Viewing the HTML and original source for incoming tickets

Email sent to your Zendesk instance has two parts that can be used for creating the ticket: the plain text and the HTML.

By default, Zendesk uses the HTML part of the inbound email to create tickets and comments. This means that any rich content in emails is retained and displayed in tickets, with a few exceptions.

You can view and download the original email for any ticket created by email from an end user, including the text version, HTML version, and the source header. This can be useful for troubleshooting issues.

This article contains the following sections:

• Viewing rich content in incoming tickets
• Viewing and downloading the original email for a ticket

Viewing rich content in incoming tickets

By default, Zendesk uses the HTML part of the inbound email to create tickets and comments. Any rich content in emails is retained and displayed in tickets.

Rich content includes:

• Full color, basic formatting, code blocks, tables, and inline images
• Basic formatting options, such as bold, italic, and underline
• Code blocks
• Tables
• Inline images

Special fonts and background images are not supported and do not appear in tickets.

Rich content for inbound tickets is enabled by default, so you can view any HTML included in an incoming ticket or comment directly in the ticket.

You can deactivate the rich content option if you want to use the plain text version of incoming emails (which has no formatting) to create tickets instead. See Disabling rich content in incoming emails.

Viewing and downloading the original email for a ticket

Note: On May 9, 2023, Zendesk is introducing a 365-day limit for retaining original emails for tickets. After 365 days, the View original email option won't be available. See Announcing a 365-day limit for View Original Email.

By default, Zendesk uses the HTML part of the inbound email to create tickets and comments so that you can view any rich content included in incoming emails directly in the ticket.

You also can view and download the entire original email for any ticket created by inbound email from an end user. The original email includes the following:

• Text version of the email
• HTML version of the email
• Source header for the email

Note: Depending on the end user's email server settings, you might not see all this information.

Viewing the source header information for the email can be valuable for troubleshooting email issues, such as email pass-through and forwarding.

To view the original email for a ticket created by inbound email

1. Open a ticket created by inbound email.
2. Hover your mouse over the original comment.
3. Click the arrow that appears, then select View original email.

   

   Alternatively, you can click Show all events above the comments, then scroll down and click Show email.

   The original email appears in a new window.

4. View the text version in the Text tab, or click HTML to view the HTML version, or click Source to view the email source header.
   Note: Depending on the end user's email server settings, you might not see the text or HTML version. Some email servers do not send that information.

To download the source for the original email

1. Open a ticket created by inbound email.
2. Hover your mouse over the original comment.
3. Click the arrow that appears, then select View original email.

   The original email appears in a new window.

4. Click the Source tab, then click Download source in the upper-right.