Wait for Event

A wait for event step holds the automation until a specific event is received. Unlike a delay, which resumes after a fixed time, this step resumes when something happens in your application.

See Using automations for the surrounding workflow.

Common use cases:

• Payment — wait for a payment to succeed before sending a receipt.
• Adoption — wait for a user to complete an action to unlock a feature.
• Verification — wait for the user to verify their email before continuing.

How it works

Add a wait_for_event step to the steps array, naming the event to wait for and an optional timeout.

import { MailBlastr } from 'mailblastr';

const mb = new MailBlastr('mb_xxxxxxxxx');

const { data, error } = await mb.automations.create({
  "name": "Verification reminder",
  "domain": "yourdomain.com",
  "steps": [
    {
      "key": "start",
      "type": "trigger",
      "config": { "event_name": "user.created" }
    },
    {
      "key": "verification",
      "type": "wait_for_event",
      "config": {
        "event_name": "email.verified",
        "timeout": "1 day"
      }
    }
  ],
  "connections": [
    { "from": "start", "to": "verification", "type": "default" }
  ]
});
console.log({ data, error });

Timeouts

When you set a timeout, the step stops waiting after that duration, which prevents automations from waiting indefinitely. A wait-for-event step produces two possible connection types so you can branch on whether the event arrived in time:

{
  "key": "payment",
  "type": "wait_for_event",
  "config": {
    "event_name": "payment.completed",
    "timeout": "3 days"
  }
}

Filter rules

Use filter_rule to match only events that meet specific criteria — useful when the same event name is sent with different payloads. The rule is evaluated against the incoming event's payload. For example, to wait specifically for a successful payment:

{
  "key": "payment",
  "type": "wait_for_event",
  "config": {
    "event_name": "payment.completed",
    "filter_rule": {
      "type": "rule",
      "field": "event.status",
      "operator": "eq",
      "value": "succeeded"
    }
  }
}

The filter rule supports the same rule shapes and operators as condition steps — including and/or groups.

Configuration