---
title: fastly.ff.visits_this_service
summary: null
url: >-
  https://www.fastly.com/documentation/reference/vcl/variables/miscellaneous/fastly-ff-visits-this-service
---


The number of previous Fastly servers that have seen the current request in the context of the current service configuration.

This can be seen as an indication of how "deep" the request has gone within the Fastly network.  By default, Fastly services perform [clustering](/guides/vcl/clustering), which transfers control of the request from one cache server to another after the cache key has been calculated.  As a result, it is common for this value to be `0` in `vcl_recv`, but `1` in `vcl_miss`, `vcl_hit`, and `vcl_fetch`, returning to `0` in `vcl_deliver`.

For services that have [shielding](/guides/concepts/shielding/) enabled, the value may be as high as 3 in `vcl_fetch` at the shield data center.

This value is derived from the `Fastly-FF` request header and should be used in preference to reading the header directly.

## Example

In general, `fastly.ff.visits_this_service` is used to check that the current node is the outermost one, allowing for initial processing to take place on a request or for final processing to take place on a response.  For example, in `vcl_deliver`, it can be used to add a browser-only caching policy:

```vcl
if (fastly.ff.visits_this_service == 0) {
  set resp.http.Cache-Control = "private, no-store";
}
```