Rule types

Learn about incoming, outgoing, and action rule types in Missive.

Pick one rule type. This determines when the rule runs.

Incoming messages

Fires when a message arrives in your inbox from any of these channels:

Channel	What it catches
Email	New emails received
SMS	Incoming text messages via Twilio
WhatsApp	Incoming WhatsApp messages
Messenger	Facebook Messenger messages
Instagram	Instagram Direct Messages
Live Chat	Messages from Missive Live Chat widget
Post	API posts, call logs (Dialpad, Aircall, etc.)

Incoming message rules run before the message appears in anyone's inbox. Actions happen instantly.

Outgoing messages

Fires when you or a teammate sends a message:

Channel	What it catches
Email	Emails sent from Missive
SMS	Outgoing text messages
WhatsApp	Outgoing WhatsApp messages
Messenger	Outgoing Facebook messages
Instagram	Outgoing Instagram DMs
Live Chat	Agent responses in Live Chat

Common uses:

• Auto-assign conversations to the person who replied

• Schedule follow-up reminders

• Apply labels to track sent messages

User actions

Fires when someone does something in Missive:

Action	When it fires
New comment	A comment or task is added to a conversation
Label change	A label is added or removed
Conversation closed	Someone closes a conversation
Conversation reopened	A closed conversation is reopened
Assignee changed	Assignees are added or removed
Team changed	Conversation moves to a different team

User action rules can fire for any user in the organization, or you can filter to specific people using the Action initiator condition.

User action rules only trigger when actual users perform these actions.

Rules performing these actions (like an incoming message rule adding a label) will not trigger user action rules. Put all your actions in a single rule instead of trying to chain rules together.

Personal vs organization rules

Personal rules only fire on your private conversations.

Organization rules only fire on conversations shared with that organization.

If you need a rule to work on both, create two rules - one personal, one organizational.

To copy a rule from one type to the other, click ••• on the rule and select Export, then create a new rule and click Import in the bottom-right corner of the rule editor.