Why is my campaign Active but not sending when I use my own Instantly account?
How to tell whether a stalled campaign is an Acquisity issue or an Instantly issue, and what to check in each.
This page is only for legacy workspaces that connect directly to their own Instantly.ai account. At some point you (or whoever set up your workspace) pasted an Instantly API key into Acquisity, and your mailboxes, domains, and warmup all live inside that Instantly account rather than on Acquisity-managed sending infrastructure.
Not sure which connection you have? See how to tell if you're connected to Instantly to confirm. If your workspace uses Acquisity-managed inboxes (all new workspaces do), this page doesn't apply. Use the standard stall checklist instead.
If your workspace is connected to Instantly, troubleshooting a stalled campaign works differently. The standard checklist assumes Acquisity manages your inboxes. With your own Instantly account connected, those checks can look perfectly fine while sending is still broken, because the real controls live inside Instantly, not Acquisity.
How to tell if you're connected to Instantly
Go to Settings → Cold Email Agent and look at the Outreach Providers card:
- If it shows a Managed by Acquisity badge, Acquisity runs your sending infrastructure. Use the standard stall checklist and Health & troubleshooting instead of this page.
- If it shows an Edit button, your workspace is currently connected to Instantly via API. This page is for you.
If you aren't seeing that page, check with your workspace owner or admin.
What Acquisity controls vs. what Instantly controls
When you connect your own Instantly account, Acquisity syncs your campaign setup (leads, sequences, schedule) to Instantly and pulls sending results back. But the actual sending machinery belongs to Instantly:
| Lives in Acquisity | Lives in your Instantly account |
|---|---|
| Campaign status (Active / Paused) | Whether emails actually go out |
| Leads and sequences | Mailbox connections and reconnects |
| Sending schedule you configured | Warmup and mailbox health |
| Analytics synced back from Instantly | Per-mailbox and per-campaign sending limits |
| The provider connection (API key) | Your Instantly plan, billing, and sending caps |
Because of this split, Acquisity has limited visibility into your mailboxes. A green status indicator in Acquisity means the last sync from Instantly reported the account as connected. It does not guarantee the mailbox is actually sending. Support has the same limitation: our team cannot see inside your Instantly account.
Step 1: Check the Acquisity side
Run these checks in Acquisity:
- Campaign status: open the campaign. It should say Active, with no Attention Needed banner.
- Sending schedule: on the campaign's Options tab, confirm you're inside the configured sending days and hours.
- Provider connection: in Settings → Cold Email Agent, the Outreach Providers card should show a green Connected badge. Click Test Connection to verify the link to Instantly is actually working right now, and Sync Campaigns to push the latest campaign setup to Instantly.
- Read any error shown: if the card shows Disconnected, it displays the specific error underneath. Run Test Connection first and read the message. If it points to an invalid or expired API key, click Edit and reconnect with a fresh key from Instantly (Settings → Integrations → API keys, with the all:all scope). If the error mentions anything else, such as webhooks or syncing, don't rotate the key. Contact Acquisity support instead.
- Compare the campaign in both systems: open the same campaign in your Instantly dashboard and confirm its setup (sequence, schedule, leads) matches what you configured in Acquisity. If the campaign is missing in Instantly or its configuration doesn't match, the sync between the two systems has failed. Contact Acquisity support.
These checks confirm what Acquisity is reporting, but they can't fully prove the two systems are in sync: the green badge reflects the last known connection state, not a live end-to-end check. If everything above looks fine and the configuration matches in both systems, the stall is likely on the Instantly side. Continue below. If anything is mismatched, missing, or failing, contact Acquisity support.
Step 2: Compare send counts
Now open your Instantly dashboard and look at the same campaign's sent count for the last few days.
- Instantly shows sends, but Acquisity shows 0: the emails are going out but results aren't syncing back. Contact support (open Feedback in the bottom-left sidebar, type "human agent") and mention that Instantly is sending but Acquisity analytics show zero.
- Instantly also shows 0 sends: Instantly hasn't sent anything. If the campaign exists in Instantly with matching configuration (Step 1), the cause is likely an Instantly-side setting. Continue to Step 3. If the campaign looks wrong or missing in Instantly, contact Acquisity support instead, because the sync may have failed.
Step 3: Check inside your Instantly account
Instantly maintains an official troubleshooting guide for campaigns that aren't sending. Work through it in your Instantly dashboard, starting with its Diagnose action: Campaign not sending: complete troubleshooting guide.
The most common culprits it covers include the Instantly campaign being paused or completed, the sending schedule and end date, mailbox errors or disconnects, warmup, sending-account assignment, campaign and account sending limits, follow-up timing for waiting leads, and your Instantly plan and billing status.
If none of these explain it, contact Instantly's support: they can see your account's sending logs, which neither you (from Acquisity) nor Acquisity support can access.
When to contact Acquisity support
Contact us (open Feedback in the bottom-left sidebar, type "human agent") when:
- The Outreach Providers card shows Disconnected with an error that isn't about the API key (for example, a webhook or sync error), or reconnecting with a fresh key doesn't fix it.
- Test Connection fails, Sync Campaigns doesn't bring the two systems in line, or the campaign's setup in Instantly doesn't match Acquisity.
- Instantly shows sends but Acquisity analytics stay at zero.
- You want to move off your own Instantly account onto Acquisity-managed sending.
Please mention up front that you use your own connected Instantly account. It saves a round of back-and-forth, since our team can't see into third-party Instantly accounts.
Related
- Why did my campaign stall at 200 emails?: the checklist for Acquisity-managed inboxes
- Health & troubleshooting: inbox statuses for managed accounts
- How do I disconnect Instantly from Acquisity?