Email notifications are a critical component of the ServiceNow platform. Often undelivered notifications are due to expected platform behavior that can be fixed by modifying the configurations. Let’s take a look at some troubleshooting tips on what to try first when notifications don’t get delivered as planned.
Preview Notification does more than check how an email looks
As the name implies, with this feature you can review the appearance of notifications before you send them. However, using Preview Notification also helps you to learn why a notification wasn’t received.
Test it out by following these steps:
1. Go to System Notification > Email > Notifications.
2. On the form header, select Preview Notification.
3. In the Notification Preview window, invalid recipients are highlighted in red.
4. When you hover over the recipient name, a label displays showing why they didn't receive the email. For example, in the following screenshot, the user’s notification setting is disabled.
Check if the recipient disabled their notifications
Notifications can be enabled or disabled from a user profile or by changing subscription preferences by device. This can be another reason why a user isn’t receiving email notifications; they’ve simply disabled them.
Note: To verify user settings, you do this through the platform UI in the instance, not the Service Portal.
Before you get into the user's settings, check that they are active, not locked out, and have a valid email address.
To verify a user’s email notification preferences:
1. Sign in to the instance.
2. Go to User Administration > Users.
3. Select the specific user record to validate.
4. Verify that the Notification field is set to Enable.
a. If set to Disabled, change the value and update the user record.
b. If notifications were already enabled, verify that a matching notification device is active.
To see a list of the user's devices:
1. From the User page, under Related Links, select Notification Preferences.
2. Enable or disable notifications per device.
Notifications are sent to the primary email by default, while other devices require specific enablement to receive notifications. The following table shows how these are prioritized.
| Primary Email | Other Devices | |
| Enabled | Send | Send |
| Disabled | Don't Send | Don't Send |
| Not Listed | Send | Don't Send |
These troubleshooting tips aren’t exhaustive, but they provide a good place to start. You can always revisit the steps in this article or check out the resources below for a closer look at email notifications.
Additional Resources
- How to use Preview Notification to troubleshoot undelivered emails
- Verify a user's email notification preferences
- Email and SMS notification
- Email diagnostics dashboard
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