Support Knowlege Base

Email / My Emails are Arriving Late

You are expecting an important email from someone and it arrives an hour later instead of in a minute or two.

Below are a few ways to determine what maybe causing the delay:

1) Check The Domain's Mail Server

MX Toolbox has a free tool to analyse issues. Just enter your domain name inside the form to begin.

2) Analyze The Message Headers

To find the answer you can analyze the message headers. Email programs will show you the "message headers". This header will show you the actual route the email traveled from the sender's mail server to your mail server. The IP addresses are listed in the reverse order so start from the bottom to see the actual path travelled.

If you can't understand it, try coping the full message header into Google Apps Toolbox.

This tool will analyze the email’s path and, based on the timestamps when it passed the different machines, it will tell you the exact source that is responsible for delaying the message delivery.

The toolbox is part of Google Apps but it should be able to analyze messages from other email programs too.