System permanently thinks there are user approvals outstanding

[Moin]

Welcome to Meta

@PHolder

It would be nice if there was an option to have the system not constantly message me about approvals as they occur, but have a way to delay it for just me until some editable criteria are matched (say at least 10 approvals or at least one for more than a week or something like that.)

There is the pending users reminder delay minutes site setting.

That helps with how often the message is sent.

@PHolder

The problem I am reporting is that even when the other admin [dis]approves all outstanding users, we immediately get a system message saying there are still 6 outstanding users. It’s been like this since I got promoted to a co-admin, so years.

Sometimes it happens that not all users are automatically approved when approval for new users is enabled. I know of at least 2 bugs that cause this ([1] & [2]).
You can try to find and approve the users. I prefer to use the data explorer plugin, but it’s also possible to export all users in case you don’t have access to that plugin.

Then you can try to use the approve button on the admin page of those users. If the button doesn’t work, you’ll have to wait for a fix (Approval button on user's profile doesn't work)