Managing automations

Once an automation exists, you run it through its states — from draft to active, pausing and resuming as you need, and archiving it when it's done. What you can do to an automation depends on the state it's in. This page covers the lifecycle and the actions available at each step.

The automation lifecycle

An automation moves through a small set of states, shown as a status badge on the list and in the builder header.

stateDiagram-v2
    [*] --> Draft
    Draft --> Active: activate sequence
    Active --> Paused: pause
    Paused --> Active: reactivate
    Active --> Archived: archive
    Paused --> Archived: archive
    Draft --> Archived: archive
    Active --> Unpaid: balance runs out
    Unpaid --> Active: top up balance
    Archived --> [*]
    class Active success
    class Paused destructive
    class Unpaid destructive
    class Archived destructive

State	What it means	Editable?
Draft	Being built — "Awaiting for the required automation steps to be completed." Not yet listening for its trigger.	Yes
Active	Running — "Automation activated and ready to receive events that trigger messages."	Limited — save changes to apply them
Paused	"not listening for events. No messages will be sent." Can be reactivated.	Limited
Archived	Terminal — "cannot be edited or resumed." Kept as a read-only record.	No
Unpaid	Blocked because the project ran out of balance — "Not enough funds. Please add credit to resume."	No

Actions

The lifecycle actions live in the builder header and the list's actions menu:

Action	What it does	Available when
Activate sequence	Starts listening for the trigger.	Draft (and after the activation checks pass)
Pause sequence	Stops enrolling and sending; can be reactivated.	Active
Reactivate sequence	Resumes a paused automation.	Paused
Archive	Sends it to a terminal, read-only state.	Any non-archived state
Clone sequence	Copies it into a new Draft — without its results.	Any state
Delete	Removes it permanently — "All configured data will be lost."	Draft only

The activation checks (a trigger event, at least one active message with content, and no active message exceeds its channel length limit) are covered in Sequences.

Contacts already in the sequence

When you pause, archive or cancel an automation, contacts who are partway through the sequence (waiting between messages) are affected differently from new ones.

Unsaved changes

The builder does not autosave. When you have pending edits, a banner appears with the option to save them or Discard changes. Save before leaving the editor, or your changes are lost. On an Active automation, your edits take effect once you save.

To read what an active automation is doing, see Analytics.