To exclude users from your funnel who performed a specific event (the 3rd event) at any time during the session—not just between the funnel steps—you should use a cohort filter rather than an exclusion step.
Exclusion steps in Mixpanel only exclude users who perform the specified event between certain funnel steps, not at any time during the session or their history. As stated in the documentation:
A user will qualify for each step in the funnel until they track the exclusion step. This means users who tracked the exclusion step are still able to enter the funnel and convert through steps. Use a cohort filter if you want users who did a particular event at any point excluded from entering the funnel.
Funnels Advanced Concepts: Exclusion Steps
Recommended approach:
1. Create a cohort of users who have performed the 3rd event at any time (or within the session, if you can define that in your cohort logic).
2. Apply a cohort filter to your funnel to exclude these users.
This will ensure that your funnel only includes users who have never performed the 3rd event (in the defined time/session scope), which should match your expectation and likely omit more users than the exclusion step alone.
If you need to be session-specific, ensure your cohort logic is scoped to the session, if possible.
Summary:
- Exclusion steps only work between funnel steps.
- To exclude users who did an event at any time, use a cohort filter instead.
For more details, see the documentation on Exclusion Steps.
