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Events

Last updated: September 24, 2026.

An event is a saved rule for where a study appears. You describe a page once — say, anywhere under /checkout — give it a name, and every study that should run on that page selects it by name instead of restating the rule. Events live in the Events page and belong to the workspace, so the whole team writes the same rule the same way.

Today an event matches on the page URL. A visitor "triggers" the event by being on a page whose path matches its rule, and any study using that event shows its invite there.

Events need the snippet installed. Without it Palette never sees the page the visitor is on, so nothing can match.

How matching works

An event is an operator plus a path:

  • Exactly matches /pricing — that page and no other.
  • Starts with /checkout — /checkout, /checkout/payment, /checkout/confirm.
  • Contains /settings — any path with that fragment anywhere in it, including /workspace/settings/keys.
  • Ends with /invite — any path finishing there, whatever precedes it.

Palette stores the path only. Paste a full URL and the origin, query string, and fragment are stripped before it is saved: https://app.example.com/billing?plan=pro#seats becomes /billing. Matching compares paths for the same reason, so a visitor on /billing?plan=pro still matches /billing.

Two consequences worth knowing:

  • One event covers every environment. Because the origin is dropped, the same event matches your production site, your staging site, and localhost. You never write the domain, and you never need a second event for it.
  • Wildcards are rejected. /blog/* is not a rule — the operator is the wildcard. Use Starts with /blog instead. Paths cannot contain spaces, and the compiled rule is capped at 512 characters.

Rather than reason about it, use Test your event on the event itself: paste any URL and Palette tells you whether it matches, using the same rule the snippet will.

When to use one

Use an event whenever a study should appear somewhere specific rather than everywhere — on the pricing page, inside checkout, after an invite is sent. A study with no event shows its invite on All pages.

The reason to save it as an event rather than describe the page inside one study is reuse. Six studies about checkout all point at one rule; correcting that rule once corrects the reading of the page everywhere, and a teammate composing the seventh study picks the same page you did rather than typing a slightly different path. It is also what lets Palette suggest a page for you — see the description below.

Setting one up

Creating and editing events needs workspace owner or member access.

  1. Open Events and choose New event.
  2. Give it a display name. Names are unique per workspace and are what everyone selects it by, so name the page rather than the study: Checkout, not Checkout abandonment study.
  3. Write a description. Palette reads this when recommending an event for a study, so say when a study should use it — "any step of the paid checkout flow" — rather than restating the path.
  4. Choose the URL match operator and enter the page URL or path.
  5. Open Test your event, paste a real URL from your site, and confirm it matches before saving.

You can also create one without leaving a study: the Trigger picker in the study composer has a New event button, and the event you create there is saved to the workspace like any other.

Using an event in a study

In the study composer, open Trigger and pick the event. Selecting it copies the event's compiled rule into that study; the snippet receives the rule itself and never learns the event's name or id.

Because the rule is copied at the moment you select it, editing the event afterwards does not silently change a study that already selected it. If the event has changed since, Palette refuses to launch and asks you to select the current version — which is the point at which you decide whether the study still wants the new rule.

Locked rules

The first time a live study uses an event, its rule locks. The event shows Rule locked and the operator and path become read-only; the name and description stay editable.

This is deliberate. A live study is collecting responses against a page, and changing the page underneath it would silently change what the study is about — with responses on both sides of the edit and no way to tell them apart afterwards.

To run a study against a different rule, create a new event with the rule you need. The locked event can still be renamed or given a clearer description.

Deleting an event

Delete permanently removes an event from the workspace, so it cannot be selected by new studies. Before you confirm, Palette shows how many studies currently reference it.

Studies that already selected the event keep the exact targeting rule they copied at selection time. This includes live studies: deleting the reusable event neither stops them nor changes where their invite appears. Their study editor continues to show the saved event details as a deleted source until you intentionally choose another event or All pages.