AO3 News

Scheduled maintenance affecting emails, invitations, and account creation

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Published:
2020-05-19 05:57:33 UTC
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On Thursday, May 21 (UTC), we'll be doing some server work that includes changing the IP address we use to send emails. As a result of this change, we're anticipating a large number of undelivered emails while email providers get used to our new IP address. To help smooth the transition, we're going to disable both the invitation queue and account creation for a few days.

We send over one million emails per day. With that many emails coming from a new IP address, it's likely some providers will treat the messages as spam at first. We want to make sure invitation and account activation emails don't get lost in the shuffle, leading to frustration for new users and extra work for our Support volunteers.

However, invitation and activation emails are not the only types of emails that may be affected. Other emails such as comment, kudos, and subscription notifications; challenge assignments; and copies of deleted works may also go undelivered beginning on Thursday, May 21. (Edit 08:55 UTC 19 May: Undelivered emails are rejected by your email provider and never make it to your inbox or spam folder.)

Unfortunately, we cannot resend any missing emails. Because of this, we strongly recommend that you do not delete works or send challenge assignments during this time.

We'll turn invitations and account creation back on once we've determined that most major email providers no longer consider us spam. Until then, what this means is:

  • Effective as of this post, you will not be able to add your email address to our invitation queue until we turn the queue back on. Invitations will not be sent out, since the queue will be empty.
  • Beginning Thursday, May 21, you will not be able to use an existing invitation to sign up until we re-enable account creation.
  • A notification banner will be displayed on all AO3 pages as long as account creation is disabled.

Even once this server work is done, please keep in mind that emails may sometimes take up to 72 hours to reach you. (In certain cases, they may not be delivered at all.) Please allow a few days and check your spam folder before you contact our Support team about a lost email.

Updated at 02:25 UTC Thursday, May 28: Invitation requests and account creation are back on, but we're still experiencing delays and lost emails with some providers, notably Yahoo and AOL. We've reached out to Yahoo multiple times at their request, but were unable to obtain any help in resolving this issue or information about when they'll start accepting our emails again. Therefore, if you're still not receiving emails from the Archive, you may want to consider changing the email associated with your AO3 account. (Depending on your provider, you may be able to set up your new address to forward messages to your old email.)

Updated at 12:22 UTC Wednesday, July 15: To the best of our knowledge, any remaining problems with certain email providers have been resolved. As always, please check your spam folder if you are waiting for a notification from the Archive, and allow up to 24 hours for delivery, as some delays are expected with a number of providers.