Email notifications keep your agents and customers automatically informed about ticket activity. This article explains how to access, configure, and customize the different notification types available in Freshdesk.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• Overview of email notifications
• Configure agent notifications
• Configure requester notifications
• Configure CC notifications
• Customize reply and forward templates

Prerequisites

Before configuring email notifications, make sure you have the following permissions and requirements:

• Administrator access to your Freshdesk account
• Set up a verified support email address
• Pro or Enterprise plan for multi-language notifications

Overview of email notifications

Freshdesk lets you send automatic email notifications to agents and requesters when specific ticket events occur. These notifications ensure that everyone involved in a ticket is informed without any manual follow-up. 

For example, you can notify customers when agents add comments or public notes to their tickets with a customized email with a link to the ticket.

Tip: Email notifications are triggered automatically based on ticket events. However, to perform more advanced actions, such as updating fields, assigning tickets, or sending conditional emails, use automations.

Email notification types

The following table provides details about the different categories of email notifications:

For all notification types, you can configure the following settings:

• Enable or disable each notification type based on your requirements
• Edit the email template for the subject and body
• Insert dynamic placeholders (for example, {{ticket.id}}, {{ticket.url}}) to include ticket-specific information
• Configure multiple languages and customize templates for each language. When editing translations, the ⚠️ icon indicates that a translated version may be outdated and should be reviewed.
  Note: Multiple-language support is available only with the Pro plan.

Access email notifications

To access and configure different types of email notifications:

1. Go to Admin > Workflows > Email Notifications.
2. Select the relevant tab to view and configure notifications for each category.
   
   The following sections provide detailed information on configuring the different email notification types.

Note: If your account has multiple support email addresses, all notifications are sent from the primary email address. Also, failure notifications related to email configuration are sent to the account administrator.

Configure agent notifications

Agent notifications inform agents about ticket events in your account. You can turn each notification type on or off and customize the email templates. 

The following table provides details on the different events for which you can trigger agent email notifications:

Note: The SLA-related notifications are available only from the Pro plan.

Example: notify agents when a new ticket is created

Your support team wants every agent in the Billing group to receive an email whenever a new billing ticket is received. For this, you can configure the New ticket created agent notification:

1. Go to Admin > Workflows > Email Notifications.
2. Select the Agent Notifications tab.
   
3. Click New Ticket Created.
4. Edit the subject line and message as needed.
5. In the Notify Agents section, add the agents who should receive this notification. For example, all agents in the Billing group.
   
6. Use placeholders such as {{ticket.id}} and {{public.url}} to include dynamic ticket information.
7. Click Save. 
8. Enable the toggle to activate the notification.

Note: You can add multiple agents only to the New ticket created agent notification. For all other notification types, only the assigned agent on the ticket receives the notification. If you want to notify multiple agents on other event types, set up an automation rule.

Configure requester notifications

Requester notifications keep customers informed about activity on their tickets. The following events trigger a notification to the requester:

Note: If you turn off the User activation email notification, customers will not receive an activation email after signing up unless you send it manually from the contact profile. Password reset emails are also affected when this toggle is off.

Example: send notifications to the requester when an agent solves the ticket

Notify the ticket requester proactively once an agent resolves the ticket, ensuring they are aware their issue has been addressed.

1. Go to Admin > Workflows > Email Notifications.
2. Select the Requester Notifications tab.
   
3. Click Agent Solves the ticket.
4. Customize the email body.
   Add placeholders such as {{ticket.id}} and {{public.url}} to give customers a direct reference to their ticket.
   
5. Click Save.
6. Enable the toggle to activate the notification.
   
   

Note: If requesters receiving duplicate notifications when a new ticket is created, a ticket creation automation rule may be sending an additional email alongside this default notification. Check the ticket activity log (Show Activities) to see if an automation rule ran on that ticket. If the rule includes a Send email to requester action, remove it or add a Skip new ticket email notification action to prevent duplicates. 

Configure CC notifications

CC notifications are sent to users added as CC on a ticket. These notifications ensure that stakeholders copied on a ticket are informed about key updates without being directly involved in ticket handling.

When a ticket is created with CC users, they receive the initial notification. The subsequent agent replies are delivered directly as regular emails rather than separate notification triggers. However, whenever a public note is added to the ticket, a notification is sent to all CC’d users regardless of how the ticket was created.

 The types of CC notifications you can send are:

• New ticket created: This notification is sent to users added in the CC field only when an agent creates a ticket for a customer and adds them as CC. 
• Note added to the ticket: Sent to everyone in CC when a public note is added.

Example: notify stakeholders about escalations

Automatically notify managers when a public note is added if they are included as a CC on the ticket. Ensure that the relevant stakeholder is added as a CC when creating or updating the ticket.

1. Go to Admin > Workflows > Email Notifications.
2. Select CC Notifications.
   
3. Click Note added to ticket.
4. Review or customize the email template if needed. You can also add placeholders.
5. Click Save.

Using email notifications with automation

In addition to email notifications, you can also use automation rules to send emails to agents and customers. While notifications apply to all tickets automatically, automations give you more control. With automations, you send emails conditionally, target specific recipients, or substitute a notification with a custom message. Understanding which system is responsible for a given email helps you configure, edit, or stop it correctly.

The following sections describe the most common scenarios where email notifications and automation rules work together.  including how to identify which system is sending an email, when to use automations instead of notifications, and how to switch between the two temporarily.

Identify the source of the email notification

When a ticket is created or updated, Freshdesk may send an email from either a notification template or an automation rule. Both can be active at the same time and send emails independently.

This may lead to two common issues:

• You edit a notification template, but the customer still receives the same content, because an automation rule is sending its own email on the same event.
• You receive an email you did not set up, and you cannot find it in Email Notifications because it is triggered by an automation rule rather than a notification template.

To identify the source of an outgoing email, follow these steps:

1. Open the relevant ticket in Freshdesk.
2. Click Activities in the top-right corner of the ticket.
3. Review the log for any automation rule that ran on the ticket. If a rule is triggered, you will see the automation rule name.
   In this case, edit or disable the automation rule. You can click on the rule name to go to the Automation Rules page.
4. If no automation rule appears in the log, it indicates that the email is coming from a notification template. In this case, locate the matching notification type from the Email Notifications page. 

Tip: After-hours response emails and business-specific emails (such as return confirmations) are almost always sent by automation rules, not notification templates. Always check Show activities first before editing a notification template.

Use automations for conditional or targeted emails

As email notifications apply globally, you cannot filter them by recipient, ticket source, or any other condition. When you need more control over who receives an email or when it is sent, use an automation rule instead of, or in addition to, the notification.

Common scenarios where an automation rule is the right choice:

• Send a notification to specific email addresses:
  Use a ticket creation automation rule with the condition "In Tickets > if To email > Is > [email address]" and action send email to group, agent, or requester.
• Exclude specific customers from receiving notifications:
  In this case, keep the notification enabled and add a ticket creation automation rule with the action Skip new ticket email notifications for the excluded recipients.
• Send a business-specific or custom email:
  Use a ticket creation automation rule with conditions specific to that ticket type, priority, or time window instead of modifying the global notification template.

Customize reply and forward templates

Reply and forward templates define the default content that appears in the agent reply editor when an agent responds to or forwards a ticket.

You can include the [#{{ticket.id}}] in the subject line to ensure that email conversations are threaded properly. You can also control the content that appears by setting a default font in Helpdesk Settings and allow agents to choose their own font preferences.

In addition to placeholders and formatting, you can also standardize communication by adding a global signature directly within the template. This ensures that every agent’s reply includes consistent branding, contact details, or disclaimers. You can customize signatures in the template body using HTML. However, agents can still personalize their individual signatures from their profile settings if required.

To update a reply or forward template:

1. Go to Admin > Workflows > Email Notifications.
2. Select Reply Templates.
   
3. Edit the required template.
   
4. Use Insert Placeholder to add fields such as Ticket ID. You can also add prefixes to the placeholder. For example, add your product name to all Ticket IDs when replying using [#prefix-{{ticket.id}}]. 
   For more details, see Use dynamic placeholders.
5. Click Save.