Next.js experiments installation

Install the package

Required

Install the PostHog JavaScript library using your package manager:

npm install posthog-js
yarn add posthog-js
pnpm add posthog-js

Add environment variables

Required

Add your PostHog API key and host to your .env.local file and to your hosting provider (e.g. Vercel, Netlify). These values need to start with NEXT_PUBLIC_ to be accessible on the client-side.

.env.local
NEXT_PUBLIC_POSTHOG_KEY=<ph_project_token>
NEXT_PUBLIC_POSTHOG_HOST=https://us.i.posthog.com

Initialize PostHog

Required

Choose the integration method based on your Next.js version and router type.

If you're using Next.js 15.3+, you can use instrumentation-client.ts for a lightweight, fast integration:

instrumentation-client.ts
import posthog from 'posthog-js'

posthog.init(process.env.NEXT_PUBLIC_POSTHOG_KEY!, {
    api_host: process.env.NEXT_PUBLIC_POSTHOG_HOST,
    defaults: '2026-01-30'
})

For the App router, create a providers.tsx file in your app folder. The posthog-js library needs to be initialized on the client-side using the 'use client' directive:

app/providers.tsx
'use client'

import { usePathname, useSearchParams } from "next/navigation"
import { useEffect } from "react"

import posthog from 'posthog-js'
import { PostHogProvider as PHProvider } from 'posthog-js/react'

export function PostHogProvider({ children }: { children: React.ReactNode }) {
  useEffect(() => {
    posthog.init(process.env.NEXT_PUBLIC_POSTHOG_KEY as string, {
      api_host: process.env.NEXT_PUBLIC_POSTHOG_HOST,
      defaults: '2026-01-30'
    })
  }, [])

  return (
    <PHProvider client={posthog}>
      {children}
    </PHProvider>
  )
}

Then import the PostHogProvider component in your app/layout.tsx and wrap your app with it:

app/layout.tsx
import './globals.css'
import { PostHogProvider } from './providers'

export default function RootLayout({ children }: { children: React.ReactNode }) {
  return (
    <html lang="en">
      <body>
        <PostHogProvider>
          {children}
        </PostHogProvider>
      </body>
    </html>
  )
}

For the Pages router, integrate PostHog at the root of your app in pages/_app.tsx:

pages/_app.tsx
import { useEffect } from 'react'
import { Router } from 'next/router'
import posthog from 'posthog-js'
import { PostHogProvider } from 'posthog-js/react'
import type { AppProps } from 'next/app'

export default function App({ Component, pageProps }: AppProps) {

  useEffect(() => {
    posthog.init(process.env.NEXT_PUBLIC_POSTHOG_KEY as string, {
      api_host: process.env.NEXT_PUBLIC_POSTHOG_HOST,
      defaults: '2026-01-30',
      loaded: (posthog) => {
        if (process.env.NODE_ENV === 'development') posthog.debug()
      }
    })
  }, [])

  return (
    <PostHogProvider client={posthog}>
      <Component {...pageProps} />
    </PostHogProvider>
  )
}

Defaults option

The defaults option automatically configures PostHog with recommended settings for new projects. See SDK defaults for details.

Implement your experiment

Required

Experiments run on top of our feature flags. You can define which version of your code runs based on the return value of the feature flag:

For client-side experiments in React components, you can use the useFeatureFlagVariantKey hook or the PostHogFeature component:

// You can either use the useFeatureFlagVariantKey hook,
// or you can use the feature flags component - https://posthog.com/docs/libraries/react#feature-flags-react-component

// Method one: using the useFeatureFlagVariantKey hook
import { useFeatureFlagVariantKey } from 'posthog-js/react'

function App() {
    const variant = useFeatureFlagVariantKey('your-experiment-feature-flag')
    if (variant === 'test') {
        // do something
    }
}

// Method two: using the feature flags component
import { PostHogFeature } from 'posthog-js/react'

function App() {
    return (
        <PostHogFeature flag='your-experiment-feature-flag' match='test'>
            <div>
                {/* the component to show */}
            </div>
        </PostHogFeature>
    )
}

// You can also test your code by overriding the feature flag:
posthog.featureFlags.overrideFeatureFlags({ flags: {'your-experiment-feature-flag': 'test'} })

For server-side experiments in API routes or server actions, use posthog-node:

const experimentFlagValue = await client.getFeatureFlag('your-experiment-feature-flag', 'user distinct id')

if (experimentFlagValue === 'test' ) {
    // Do something differently for this user
} else {
    // It's a good idea to let control variant always be the default behaviour,
    // so if something goes wrong with flag evaluation, you don't break your app.
}

5
Run your experiment
Required
Once you've implemented the feature flag in your code, you'll enable it for a target audience by creating a new experiment in the PostHog dashboard.

Next steps

Recommended

Now that you're running experiments, continue with the resources below to learn what else Experiments enables within the PostHog platform.

Resource	Description
Creating an experiment	How to create an experiment in PostHog
Adding experiment code	How to implement experiments for all platforms
Statistical significance	Understanding when results are meaningful
Experiment insights	How to analyze your experiment data
More tutorials	Other real-world examples and use cases

Next.js experiments installation

Install the package

Add environment variables

Initialize PostHog

Implement your experiment

Run your experiment

Next steps

Community questions

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