Managing Subscriptions

---
name: managing-subscriptions
description: 'Manage PostHog subscriptions — scheduled email, Slack, or webhook deliveries of insight or dashboard snapshots, optionally with an AI-written summary attached to each delivery. Use when the user wants to subscribe to an insight or dashboard, get an AI summary attached to those deliveries, check existing subscriptions, change delivery frequency, add or remove recipients, or stop receiving updates.'
---

# Managing subscriptions

This skill guides you through managing PostHog subscriptions.
Subscriptions deliver scheduled snapshots of insights or dashboards via email, Slack, or webhook.

## When to use this skill

Use this skill when the user:

- Wants to "track", "follow", "subscribe to", or "get updates" about an insight or dashboard
- Asks for "daily updates", "weekly reports", or "send me this every morning"
- Wants an **AI-written summary** attached to each delivery of an insight or dashboard (see step 6)
- Asks to "post", "send", or "share" the key numbers from an existing dashboard or insight to a channel on a schedule — even when phrased as "set up a scout/bot to post this daily" (a recurring message like this is usually a better fit for a dashboard/insight subscription than a Signals scout; when it's unclear which they want, confirm before building — see the happy path below)
- Wants to know what subscriptions they have
- Asks to stop, pause, or unsubscribe from something
- Wants to change who receives an update or how often

## Subscriptions vs alerts

Subscriptions and alerts serve different purposes:

- **Subscriptions** deliver a snapshot on a fixed schedule (daily, weekly, etc.) regardless of the data
- **Alerts** fire only when a condition is met (threshold crossed, anomaly detected)

If the user says "notify me when this drops below 100", use alerts.
If the user says "send me this every morning", use subscriptions.

## The happy path: recurring numbers from a dashboard or insight

When someone wants the **key numbers from an existing dashboard or insight** posted to a channel on a schedule — "post the top-line from this dashboard in #launch once a day", "send the team these metrics every morning", or even "set up a scout/bot to post this daily" — the right tool is a **dashboard (or insight) subscription**, and an AI summary is its natural companion:

- Set `dashboard` (or `insight`) and deliver to Slack or email. For a **dashboard** subscription, pick the tiles via `dashboard_export_insights` — that field is dashboard-only, and an insight subscription is rejected if you send it (an insight subscription needs no tile list).
- **Offer the AI summary, don't assume it.** Per step 6, ask before enabling it, then set `summary_enabled: true` once the user agrees — it has AI-consent, quota, and budget gates that can reject the create, so keep it opt-in.
- The attached **tile snapshots are exact**. The AI summary text is model-written, so treat any figure it quotes as approximate (the same drift caveat as a prompt subscription) and lean on the snapshot for exact numbers.

Usually a better fit than a **prompt subscription** (`creating-ai-subscription`) or a **Signals scout**.
A prompt subscription composes its own HogQL and can drift from the dashboard's numbers; a scout is for open-ended watching that decides what's worth surfacing, not scheduled delivery of a fixed, user-specified metric set.
Don't override a user who's certain they want one of those — but when the ask is ambiguous (e.g. "set up a scout to post this daily"), suggest the subscription and confirm before building: _"A dashboard subscription is a better fit for a recurring message. Want me to set that up?"_
Reach for a prompt subscription when the user specifically asks for a free-text AI report, or when no existing insight/dashboard covers the ask.

## Workflow

### Listing existing subscriptions

Before creating a new subscription, check if one already exists.

Use `subscriptions-list` with optional filters:

- Filter by insight: pass the `insight` query parameter with the insight ID
- Filter by dashboard: pass the `dashboard` query parameter with the dashboard ID
- Filter by channel: pass `target_type` as `email`, `slack`, or `webhook`

### Creating a subscription

#### Step 1: Ask the user how they want to receive it

**Always ask the user whether they want email or Slack delivery** before creating a subscription.
Do not assume a channel — ask explicitly:

> Would you like to receive this via **email** or **Slack**?

If the user says Slack, you must verify the integration is available (see step 2).
If the user doesn't have a preference, suggest email as the simplest option.

#### Step 2: Verify channel availability

**Email** requires no setup — it works out of the box. You just need the user's email address.
Get it from the user context or from `org-members-list`.

**Slack** requires a connected Slack integration. Before creating a Slack subscription:

1. Call `integrations-list` and look for an integration where `kind` is `"slack"`
2. If a Slack integration exists, note its `id` — you'll need it as `integration_id`
3. If **no Slack integration exists**, tell the user:
   > Slack isn't connected to this project yet. You can set it up in
   > [Project settings > Integrations](/settings/integrations).
   > In the meantime, would you like to receive this via email instead?

Slack setup requires an OAuth flow in the browser — it cannot be done via MCP.

**Webhook** requires the user to provide a URL. Verify it looks like a valid URL before submitting.

#### Step 3: Identify the target

Get the insight ID or dashboard ID. If the user provides a URL like `/project/2/insights/pKxzopBG`,
fetch the insight first with `insight-get` to get the numeric ID.

#### Step 4: Determine delivery settings from the user's request

| User says                               | Parameters                                                                |
| --------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| "every day" / "daily" / "every morning" | `frequency: "daily"`                                                      |
| "every week" / "weekly"                 | `frequency: "weekly"`                                                     |
| "every Monday"                          | `frequency: "weekly"`, `byweekday: ["monday"]`                            |
| "every month" / "monthly"               | `frequency: "monthly"`                                                    |
| "twice a week"                          | `frequency: "weekly"`, `interval: 1`, `byweekday: ["monday", "thursday"]` |

#### Step 5: Create with `subscriptions-create`

For an insight subscription via email:

```json
{
  "insight": 12345,
  "target_type": "email",
  "target_value": "user@example.com",
  "frequency": "daily",
  "start_date": "2025-01-01T09:00:00Z"
}
```

For a dashboard subscription (requires selecting which insights to include, max 10):

```json
{
  "dashboard": 67,
  "dashboard_export_insights": [101, 102, 103],
  "target_type": "email",
  "target_value": "user@example.com",
  "frequency": "weekly",
  "byweekday": ["monday"],
  "start_date": "2025-01-01T09:00:00Z"
}
```

For Slack delivery, include the `integration_id` from step 2:

```json
{
  "insight": 12345,
  "target_type": "slack",
  "target_value": "#general",
  "integration_id": 789,
  "frequency": "daily",
  "start_date": "2025-01-01T09:00:00Z"
}
```

#### Step 6 (optional): Attach an AI summary

For **insight and dashboard** subscriptions you can attach an AI-written summary to every
delivery — a short narrative that calls out what changed, outliers, and notable insights
alongside the snapshot. Set it at create time (or toggle later via `subscriptions-partial-update`):

- `summary_enabled: true` — turns on the per-delivery AI summary
- `summary_prompt_guide: "..."` — optional steer, e.g. "focus on sign-up conversion and any new drop-off points"

```json
{
  "dashboard": 67,
  "dashboard_export_insights": [101, 102, 103],
  "target_type": "email",
  "target_value": "user@example.com",
  "frequency": "weekly",
  "byweekday": ["monday"],
  "start_date": "2025-01-01T09:00:00Z",
  "summary_enabled": true,
  "summary_prompt_guide": "Call out outliers and new insights since last week"
}
```

Enabling a summary requires the organization to have **approved AI data processing**
(`Org settings → Data → AI data processing`) and to be within its active-summary cap and AI
credit budget; otherwise the create/update is rejected. `summary_enabled` does not apply to
prompt subscriptions — those are AI-generated by definition (see `creating-ai-subscription`).

### Updating a subscription

Use `subscriptions-partial-update` with the subscription ID. Common updates:

- **Change frequency**: `{"frequency": "weekly", "byweekday": ["monday"]}`
- **Add recipients**: Update `target_value` with the full comma-separated list
- **Change channel**: Update `target_type` and `target_value` together
- **Toggle the AI summary** (insight/dashboard subs): `{"summary_enabled": true, "summary_prompt_guide": "..."}` — same AI-data-processing and budget gates as step 6

### Deactivating a subscription

Subscriptions are soft-deleted. Use `subscriptions-partial-update`:

```json
{
  "id": 456,
  "deleted": true
}
```

## Defaults

When the user doesn't specify details:

- **Frequency**: `"daily"`
- **Channel**: email to the current user
- **Start date**: now (ISO 8601)
- **Title**: auto-generated from the insight/dashboard name if not specified

## Error handling

- **Duplicate check**: If a subscription already exists for the same insight/dashboard and channel, inform the user and offer to update it rather than creating a duplicate
- **Slack not connected**: If a Slack subscription is requested but no Slack integration exists, explain that Slack must be connected in [Project settings > Integrations](/settings/integrations) first, then offer email as an alternative. Do not attempt to create the subscription — it will fail with a validation error
- **Slack integration wrong team**: The Slack integration must belong to the same PostHog team. If `integrations-list` returns Slack integrations but creation still fails, the integration may be misconfigured
- **Dashboard insights**: Dashboard subscriptions require at least 1 and at most 10 insights selected via `dashboard_export_insights`. If the user doesn't specify which insights, fetch the dashboard with `dashboard-get` and select up to the first 10 insights from its tiles

## Related skills

- **`building-a-dashboard`** — assemble the dashboard worth subscribing to first
- **`creating-ai-subscription`** — schedule a free-text AI report instead of an insight/dashboard snapshot