Properties: Supported Data Types

Mixpanel supports five data types for properties: string, numeric, boolean, date, and list.

The images represent how each data type will appear in the properties drop-down in Mixpanel reports so that you can distinguish the type of property you select:

  String

Mixpanel will treat any value sent that doesn’t match any other data type as a string. In reports, Properties sent as strings will allow Events to be broken out by each unique value.

Example:

mixpanel.track('Account Created',{'Account Type':'Paid'});

String properties have a field size character limit of 255 bytes. 

  Numeric

Mixpanel treats any value that is a number (whether integer or decimal) as a numeric Property. Reports can display numeric Properties as histograms.

Example:

mixpanel.track('Application Loaded',{'Load Time (seconds)':1.231});

  Boolean

Mixpanel treats Properties as booleans if the value is either the JSON constant true or false.

Example:

mixpanel.track('Played Video',{'Ad Included':true});

  Date

To guarantee appropriate typecasting across all Mixpanel reports, use the date format YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS. Make sure you’re sending dates in this format by using the .toISOString method in JavaScript if possible, which will also ensure dates are sent to Mixpanel in UTC.

If you send a unix timestamp as a date, Mixpanel will treat it as an integer; however, in the Mixpanel UI, you can force it to be treated as a date (see Typecasting section below).

Note: A property value that is formatted as a date will be passed as a date type.

Example:

mixpanel.track('Account Created',{'Date First Seen':'2016-06-01T12:34:56'});

  List

Send a list of values (for example, the products in a shopping cart) as a JSON array. In Insights, when querying for a particular item, list Properties allow you to see all events where that item was included in the list.

Example:

mixpanel.track('Order Successful',{'Products':['Jacket','Helmet','Gloves']});

List properties have a field size character limit of 255 bytes for each item in the list. Here is a detailed article on how list properties behave when used as a filter/breakdown.

Typecasting

Mixpanel allows you to force Properties into another data format by clicking on the Property Name and selecting a different type:

Typecasting is helpful when one of your properties is a number but is sent to Mixpanel as a string and you want to see histogram data for that property. Or if one of your properties is a unix timestamp and got sent as a number, and you want it to be treated as a date Property instead.

Data Type Operators

Every data type has a different set of operators to choose from when you filter by properties.

This image shows the operators for each data type.

String Type Operators

"equals", "does not equal", "contains", "does not contain", "is set", "is not set"

Number Type Operators

"in between", "less than", "equal to", "greater than"

Boolean Type Operators

"true", "false"

List Type Operators

"contains"

Date Type Operators

"was less than"

"was more than"

"will occur within"

In time increments of:

"hours", "days", "weeks", "months"

For a string property, you can use the “is set” operator to determine if the property exists for the event or user profile.

If you’re looking for all users who have a specific value of a property (such as “Account Type” contains “Premium”), then you would use the “contains” or “equals” operators.

Note that “contains” is usually a better operator to use than “equals”, especially for properties with several values.