Funnel analysis vs. path analysis
Funnels measure survival through steps you chose; path analysis reveals the routes people actually took when you do not know the steps yet.
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What it is
A funnel starts with a route you already care about and asks how many people completed its ordered steps. Path analysis starts from one event or page and fans out through whatever people actually did next or before. Funnels test a hypothesis; paths help you discover one. GA4 makes the distinction literal with separate Funnel exploration and Path exploration techniques.
Use a funnel for a known flow such as product viewed, cart added, checkout started, order completed. Use a path when the route is not known yet: what people do after an error, how they reach upgrade, or where they go instead of finishing onboarding. A useful path often suggests the steps for the next funnel.
Gotcha: path diagrams explode into unreadable branches when pageviews, repeated events, and backtracking are left raw. Group equivalent nodes, cap the depth, and collapse loops. A thick path is popular, not necessarily successful, and it does not supply a conversion rate until you define an eligible cohort and a completion window.
Ask AI for it
Build two PostHog insights from the same event set. First create a strictly ordered Funnel insight for [step 1], [step 2], [step 3], and [outcome] with unique users and a 7-day conversion window. Then create a Paths insight starting at [step 1], limited to five transitions, that groups equivalent URLs, removes query strings, and collapses repeated self-loops. Put them side by side and annotate which unexpected path branches should become a new funnel hypothesis.