Understanding Session Start, End, and Expire Definitions
What's the definition of event "Session Start", "Session End", and "Session Expire"
What's the definition of event "Session Start", "Session End", and "Session Expire"
Hi Yanisa S., Please stand by as I search the Mixpanel knowledge base for an AI-powered answer. I normally take about 15 seconds or so. In case AI cannot answer your question, feel free to reach out to Mixpanel support at mixpanel.com/get-support. If you have follow-up questions for this thread, please tag me again with your question: @kapa.ai <follow-up question> 👋
Feel free to ask a follow-up question once I've answered by mentioning me with @kapa.ai
Here’s what the docs say about these session events in Mixpanel:
Session Start
- A virtual event that marks the beginning of a session.
- When it fires depends on your session configuration:
- Timeout-based (default): First non-excluded event by a user starts a session. [Sessions overview]
- Event-based: Session starts when the configured “Session Start” event (e.g. Login) occurs. [Event-based sessions]
- Property-based: Session starts when an event with a new session_id value appears. [Property-based sessions]
Session End
- A virtual event that marks the end of a session.
- When it fires depends on configuration:
- Timeout-based: When the user has no events for at least the configured timeout; the end time is the timestamp of the last event before inactivity. [Session deep-dive; Timeout examples]
- Event-based: When the configured “Session End” event (e.g. Logout) occurs. [Event-based sessions]
- Property-based: When the session_id value changes or when the day resets at midnight; the end time is the timestamp of the last event in that session. [Property-based sessions]
For both Session Start and Session End, Mixpanel also computes properties like Session Duration (Seconds), Session Event Count, Session Start Event Name, and Session End Event Name on these events. [Session properties; Reserved properties]
Session Expire
The provided knowledge sources do not mention an event or concept explicitly named “Session Expire”. They only describe how and when a session ends (and a Session End event is generated), including timeout-based expiry, but there is no separate “Session Expire” event documented. [Sessions overview; Session deep-dive]
So, based on the docs available, Mixpanel defines Session Start and Session End as above, but does not document a distinct Session Expire event.
kapa.ai is still learning and improving, please let me know how I did by reacting below.
ℹ️ Tip: Mention @kapa.ai in the thread for follow-ups or DM the app for 1-to-1 help.