Filter and path rules in Zaps

Written by Owner

Updated at August 20th, 2025

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Table of Contents

Filter rule conditions Text filters Number filters Boolean filters Generic filters Filters and line items If your filter conditions are all positive If your filter conditions are both positive and negative or all negative

Filters and paths are both tools that can be used for conditional or branching logic in your Zaps. This allows you to ensure actions get performed only on the items you want. Both tools let you set up specific conditions to get the granularity you need.

For instance, you can set up a filter to only capture emails that contain a specific subject line or only customers who purchase a specific product. So when the data from your Zap meets the conditions of a filter, it proceeds to the next action in your Zap. If a filter stops an item, then no further actions are performed.

Using either tool doesn't towards your task usage.

Learn how to set up filters or paths for your Zaps.

Filter rule conditions

Filters can use different rules for logic. Conditions can only work for the type of data that is specified in parentheses. There are five types of filter rules: text, number, date/time, boolean, and generic.

Examples

In this table, you can see which fields would pass a given rule. In each example, the condition is the logic used for the rule, the value is what we’re evaluating the condition against.

Condition	Value	Examples that would pass	Examples that wouldn’t pass
(Text) Contains	Apples and bananas	Apples Apple Apples and bananas	Strawberries
(Text) Does not contain	Apples and bananas	Strawberries	Apple
(Text) Exactly matches	Apples	Apples	Apple (not plural)
(Text) Does not exactly match	Apples	Apple Banana And more	Apples
(Text) Is in	Apples, bananas	Apples Bananas	Apple Banana Strawberries
(Text) Is not in	Apples, bananas	Strawberries Apple	Apples Bananas
(Text) Starts with	App	Apples Applesauce	Apricots Bananas
(Text) Does not start with	App	Apricots Bananas	Apples Applesauce
(Text) Ends with	s	Bananas Apple and bananas	Apple
(Text) Does not end with	s	Apple Banana	Apples Bananas
(Number) Greater than	10	11100	9-1
(Number) Less than	10	9-1	100
(Date/time) After	12/31/2018 1:00	01/01/2019 12/31/2018 01:01	12/31/2017
(Date/time) Before	12/31/2018 1:00	12/31/2017	01/01/2019
(Date/time) Equals	12/31/2018 1:00	12/31/2018 1:00	12/31/2019 12/31/2018 00:00
Exists	n/a	Apple 10 01/01/2019
Does not exist	n/a		Apple 10 01/01/2019

Note

When filtering line items, whether your Zap continues past the filter depends on whether you use positive or negative filter conditions.

Text filters

Text filters only work with text data, so they won’t work with numbers or dates.

Contains: Checks if the field contains a value. This is not case-sensitive.
Does not contain: The opposite of Contains, this checks that the field does not contain a value. This is not case-sensitive.
Exactly matches: Checks if the field matches a value letter-for-letter. This is not case-sensitive.
Does not exactly match: Checks if the field does not match a value letter-for-letter. This is not case-sensitive.
Is in: Checks if a field is in a list of values. This is not case-sensitive.
Is not in: Checks if a field is not in a list of values. This is not case-sensitive.
Starts with: Checks if a field begins with a certain value. This is not case-sensitive.
Does not start with: Checks if a field does not begin with a certain value. This is not case-sensitive.
Ends with: Checks if a field ends with a certain value. This is not case-sensitive.
Does not end with: Checks if a field doesn’t end with a certain value. This is not case-sensitive.

Number filters

Number filters only work with numeric values, like 1 or 100. They do not work with written forms of numbers (one, two, one hundred) or dates.

Greater than: Checks if a field is greater than a certain number.
Less than: Checks if a field is less than a certain number.
Date/time
- After: Checks if a date is after a certain date.
- Before: Checks if a date is before a certain date.
- Equals: Checks if two dates are identical.

Boolean filters

Is true: Checks is a boolean value is true.
Is false: Checks if a boolean value is false.

Generic filters

Exists: Checks if a value exists (can be used with any type of field).
Does not exist: Checks if a value doesn’t exist (can be used with any type of field).

Filters and line items

If you have a set of line items like this:

Example of line items

Whether your Zap continues past the filter depends on whether you use positive or negative filter conditions.

Examples of positive filter conditions are “Contains” and “Starts with”.
Examples of negative filter conditions are “Does not contain” and “Does not start with”.

If your filter conditions are all positive

If all conditions are positive, at least one line item must pass all filter conditions for the Zap to continue.

In the example below, the Zap continues because a single line item passed both positive conditions, even if others didn't.

Example of line items passing when using all positive filter conditions

If your filter conditions are both positive and negative or all negative

Whenever there is a negative condition included, all line items must pass all filter conditions for the Zap to continue.

In the example below, the Zap doesn't continue because at least one line item didn't pass the filter conditions.

Example of line items not passing when using all negative filter conditions

Tip

You can use Formatter to convert line-items to text if you need to filter on all line items.