Understanding stats for 'topic views', 'posts read', and 'reading time'

:bookmark: This is a reference guide explaining how topic views, posts read, and reading time are tracked on Discourse.

:person_raising_hand: Required user level: All users

Discourse provides insightful statistics on user activities such as read time, topics viewed, and posts read. This information can be accessed on the user’s profile page:

Topic views

Topic views represent the number of topics a user has clicked on. When a user clicks on a topic, it loads in their browser, and this is counted as a view. It’s important to note:

  • Unread topics will have a blue dot next to them:
    Unread topics
  • Topic views are tracked once per user.
  • Viewing a topic doesn’t necessarily indicate that all posts within the topic have been read by the user.

Posts read

Posts read indicate the number of posts a user has fully read. Here’s how it works:

  • Unread posts will have a blue dot next to the timestamp they were created at.
  • Once the blue dot disappears, Discourse counts the post as “read”.
    Unread post

Reading time

Discourse also tracks reading time for each post a user views. Here are some key points about how Discourse tracks this:

  • 6 minutes: Maximum logged reading time per post each time a user views it before navigating away.
    • No upper limit: A post can be read for days if the user keeps returning to the topic.
  • 3 minutes: If no scrolling occurs in this duration, then reading time tracking is paused until scrolling resumes.
  • 5 topics: Reading time is logged for up to five topics for anonymous users.

FAQs

If I open one topic with a lot of replies and scroll down quickly, will I have read all the posts in the topic?

No, Discourse requires a post to be on the screen for at least a few seconds before counting it as read. The exact time varies depending on the length of the post.

Additional resources:

Last edited by @hugh 2024-06-20T01:39:50Z

Last checked by @hugh 2024-06-19T06:51:42Z

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7 Likes

Is there an option to disable public display of all these statistics for users?

If not could do a feature request for that, can be too many numbers confusing.

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