VAST tracking events / Linear
playerCollapse VAST tracking event
Short answer: Fires when the player leaves the expanded surface (4.0+). Introduced in VAST 4.0.
When it fires
The player left the expanded or fullscreen surface. Pair with playerExpand. This is player chrome, not the creative collapsing (adCollapse).
Leaving the expanded player
playerCollapse fires when the player leaves the expanded surface. Pair it with playerExpand. Both arrived in VAST 4.0, replacing exitFullscreen. A 3.0 document should keep exitFullscreen. A 4.x document should use this name.
adCollapse is the creative shrinking, on NonLinear. A report that merges playerCollapse and adCollapse mixes the player chrome with the overlay. They are different URLs because they are different events.
Collapses without expands
A playerCollapse with no playerExpand means the player emitted the leave event without the enter event, or the enter URL is missing from the tag. Check the template before you call it a viewer pattern. A genuine session starts expanded and then leaves, which is expand then collapse, in that order.
adCollapse on a NonLinear creative in the same pod is a different URL. A wrapper that adds playerCollapse to every creative, including overlays, asks the player to fire a linear event from a hop that is not itself linear. Wrapper tracking is still requested when the InLine event happens, even if the wrapper creative type differs. The call means the InLine event occurred. It does not mean the wrapper was a linear ad.
When the column stays empty
playerCollapse is absent from VAST 2.0 and from 3.0. A player that only implements those versions will not request it. The version table on this page is the set that includes it.
Each wrapper hop may include its own playerCollapse URL. The player requests every one of them when the event happens, so a chain of four hops produces four calls for one playback. An http URL on an https page is dropped by the browser before the ad server sees a miss. The event name can be right and the scheme can still zero the column.
Where it is valid
| 2.0 | 3.0 | 4.0 | 4.1+ |
|---|---|---|---|
| No | No | Yes | Yes |
Legal containers: Linear. An event in the wrong container is not a player error. It is a URL nobody calls.
Using it in a tag
Put it in a Linear TrackingEvents block. It is not valid on the other creative types, and a player does not fire a tracker in the wrong container.
<Linear>
<TrackingEvents>
<Tracking event="playerCollapse">
<![CDATA[https://track.example.com/playerCollapse]]>
</Tracking>
</TrackingEvents>
</Linear>VAST XML fragment only. This excerpt belongs inside a complete VAST document, so standalone validation will fail until it is wrapped in a full <VAST>response.
Related vastlint rules
- VAST-4.0-tracking-event-removed: fullscreen/exitFullscreen tracking events were removed in VAST 4.0
- VAST-4.1-tracking-event-value: Tracking event attribute not in the valid set for this VAST version
Related events
- playerExpand: Fires when the player grows (4.0+ replacement for fullscreen).
- exitFullscreen: Removed in VAST 4.0. Use playerCollapse on 4.x tags.
- adCollapse: Fires when the creative collapses after expand. 4.0+ name.
Check the XML, then confirm the beacons fire
Validate the event names and containers on the document. Test a live URL when the XML is clean and reporting is still empty.