What does “Soft Bounce” mean when sending emails?

The status “Soft Bounce” is very normal and usually not a cause for concern.

If this happens MailMergic has received an answer from the receiving server that tells us that the receiving server has temporarily limited access to their system. You can think of this like a busy signal. Note that this report only tracks the recipient, not the CC and BCC recipients.

It does not mean that your message will not be delivered. Rather, it is a signal that your message will not be delivered immediately.

Reasons for this status can include:

• The mailbox was full (the user is over their quota)
• The server was down

In certain circumstances it can also happen that all emails from your mailing receive the status “Soft Bounce” – especially if all recipient email addresses belong to the same domain.

We continue to attempt to send these messages for up to 72 hours until the message is delivered. This process can’t be canceled. If a message is continuously deferred for 72 hours, we will assign the status “Undeliverable” to this message.

In most cases the “Soft Bounce” status will resolve to a “Delivered” status after a few hours. Just check the email report later via the “History”: