Personal message rate limit also limits "Something Else" flags

zogstrip · February 24, 2026, 1:02pm

Thanks @jericson for the report, I “skipped” the “PM rate limit” when using a flag that generates a PM to the moderators in

github.com/discourse/discourse

FIX: Exclude notify_moderators PMs from personal message rate limit (#38021)

main ← fix/notify-moderators-pm-rate-limit

merged 01:27PM - 24 Feb 26 UTC

ZogStriP

+22 -0

When a user flags a post with "Something Else", Discourse creates a private mess…age to moderators containing the flag details. This PM is created with the flagger as the topic owner, which causes it to count against the user's `max_personal_messages_per_day` rate limit. This means users who have exhausted their daily PM quota cannot flag posts with the "Something Else" reason, even though the flag itself has its own independent rate limits (`max_flags_per_day` with trust level multipliers). The error message ("You've reached the maximum messages allowed per day") is also confusing in a flagging context. This fix excludes topics with the `notify_moderators` subtype from the PM per-day rate limit check in `Topic#limit_private_messages_per_day`. Flag-generated PMs are system-initiated side effects, not user-initiated messages, and should not count against the personal message quota. https://meta.discourse.org/t/257002

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Personal message rate limit also limits "Something Else" flags

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