Email Forwarding Rules

The Email Forwarding Rules, often known as Incoming Transport Rules, allow you to define conditions based on which an email can be forwarded. The transport rules will be processed after an email reaches the intended recipient's mailbox. You can configure transport rules in the Incoming Rules section under Security & Compliance.

Create a New Rule

Follow these steps to create a new email forwarding rule: 

1. Log in to Zoho Mail Admin Console and select Security & Compliance in the left pane.
2. Navigate to Forwarding Filter (Level 3) under Incoming Rules and click Create New Rule if you are creating the first rule.

   Note:

   You must enable Organization Rules in order to configure incoming transport rules. If you have not enabled it already, click Enable now from the Incoming Rules page. 

3. If there are any existing rules, select the Create drop-down and choose one of the below options:
   • Create new rule
   • Bcc emails from external senders to administrator
   • Forward emails with specific content to administrator
     
4. On the Create email forwarding rule page, enter the Rule name, an optional Rule Description, and click Proceed.
5. Select the Condition Type as per your requirement:
   • AND - Only if the incoming emails satisfy all the conditions you provided, the preferred action will be performed.
   • OR - Even if the incoming emails satisfy one of the conditions you provided, the preferred action will be performed.
   • Advanced - You can combine both AND & OR condition types, within a single condition, for the preferred action.
   • No Condition - When chosen, all the emails you receive will go through the preferred action.
6. Set your condition and preferred actions.
7. Click the   icon adjacent to Email forwarding addresses.
   
8. Search and add the desired recipients in the Add email forwarding address dialog.
9. Click Add and then click Proceed.

   Note:

   It is possible that there are one or more unverified email addresses in the Email forwarding address list. In such cases, you can enable the rules but, the email will not be forwarded to the unverified email address. Follow these steps to verify the email address in order to enable forwarding.

10. Click Proceed after you add the intended recipients to the Email forwarding addresses list.
11. After filter creation you can choose, to which users you want the rule to be applied. You can select one of the options below:
    • All Users - The rule will be applied to all the users in your organization.
    • Selected Users - The rule will be applied to the specific set of users you add.
    • All users excluding selected users - The rule will be applied to all the users except the ones added to the list.
12. To add users to the Selected Users or Excluded users list, simply select the respective option, and click the Add button.
13. Select the users you want to add to the list and click Proceed. You can also remove a user from the list by clicking the Delete icon next to the user.
14. Once done, click Proceed. You can review your rule on the preview page and set an expiry date if needed.
15. After reviewing the rule, select one of the below options:
    • Create & Enable Rule - Your rule will not only be created but also be activated automatically to start processing emails with respect to its conditions and actions.
    • Create Rule - Your rule will only be created and not activated. That means if you want the rule to be applied to the emails you receive, you will have to manually enable it.

Available Conditions

You can set up more than one condition in a single rule depending on your requirement. 

Operating parameters

Available Actions

Verify an Email Address

Follow these steps to verify an email address:

1. Log in to Zoho Mail Admin Console and click Security & Compliance.
2. Navigate to Forwarding Filter (Level 3) under Incoming Rules. The list of rules added by you appears.
   
3. Select the rule which has an unverified email address.
   
4. Click Verify Now in the Email verification pending dialog that appears. Alternatively, you can scroll down to locate the unverified email address and click Verify.
5. Enter the Confirmation code that was sent to the external email address and click the Verify icon. The email address gets verified successfully.

Rule Processing and Priority

You can add any number of email forwarding rule to process different types of incoming emails. In the case of multiple rules, the order of processing will be based on the Sequence. The rule with the highest sequence (1) will take precedence over the rules with a lower sequence (2). To change the sequence of the rules, follow these steps:

1. Log in to Zoho Mail Admin Console and click Security & Compliance.
2. Navigate to Forwarding Filter (Level 3) under Incoming Rules. The list of rules added by you appears.
   
3. Drag and drop the rules in the order of your preference. The sequence of rules gets updated as per your selection.

Enable or Disable a rule

You can enable or disable a rule to start or stop filtering.

1. Log in to Zoho Mail Admin Console and select Security & Compliance in the left pane.
2. Navigate to Forwarding Filter (Level 3) under Incoming Rules. The list of rules added by you appears.
   
3. Switch the Status toggle bar to ON/OFF in order to enable or disable a rule.
   

Remove expired rules from the list

In case you set an expiry date for the rules, you will find a number of expired rules in your list. You can remove them by using the Clear option.

1. Log in to Zoho Mail Admin Console and select Security & Compliance in the left pane.
2. Navigate to Forwarding Filter (Level 3) under Incoming Rules. The list of rules added by you appears.
   
3. Click Clear from the top menu and then select Delete in the Clear all expired rules warning dialog. This will remove all the filters that have already expired from your list.