Why am I receiving duplicate emails?

 

Overview

This article provides common reasons you may receive duplicate emails and ways to prevent this from occurring.

Confirming an email is a duplicate

You can confirm if an email is a duplicate by reviewing the headers of the message. If it's a duplicate, you will see the same Message-Id value in the different emails:

"Message-Id: <46007331.1050908@example.com>"

Reviewing your email settings

Review each of the following sections as these are most often the cause of receiving duplicate emails.

Corrupted POP3 profile

The most common cause using the POP3 protocol in your email client. The POP3 protocol is known to download the same message in the following situations:

  • If you have enabled the option "leave a copy on the server".
  • If you're accessing the same email account on multiple computers.

Unfortunately, there's not much you can do to eliminate duplicate messages unless you change the way you access that particular email account.

If you do not have a specific reason to use a POP connection, it's highly recommended you update it to an IMAP connection instead. View the POP3 vs IMAP article for further details.

Forwarding addresses

Another common cause is if you have configured multiple addresses to forward to one address.  If so, your email client will view them as new email messages.

Review your domain's email settings in the panel to ensure you have not created multiple forward addresses.

See also

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Article last updated PST.

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