Spot what is spiking
💡 Catch a Narrative accelerating in volume and engagement — before it peaks.
Surges build when no one is watching — over a weekend, overnight. Narrative Pulse never stops, so a surge that began while you were away is waiting for you. Open it from the left-hand navigation in Vantage: it lands on the Narrative Landscape, and this guide shows you how to catch a Narrative accelerating and see which Malign Assets are amplifying it before it peaks.
When to use this
First thing after a weekend or a break, when you need to know what accelerated while you were away — and, more to the point, which Malign Assets were behind the acceleration, so you can act before the Narrative peaks rather than after.
KEY TERM Malign Asset — an Asset identified by its behavior and stance. This includes Assets that display malign tactics, techniques, and procedures or coordinated inauthentic behavior; sources named in threat reports by international organizations and platforms; as well as Assets with 70% or more semantic match with narratives of datasets of attributed Malign Assets' publications. |
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KEY TERM Narrative Trigger — A cluster of trending real-world discussions or events that activates or reactivates a Narrative or Sub-Narrative in the Information Landscape, surfacing why audiences engage with the Narrative at a given moment. |
TIP Engagement keeps updating for a couple of days after a post appears and settles after about 48 hours, so very fresh numbers may still move. For what each metric means, see Narrative Pulse — Terms & Metrics. |
The Walkthrough
Set the window to the period you were away, and filter to Malign Assets
On the top panel, click Custom, pick the weekend or days you missed, and click Done. Then set the asset filter to Malign Assets. The Narrative Landscape now shows only what Malign Assets amplified while the space was quiet.
A custom window set to the days you missed, filtered to Malign Assets. The Narrative Landscape shows only what Malign Assets amplified while the space was quiet.
Read the acceleration, in volume and engagement
Sort the table by Publications and scan the change figure beside each count. Then read the engagement column: a Narrative can barely move in volume yet surge in engagement. The standout is the one climbing fastest, not the one sitting highest.
Sorted by Publications, reading the change figures. Here, “Ukraine is degraded” barely moves in volume yet engagement is up 673% over the weekend.
Open the fastest climber
Open the Narrative and toggle the graph between Publications and Engagement to see where the acceleration is coming from. Read the Sub-Narratives and Triggers beneath it — some Triggers spike hard in their own right, which tells you what is sustaining the surge right now.
Generate a summary
Click Generate summary. Narrative Pulse returns a short summary: how the Narrative persists — the Sub-Narratives and Triggers sustaining it — and its highest-engagement Publications, each linked to the post and to the Asset that amplified it. This is where the surge becomes a shortlist of Malign Assets to watch.
The summary — how the Narrative persists, and its highest-engagement Publications with the Malign Assets that amplified them.
Share feedback at any point
Tell us whenever something is not working or does not look right, or share what would make Narrative Pulse better for you. There are two ways in: the message icon, available throughout Narrative Pulse, and the Support button in the bottom-left corner.
Either opens the “How can we help?” form — choose the type of feedback, add a note, and attach a file if it helps.
Have a question? Our team is ready to help via the Support form.
Last Updated: 30 August, 2026
