Enabling and Disabling Automations
Toggle automations on and off
Enabling and Disabling Automations
Automations in Mailnaptic can be toggled between active and inactive states. This gives you control over when automations run and lets you pause them for maintenance, content updates, or troubleshooting.
Activating an automation
- Navigate to Automations in the sidebar.
- Open the automation you want to activate.
- Toggle the Active switch to the on position.
- The automation is now live and will begin enrolling contacts when trigger events occur.
Requirements for activation
- Verified domain: If the automation contains email send steps, you must have at least one verified sending domain. The toggle will be disabled with a hint message if no verified domain exists.
- Valid trigger: The automation must have a configured trigger.
- At least one action: The automation must contain at least one action step (e.g., send email, add tag).
Deactivating an automation
- Open the automation.
- Toggle the Active switch to the off position.
- The automation immediately stops enrolling new contacts.
What happens to contacts already in the automation?
When you deactivate an automation, contacts who are currently progressing through it will pause at their current step. They will not be removed from the automation. When you reactivate, they will resume from where they left off.
Contacts waiting on a delay step will remain in the delay. When the automation is reactivated, the delay countdown continues from where it left off (it does not restart).
When to deactivate
- Content updates: Deactivate while updating email content or restructuring the flow to prevent contacts from receiving incomplete or incorrect content.
- Seasonal pauses: Disable holiday-specific automations outside the relevant season.
- Troubleshooting: If you notice errors in automation runs, deactivate to prevent further issues while you investigate.
- Domain changes: If your sending domain becomes unverified, deactivate automations with email steps until the domain is re-verified.
Automation states on the list page
The automations list page shows the status of each automation:
- Active — Running and enrolling contacts.
- Inactive / Draft — Not running. No new contacts will be enrolled.
A banner is displayed on the automations list page if you have no verified domains, informing you that automations with email steps cannot be activated.
Best practices
- Deactivate before making structural changes to the automation flow (adding/removing steps, changing conditions).
- Reactivate promptly after making changes to minimize the gap in enrollment.
- Check for in-progress contacts before deactivating — they will pause and resume, which may cause unexpected timing.
- Use the automation run monitor to verify contacts resume correctly after reactivation.