simulate-returning-user

Browses several pages in a row the way one person would, to check that PostHog still counts them as the same person all the way through instead of a new stranger on every page.

WHEN TO USE

SCOPE

USE FOR

Confirm the same distinct_id carries across every page view in one session.
Check that a $pageview event fires on every navigation, not only the first.
Reproduce a report of a session not stitching or events splitting across users.

This is a saved copy of the skill's SKILL.md instructions. It may differ from the upstream file or the version you install.

In this document (4)

Simulate returning-user traffic

Drives a single browser context across N page views (cookies and localStorage persist), navigating between pages and reporting which PostHog events fired. This matches the behavior of a single visitor browsing multiple pages on the same site.

When to use

Confirm that PostHog reuses the same distinct_id across page views in a session (no fresh anonymous IDs per page).
Confirm $pageview fires on every page view, not just the first.
Reproduce "session not stitching" or "events split across multiple users" reports.

How to invoke

Call the simulate_returning_user MCP tool with:

url (required) — the page to visit each iteration.
page_views (default 3) — number of page views in the session.
interval (default 5.0) — seconds between page views.
posthog_host (default https://us.i.posthog.com).

To exercise multi-page navigation, call the tool once per URL — the cookies won't carry across calls (each call is a separate Playwright context). For true multi-page browsing within one session, edit the URL list passed to the underlying CLI: traffic-sim returning-user --url A --url B --url C.

Interpreting the result

The structured response shape matches simulate_new_user. Key signals:

verified: true and pageviews >= page_views — the session works.
Same distinct_id across all pageviews (visible in PostHog UI under the run_id query param) — session stitching works.
Different distinct_id per visit — likely a cookie domain or storage-permissions issue. Inspect the raw posthog_requests for $session_id values to diagnose.

Install this skill from posthog/posthog on GitHub, not from a copy somewhere else. The command below does this for you.

Run this outside your AI tool, using Node.js 22.20.0 or newer. Skills CLI 1.7.2 skips skill selection; prompts cancel installation without an interactive terminal. If choosing Project when asked about installation scope, open your project's folder before running this.

Install checklist

Check selected tools if a picker appears; Claude Code may be unchecked under Additional agents. ↑/↓ moves, Space toggles selections, Enter confirms.
Without a tool picker, check Installing to: for your intended tool. Stop if it names a different tool.
If asked, choose Symlink (Recommended) for shared files or Copy to all agents for separate copies; review the summary before confirming installation.
Install the find-skills skill? defaults to Yes, adding another skill for all projects. Choose No if you don't want that extra installation.

Skills CLI 1.7.2 sends install data to skills.sh by default, including the source, skill names, target tools and file details; GitHub sources are reported only when GitHub confirms the repository is public, while other remote sources can also be reported. Confirmed-public GitHub sources also trigger a security-audit request. Before installing, set the environment variable DO_NOT_TRACK=1 or DISABLE_TELEMETRY=1 to disable both.

npx skills add posthog/posthog --skill "simulate-returning-user" --full-depth

After installing for Claude Code, open it in the installation project if you chose Project; Global makes the skill available across projects on this computer. Once Claude Code loads the skill, its description helps Claude decide when to use it.

If installation created a top-level skills folder that did not exist when your Claude Code session started, run /reload-skills in that session. Run it again after later changes in that folder.

View on GitHub

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Simulate returning-user traffic

When to use

How to invoke

Interpreting the result

MCP connection required

More skills

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depot-github-runners

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react-doctor

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