fix: Return None for malformed feature flag payloads

[marandaneto]

💡 Motivation and Context

Malformed JSON payloads currently return the raw string through evaluate_flags(...).get_flag_payload(...), while the deprecated get_feature_flag_payload(...) can raise JSONDecodeError.

Both APIs now use a shared parser that returns None for malformed or empty JSON strings, for local and server-provided payloads. Valid JSON and pre-decoded values are preserved.

💚 How did you test it?

• Reproduced the inconsistent behavior with failing regression tests before the fix.
• All 327 focused payload, evaluation, feature flag, and type tests pass.
• Ruff formatting and lint checks, the public API snapshot check, and import with warnings treated as errors pass.
• Autoreview of commit 3781203 against origin/main reported no actionable findings.

📝 Checklist

• I reviewed the submitted code.
• I added tests to verify the changes.
• I updated the docs if needed.
• No breaking change or entry added to the changelog.

If releasing new changes

• Ran sampo add to generate a changeset file

🤖 Agent context

Autonomy: Human-driven (agent-assisted)

Implemented with Pi using file editing, shell tests, GitHub CLI, and the isolated autoreview helper. The requested behavior is to treat malformed JSON payloads as absent rather than return invalid strings or raise decoding errors. The change shares parsing between the newer and deprecated APIs and includes local and remote regression coverage. Human review is required.

[github-actions]

posthog-python Compliance Report

Date: 2026-09-23T15:15:00.009880+00:00
Duration: 259280ms

✅ All Tests Passed!

121/121 tests passed

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Capture_V1 Tests

✅ 95/95 tests passed

View Details

Test	Status	Duration
Endpoint And Method.Targets V1 Endpoint	✅	514ms
Endpoint And Method.Does Not Use Legacy Endpoints	✅	508ms
Required Headers.Has Authorization Bearer Header	✅	508ms
Required Headers.Has Content Type Json	✅	509ms
Required Headers.Has Posthog Sdk Info Format	✅	508ms
Required Headers.Has Posthog Attempt Header	✅	508ms
Required Headers.Has Posthog Request Id	✅	508ms
Required Headers.Has Posthog Request Timestamp	✅	508ms
Required Headers.Has User Agent	✅	508ms
Body Format.Body Has Created At And Batch	✅	509ms
Body Format.No Api Key In Body	✅	508ms
Body Format.No Sent At In Body	✅	508ms
Event Format.Event Has Required Root Fields	✅	508ms
Event Format.Event Uuid Is Valid	✅	510ms
Event Format.Event Timestamp Is Rfc3339	✅	508ms
Event Format.Non Utc Event Timestamp Is Converted To Utc	✅	514ms
Event Format.Distinct Id Is String	✅	509ms
Event Format.Distinct Id At Root Not Properties	✅	509ms
Event Format.Custom Properties Preserved	✅	508ms
Event Format.Set Properties Preserved	✅	508ms
Event Format.Set Once Properties Preserved	✅	508ms
Event Format.Groups Properties Preserved	✅	508ms
Event Format.Sdk Generates Uuid If Not Provided	✅	509ms
Event Format.Event Has Required Root Fields Batch	✅	510ms
Event Format.Event Uuid Is Valid Batch	✅	511ms
Event Format.Event Timestamp Is Rfc3339 Batch	✅	510ms
Event Format.Distinct Id Is String Batch	✅	510ms
Event Format.Distinct Id At Root Not Properties Batch	✅	511ms
Event Format.Custom Properties Preserved Batch	✅	511ms
Event Format.Set Properties Preserved Batch	✅	511ms
Event Format.Set Once Properties Preserved Batch	✅	511ms
Event Format.Groups Properties Preserved Batch	✅	511ms
Event Format.Sdk Generates Uuid If Not Provided Batch	✅	510ms
Batch Behavior.Multiple Events In Single Batch	✅	515ms
Batch Behavior.Batch Envelope Smoke	✅	518ms
Batch Behavior.Flush With No Events Sends Nothing	✅	505ms
Batch Behavior.Flush At Triggers Batch	✅	1009ms
Batch Behavior.Created At Reflects Batch Creation Time	✅	508ms
Deduplication.Generates Unique Uuids	✅	515ms
Deduplication.Different Events Same Content Different Uuids	✅	510ms
Deduplication.Preserves Uuid On Retry	✅	6517ms
Deduplication.Preserves Timestamp On Retry	✅	6517ms
Deduplication.Preserves Uuid And Timestamp On Batch Retry	✅	6522ms
Deduplication.No Duplicate Events In Batch	✅	514ms
Header Behavior On Retry.Attempt Header Starts At One	✅	508ms
Header Behavior On Retry.Attempt Header Increments On Retry	✅	13521ms
Header Behavior On Retry.Request Id Preserved On Retry	✅	6517ms
Header Behavior On Retry.Different Requests Have Different Request Ids	✅	3015ms
Header Behavior On Retry.Request Timestamp Changes On Retry	✅	6517ms
Response Format Validation.Success Response Has Uuid Keyed Results	✅	508ms
Response Format Validation.Success Response Has Ok For Each Event	✅	511ms
Response Format Validation.Success No Retry After When All Ok	✅	510ms
Response Format Validation.Success Retry After Present When Retry Events	✅	1512ms
Response Format Validation.Success No Retry After When Drop Only	✅	510ms
Response Format Validation.Response Echoes Request Id	✅	508ms
Retry Behavior.Retries On 408	✅	6518ms
Retry Behavior.Retries On 500	✅	6513ms
Retry Behavior.Retries On 503	✅	8516ms
Retry Behavior.Retries On 504	✅	6512ms
Retry Behavior.Retryable Errors Have Retry After	✅	3515ms
Retry Behavior.Respects Retry After On Retryable Error	✅	11520ms
Retry Behavior.Does Not Retry On 400	✅	2511ms
Retry Behavior.Does Not Retry On 401	✅	2521ms
Retry Behavior.Does Not Retry On 402	✅	2511ms
Retry Behavior.Does Not Retry On 413	✅	2512ms
Retry Behavior.Does Not Retry On 415	✅	2511ms
Retry Behavior.Non Retryable Errors Have No Retry After	✅	2511ms
Retry Behavior.Implements Backoff	✅	22528ms
Retry Behavior.Max Retries Respected	✅	22534ms
Partial Batch Handling.Handles 200 Full Success	✅	2510ms
Partial Batch Handling.Handles 200 With All Ok	✅	3515ms
Partial Batch Handling.Does Not Retry Dropped Events	✅	3511ms
Partial Batch Handling.Does Not Retry Limited Events	✅	3510ms
Partial Batch Handling.Prunes Ok Events On Partial Retry	✅	6518ms
Partial Batch Handling.Prunes Dropped Events On Partial Retry	✅	6519ms
Partial Batch Handling.Retries Only Retry Events From Partial	✅	6520ms
Partial Batch Handling.Partial Retry Preserves Uuids	✅	6517ms
Partial Batch Handling.Partial Retry Attempt Header Increments	✅	6514ms
Partial Batch Handling.Partial Retry Request Id Preserved	✅	6516ms
Partial Batch Handling.Respects Retry After On Partial	✅	8514ms
Partial Batch Handling.Unknown Result Treated As Terminal	✅	3513ms
Partial Batch Handling.Mixed Ok Drop Limited No Retry	✅	3515ms
Compression.Sends Gzip Content Encoding	✅	509ms
Compression.No Content Encoding When Disabled	✅	507ms
Compression.Compressed Body Is Decompressible	✅	508ms
Error Handling.Does Not Retry On Unknown 4Xx	✅	2511ms
Event Options.Cookieless Mode Override	✅	509ms
Event Options.Disable Skew Correction Override	✅	508ms
Event Options.Process Person Profile Override	✅	508ms
Event Options.Product Tour Id Override	✅	507ms
Event Options.Unset Options Omitted	✅	508ms
Event Options.Options Override In Batch	✅	510ms
Geoip And Historical Migration.Geoip Disable Injected Into Properties	✅	508ms
Geoip And Historical Migration.Historical Migration Set In Body	✅	508ms
Geoip And Historical Migration.Historical Migration Absent By Default	✅	508ms

Capture_Ai Tests

✅ 5/5 tests passed

View Details

Test	Status	Duration
Routing.Capture Ai Posts To Ai Endpoint	✅	508ms
Routing.Capture Does Not Reroute Ai Named Events	✅	507ms
Identity.Capture Ai Event Has Uuid	✅	508ms
Identity.Capture Ai Keeps Supplied Uuid	✅	507ms
Timestamp Format.Non Utc Event Timestamp Is Converted To Utc	✅	508ms

Feature_Flags Tests

✅ 17/17 tests passed

View Details

Test	Status	Duration
Request Payload.Request With Person Properties Device Id	✅	9ms
Request Payload.Flags Request Uses V2 Query Param	✅	6ms
Request Payload.Flags Request Hits Flags Path Not Decide	✅	6ms
Request Payload.Flags Request Omits Authorization Header	✅	6ms
Request Payload.Token In Flags Body Matches Init	✅	6ms
Request Payload.Groups Round Trip	✅	6ms
Request Payload.Groups Default To Empty Object	✅	6ms
Request Payload.Disable Geoip False Propagates As Geoip Disable False	✅	6ms
Request Payload.Disable Geoip Omitted Defaults To False	✅	7ms
Request Payload.Flag Keys To Evaluate Contains Only Requested Key	✅	6ms
Request Lifecycle.No Flags Request On Init Alone	✅	2ms
Request Lifecycle.No Flags Request On Normal Capture	✅	506ms
Request Lifecycle.Two Flag Calls Produce Two Remote Requests	✅	9ms
Request Lifecycle.Mock Response Value Is Returned To Caller	✅	6ms
Retry Behavior.Retries Flags On 502	✅	308ms
Retry Behavior.Retries Flags On 504	✅	309ms
Side Effect Events.Get Feature Flag Captures Feature Flag Called Event	✅	508ms

Feature_Flags_Local_Evaluation Tests

✅ 4/4 tests passed

View Details

Test	Status	Duration
Versioned Boolean Matching.Matching Version Missing	✅	46ms
Versioned Boolean Matching.Matching Version 1	✅	45ms
Versioned Boolean Matching.Matching Version 2	✅	47ms
Versioned Boolean Matching.Version Only Reload 1 2 1 2 Missing	✅	25ms

[marandaneto]

idk if this one should be fixed or if the other sdks should be fixed
a malformed json should return as is or none
cc @PostHog/team-feature-flags ?

[JamesPatrickGill]

Just a couple of small blocking points below. Looks good otherwise.

To answer your question I think None is the correct direction in this regard. We already have the API rejecting malformed payloads and the raw string is just a bit ambiguous.

[greptile-apps]

The PR appears safe to merge, with a non-blocking observability concern around repeated payload parse warnings.

_{Reviews (1) · Last reviewed commit: "fix: merge main and restore JSON import ..."}