Email Footers
Email Footers are the org-wide blocks of text appended to outbound mail from Salesforce, configured through the Email Footers Setup page.
Definition
Email Footers are the org-wide blocks of text appended to outbound mail from Salesforce, configured through the Email Footers Setup page. Two kinds exist: a general email footer attached to mail sent through Apex, Workflow, Flow, and the standard composer, and a mass email footer that appends to List Email and legacy Mass Email sends. Each footer is plain text, capped at 32 KB, and applied unconditionally to its respective send category across the entire org.
The feature exists for compliance, not branding. Most organizations use email footers to satisfy regulatory disclaimer requirements: CAN-SPAM addresses, GDPR data-handling notices, financial services compliance text, healthcare HIPAA boilerplate. The text is not a marketing signature; that lives in per-user signatures on the User record. The footer is the small-print legal text appended to every outbound send.
How email footers behave across sends
General Footer versus Mass Email Footer
The Setup page exposes two text areas. The General Footer applies to mail sent through Apex SingleEmailMessage, Workflow Email Alerts, Flow Send Email actions, Quick Send from the composer, and Email-to-Case auto-responses. The Mass Email Footer applies to List Email sends and legacy Mass Email. The split exists because mass-marketing email has different compliance requirements than transactional and one-to-one mail. Most orgs configure both with similar but distinct text.
Plain text only, 32 KB cap
Both footers are plain text. There is no HTML editor for the footer text, no styling, no images, no links beyond raw URLs that the receiving mail client may render as hyperlinks. The 32 KB cap is generous; typical footers run a few hundred bytes. The plain-text constraint means complex compliance footers with multiple branded sections must be inserted in templates instead, since the org-wide footer cannot match a branded template visually.
How the footer attaches to HTML email
When the platform sends HTML email, the footer is appended after the HTML body, wrapped in a basic paragraph element. The footer renders below the message in the recipient mail client, separated by a horizontal break in most clients. There is no way to position the footer elsewhere or to style it. If branding is critical, build the disclaimer into the email template itself and leave the org-wide footer blank.
Per-template override
Email templates can opt out of the org-wide footer by including the Skip Email Footer setting on the template. This is the only way to suppress the footer for specific transactional emails (a password reset, a payment confirmation) where adding a compliance footer is inappropriate. Audit your templates regularly; templates with Skip Email Footer enabled bypass any compliance check.
Per-user override (or lack of it)
There is no per-user override for the footer. Every send from every user receives the footer (unless the template opts out). This is the design intent: compliance footers cannot be optional or user-configurable, otherwise they fail to satisfy regulatory requirements. The trade-off is that you cannot exempt the CEO's personal sends from the standard footer.
Unicode and multi-language footers
The footer text is stored as Unicode and renders correctly in multi-language sends. However, the org-wide setting is a single value, so an org sending in multiple languages must either pick one footer language for everyone, or move language-specific footers into the email templates. Many global orgs use English as the lingua franca for the org-wide footer and add localized addenda in templates.
Auditing what users actually receive
Email Activity logs (EmailMessage records under Enhanced Email) do not store the rendered email body with the footer applied; they store the body the sender composed. To verify what recipients actually receive, send test messages to an external address and inspect the raw mail headers and body. This is a frequent source of confusion: the activity log looks like the footer is missing, but the actual sent mail has it.
Set up Email Footers for compliance
Configuring the org-wide footers is a five-minute Setup task, but the design decisions before it (which footer goes where, which templates opt out) take real consideration. The checklist below covers both.
- Gather the legal text
Work with legal or compliance to get the exact disclaimer text. Get sign-off in writing on what goes in the General Footer and what goes in the Mass Email Footer; they often differ.
- Navigate to Email Footers
Setup > Email > Email Footers. The page has two text areas: General Footer and Mass Email Footer. Both are plain text.
- Paste the General Footer
Paste the General Footer text. Save. The footer will now append to mail sent through Apex, Workflow, Flow, Quick Send, and Email-to-Case auto-responses.
- Paste the Mass Email Footer
Paste the Mass Email Footer text. Save. This footer will append to List Email and Mass Email sends.
- Test from the composer
Send a test mail from the standard composer to an external address you control. Confirm the footer renders correctly in the receiving mail client. Test plain-text and HTML.
- Test from a List Email send
Run a small List Email to a test segment of internal addresses. Confirm the Mass Email Footer renders. The footer differs from the General Footer, so this test is separate.
- Audit templates for Skip Email Footer
Run a metadata search for templates with Skip Email Footer enabled. Confirm each is intentionally exempt; usually only transactional templates (password reset) should skip the footer.
Plain text up to 32 KB. Appended to Apex, Workflow, Flow, Quick Send, and Email-to-Case auto-responses.
Plain text up to 32 KB. Appended to List Email and Mass Email sends; usually contains marketing-specific disclaimer language.
Per-template flag that suppresses the org-wide footer. Use for transactional templates where a compliance footer is inappropriate.
Org-wide default character encoding for sent mail. Affects how the footer renders for non-ASCII text.
Per-user setting affecting which address mail comes from. Footers apply regardless of From address.
- Footer text is plain text only. There is no HTML editor; complex branded disclaimers must go in email templates instead.
- EmailMessage records store composed body, not the rendered version with footer applied. Auditing the database does not confirm footer compliance.
- Templates with Skip Email Footer enabled bypass the org-wide footer entirely. Audit which templates have this set before relying on the footer for legal compliance.
- There is no per-user override. If a senior leader insists their personal mail should not carry the corporate footer, the only solution is a custom template with Skip Email Footer.
- The General Footer and Mass Email Footer are independent settings. Configuring one does not configure the other; the most common setup mistake is missing the second.
About the Author
Dipojjal Chakrabarti is a B2C Solution Architect with 29 Salesforce certifications and over 13 years in the Salesforce ecosystem. He runs salesforcedictionary.com to help admins, developers, architects, and cert/interview candidates sharpen their fundamentals. More about Dipojjal.
Test your knowledge
Q1. In which area of Salesforce would you typically find Email Footers?
Q2. Can a Salesforce admin configure Email Footers without writing code?
Q3. Why is understanding Email Footers important for Salesforce admins?
Discussion
Loading discussion…