real lifecycle events occurred outside the report date range.

Impact on data

You may see data discrepancies between legacy and journey funnel reports due to merged contacts. Unlike legacy funnel reports, journey funnel reports will not include contacts whose lifecycle events occurred outside the selected date range, even if they were previously included because of a property change from a merge. This change provides a more accurate view of customer journeys, though it may result in lower conversion numbers.

HubSpot automatically handles contact merges to protect data integrity. For lifecycle stages specifically, HubSpot uses predefined behavior to prevent backwards progression in contact histories. It's designed to minimize manual work while maintaining data accuracy.

Understanding your data differences

If you notice differences between your legacy and journey funnel reports, note that journey funnel reports provide a more accurate representation of your customers' actual journeys. The changes in event ordering, date ranges, creation time handling, and merged contact processing are designed to give you better insights into your funnel performance.

Reasons for contact merging

Contact merging is common in HubSpot because customers often interact with your business through multiple touchpoints before becoming a contact in your CRM.

For example, someone might:

• Fill out a form on your website
• Subscribe to your newsletter
• Download a resource
• Attend a webinar
• Engage with your social media

Each of these interactions can create separate contact records in HubSpot. When HubSpot's duplicate detection identifies that these records belong to the same person, it merges them to create a single, comprehensive contact profile. This ensures you have a complete view of each customer's journey and prevents duplicate communications.

Learn more about record merging.

Contacts or deals that have gone through all stages

Example

The report below includes the All created contacts, Lead, Opportunity, and Customer funnel stages.

Assume a contact was created, became a lead, then became a customer without becoming an opportunity first. The report will only include that contact in the All created contacts and Lead stages, but not the Opportunity or Customer stages.

The contacts in the report will also change based on the time range you specify. For example, if you set the time range to last month:

• If a contact was created two months ago, then the report will not include that contact.
• If a contact was created two weeks ago, then became a lead a week later, the report will include that contact in the All created contacts  and Lead stages.

You will also see calculated next step conversion rates and cumulative conversion rates at each lifecycle stage.

• Next step conversion: the percentage of contacts moving from that stage to the next.
• Cumulative conversion: the percentage of contacts moving from the first stage to the next.