FAQ

Questions

Will simulated people show up in my analytics?

Not in Simulathic: sessions driven by our people are tagged synthetic at the source and excluded from segments, drop-offs and numbers. In your other tools, filter on navigator.webdriver or window.__SIMULATHIC_AGENT__, which every simulated browser sets.

Can they break something in production?

They are told never to delete, pay, cancel or sign out, destructive controls are never asked of them, and the explorer never submits a form. They will do what a flow asks with the test account you stored, which is why that account should be a dedicated one. For anything with side effects, point runs at staging.

How different is this from a Playwright test?

A spec presses the same buttons every time and passes or fails. A simulated person is given a task and a persona grounded in a real visitor and has to find the way, which is how it notices a button that works but is impossible to find, a flow that is fine on desktop and hopeless on a phone, or a page that loads and then confuses. We generate the specs too and run them first; the people are for what a spec can’t judge.

Where do the people run?

On Simulathic’s workers: real browsers in the cloud, real Android and iOS devices, and Mac machines for native apps. Nothing runs on your computer except the CLI and the explorer.

How do I run against localhost?

simulathic qa --port 3000 opens a temporary tunnel for the run and closes it when the run ends. It needscloudflared on your machine (brew install cloudflared; free, no Cloudflare account) orngrok; see CLI. The explorer needs no tunnel because it runs on your machine.

Do I need a workflow file for pull-request checks?

Not with the GitHub App. Install it once from Settings → GitHub in the Studio, connect a repository to a project, and every pull request gets a check run named Simulathic and one comment edited in place. Nothing goes in the repository: no workflow file, no token. The GitHub Actions path still works and needs both, a workflow that runs when the preview is ready and a SIMULATHIC_TOKEN secret; see Pull-request checks. Either way, /simulathic rerun in a comment on the pull request runs the last check again.

What does the GitHub App read from my repository?

The UI sources at the commit being checked. They are read in memory so a model can write the screens and the journeys, and they are never stored. What it writes goes into your workspace, not the repository: the screens, the journeys with the text that proves each, and the check run and comment on the pull request. The installation belongs to the workspace, not to whoever installed it. Uninstalling the App on GitHub stops the checks; nothing else in the workspace changes. See GitHub App.

Can I keep mapping with the explorer instead of connecting a repository?

Yes. simulathic map (or map_product from an agent) explores the product by clicking and uploads the map, and that stays the way in without a repository. Connecting one adds journeys written from the code: every screen and every control, not only what the explorer reached, each journey with the text that proves it, and a refresh whenever a production deployment changes a UI source. A map you edited or pinned is kept either way.

Why did my journeys change after a deployment?

A production deployment that changed a UI source rewrites the map from the code at that commit. Names stay where the journey is the same, so runs and checks line up across the change; what is new or gone follows the code. The set before is one click away: Restore previous map on the Simulate page. A map someone edited or pinned is not rewritten on its own; Write them from the code asks for it.

What does a run cost?

The Studio quotes every run before you press the button, and every finished run shows what it actually cost. Cancelled or errored sessions never count, and captured sessions are never metered. For plans, see Plans or write to team [at] simulathic [dot] com.

What happens to my data?

Masking happens in the visitor’s browser before anything is sent. What we keep, for how long, and how to have it deleted is in the privacy policy. Ask team [at] simulathic [dot] com for anything it doesn’t answer.