Forum: Viewing the email history for your forum

The Email History page gives forum administrators a complete, searchable record of the emails their forum tries to send to members. Every email appears in one feed, whether it was delivered, is still waiting to be delivered, was deliberately skipped, or could not be delivered. Each entry explains what happened in plain language and, for delivery failures, what to do about it.

Opening the Email History page

Log in to your Website Toolbox account and open the admin area.
Open the Settings page.
Click the Notifications link.
Click View Email History in the Email History row.

Reading the feed

Each entry shows the recipient's avatar, their name and username, the email's subject, the recipient's email address, the current status, and the date. Emails are listed newest first.

Only the last 6 months of email history is kept. Emails older than that no longer appear in the feed.

Use the status filters above the feed to narrow the list to one kind of outcome:

All shows every email.
Queued shows emails that are still waiting to be delivered.
Sent shows emails that were delivered successfully.
Delivery failed shows emails the recipient's mail server rejected.
Skipped shows emails your forum deliberately did not send.

You can also search by username, email address, or name. Start typing in the search box and pick a member from the suggestions, or type a full email address, then press Enter.

Understanding each status

Queued and deferred emails

A queued email is one your forum has accepted but not yet delivered. Bulk emails are sent a few at a time so that email providers do not treat them as spam, so a large send stays in the queue for a while. An email that reads Deferred - scheduled to send has been held for a later time, and Deferred - on hold means sending to it has been paused. Queued emails move to Sent, or to their final status, once the send runs.

Skipped emails

A skipped email was not sent on purpose. The status names the reason, for example the member has email notifications turned off, has not entered the forum password since it was changed, has unsubscribed, or is banned. These are working as intended and usually need no action.

Delivery failures and the "What to do" expand

When a recipient's mail server rejects an email, the status explains why in plain language. Click What to do below the status to reveal the recommended next step, such as asking the member to correct their email address, or to allow your forum's emails. Once an address fails permanently, your forum marks it as invalid and stops sending to it, which protects your forum's email reputation. For the full list of provider responses and what each one means, see Email delivery error messages and how to resolve them.

An email that bounces after it was sent is updated in place, so the original entry changes from Sent to the delivery failure, with the reason and the recommended action shown together.

Seeing a Sent entry for an email the member never received? Follow Why isn't a member receiving our forum emails? (debugging guide) to work out whether their mail system filtered or quarantined it.