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Spotter 3 Liveboard side panel (New experience)

Last updated: Oct 15, 2026

Spotter 3 offers two Liveboard experiences. In Answer overlay (Classic), Spotter opens over one chart on a Liveboard. In Liveboard side panel (New), Spotter opens beside the whole Liveboard and reads its tabs, visualizations, and the filters and date ranges applied to each chart, so that you can ask about what you see without restating your filters.

Your administrator chooses the experience. New instances and existing instances upgrading to 26.11 are set to Answer overlay (Classic) by default. Your administrator can choose to change it to Liveboard side panel (New).

Liveboard side panel (New) is an Early Access feature. To enable this feature on your cluster, contact ThoughtSpot Support.

What you can do in the Liveboard side panel

When you open Spotter from a Liveboard in the new experience, Spotter reads the Liveboard you have open, its tabs, charts, and the filters and date ranges applied to each visualization, and uses that as the starting point for the conversation.

With Spotter 3 Liveboard side panel, you can:

  • Ask questions about the data on your Liveboard without retyping your filters.

  • Drill into specific charts or visualizations by referencing them in your question.

  • Explore across all tabs on the Liveboard in a single conversation.

  • Get answers that reflect the same filters and date ranges already applied to the board.

  • Ask follow-up questions that build on what Spotter found in the previous turn.

  • Pin insights from the conversation to a Liveboard.

Enable the Liveboard side panel experience

Only administrators with access to All Orgs can change the Spotter experience.

To enable Liveboard side panel (New):

  1. Navigate to Admin > ThoughtSpot AI.

  2. Under Choose Spotter version, select Spotter 3 if it is not already selected.

  3. Under Spotter 3 Liveboard experience, select Liveboard side panel (New).

  4. Click Save.

The new experience becomes active for all users in the Org immediately.

The Spotter 3 Liveboard experience setting is visible only when Spotter 3 is selected as the Spotter version.

What happens to existing settings when you switch

Some Admin settings change when you enable Liveboard side panel (New). The table below shows how each setting behaves before and after the switch.

Setting Answer overlay (Classic) Liveboard side panel (New)

Spotter on homepage

Configurable on/off

Always on; the homepage toggle is inactive

Spotter on Liveboards

Configurable on/off

Always on; the Liveboard toggle is inactive

Spotter on Search Answers

Configurable on/off

Always on; the toggle is inactive

Chat history

On or off

Supported — behavior unchanged

Custom instructions

Supported

Supported — behavior unchanged

Memory

Supported

Supported — behavior unchanged

Per-surface toggles (homepage, Liveboards, Search Answers) are suspended while Liveboard side panel (New) is active. If you switch back to Answer overlay (Classic), your previous toggle settings are restored.

Switching back to Answer overlay (Classic)

You can switch back at any time.

  1. Navigate to Admin > ThoughtSpot AI.

  2. Under Spotter 3 Liveboard experience, select Answer overlay (Classic).

  3. Read the confirmation message and click Confirm.

Before you switch back, note the following:

  • Chat history — conversations started in Liveboard side panel (New) are not visible in Answer overlay (Classic). They are not deleted; they become accessible again if you re-enable the new experience.

  • Shared links — links to Spotter conversations shared while in the new experience stop working after you switch back.

What is not yet available in the new experience

The following capabilities are available in Answer overlay (Classic) but are not yet available in Liveboard side panel (New).

Capability Detail

Spotter in embedded ThoughtSpot

Spotter 3 Liveboard side panel is not available in embedded ThoughtSpot in this release.

Drill down from Spotter

Drill down into a chart from within a Spotter conversation is not available.

Change analysis

Change analysis is not available in the side panel experience.

AI Highlights

AI Highlights on Liveboard charts are not available while the new experience is active.

SpotIQ

SpotIQ analysis is not available from within a Spotter conversation in the new experience.

Share a Spotter conversation

Users cannot share a link to a specific Spotter conversation in the new experience.

Spotter on Search Answers

Spotter in the context of a Search Answer is not available in the new experience.

Multi-turn dataset switching

In the new experience, the dataset is fixed to the open Liveboard for the session. Users cannot switch to a different dataset mid-conversation.

Deep analysis toggle

The explicit deep analysis toggle is removed. Spotter determines the depth of analysis automatically based on the question.

Before you switch: what to users need to know

When you enable Liveboard side panel (New), some things users are familiar with change. Before you switch, communicate the following to your users:

  • Spotter opens in a side panel, not as an overlay on a single chart.

  • Chat history from Classic is not visible in the new experience. Existing conversations are not deleted, but they cannot be opened while New is active.

  • Some features are not yet available (see the previous section). Users who rely on drill down, AI Highlights, or SpotIQ from Spotter should be made aware before the switch.

  • Shared links from Classic conversations stop working after the switch.

Frequently asked questions

Is my existing chat history deleted when I switch?

No. Conversations from Answer overlay (Classic) are not deleted. They are not visible while Liveboard side panel (New) is active. If you switch back to Classic, they become accessible again.

Can users switch the experience themselves?

No. The experience is set by an administrator and applies to all users in the Org.

Can I enable the new experience for some users and not others?

No. The setting is Org-wide. All users in the Org move to the same experience when an administrator switches.

Does the new experience affect row-level security?

No. Row-level security is enforced in the same way as Classic. Spotter reads only the data the signed-in user has access to.