Suddenly after the latest update Discourse sneds mails with: “Someone replied to a topic you are Watching.” prefacing every email. All my users are complaining heavily, and none have changed any email settings. All say it is very annoying. So, what has happened, and how can we turn this off and r…

[image] Ethsim2: The only workaround today is editing the affected email templates and removing or moving %{email_preview} The preview strings can also be overridden - you can search for the specific string or .preview and then Ctrl-F search user_notifications to find them. From the commit m…

I think the source of the annoyance for Andrew’s community members is %{header_instructions}. That token expands to a fairly large block of boilerplate (“do not reply…”, links, instructions, etc.) and it appears at the very top of the email body in many notification templates. For experienced users…

@Ethsim2 thanks that’s really great. But why did this suddenly change? I am no expert at reading or even locating change logs.

@Andro yep - totally fair question. The “suddenly” part is because %{header_instructions} isn’t something you changed locally: it’s a core-provided block that Discourse injects into a number of notification emails. If core changes its wording or when it’s included, everyone will notice immediately …

[image] Andro: But why did this suddenly change? These previews were added a few days ago https://github.com/discourse/discourse/pull/36657

So just removing %{email_preview} from the templates would fix this?

And then Tracking, etc, as indicated in the topic notification status dropdown.

[image] ToddZ: The word Watching is often capitalized in reference to the specific Discourse function. To be honest, I would not have figured that out. I get it, but its a bit unusual, in a way.

Thanks, that makes sense. So in this case the sudden change Andro is seeing comes from %{email_preview} being added recently (PR #36657), which explains why it appeared overnight without any admin changes. From an admin point of view the pain point is similar either way: it’s core-injected content…

For reference, this is how the new preview text is surfacing in Outlook for iOS for me - it’s not just an inbox snippet; it becomes the first visible line associated with the message, which is what users are reacting to. [Outlook for iOS Mail screenshot showing “Someone replied to your post.” appe…

Change in behaviour re mail

Product Support

ToddZ January 12, 2026, 1:46pm 7

The word Watching is often capitalized in reference to the specific Discourse function.

I’m always watching for interesting topics to appear. But I’m Watching certain topics for any new replies.

Topic		Replies	Views
Someone replied to a topic you are Watching Product Support	13	815	February 19, 2026
Customizing specific system email templates Site Management email , how-to	8	13701	November 3, 2025
Difficult to tell that watched category notifications are to the forum UX	20	1708	February 19, 2021
Show categories in e-mail notifications Feature	50	9566	October 13, 2014
Forcing email context - input requested Feature email	71	12555	April 10, 2016

Change in behaviour re mail

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