SharePoint Alerts in SharePoint Online are being deprecated and will be fully retired by July 2026.
The retirement process began in July 2025, with new tenants unable to create new alerts. By September 2025, all tenants will be affected, and by October 2025, an expiration feature will be enabled, causing all alerts to expire after 30 days. Users can manually re-enable expired alerts for another 30 days. Microsoft recommends migrating to SharePoint Rules for modern notification solutions.
Description/What is it?
Alerts are notifications of content changes on a site, sent via email or text message to your mobile phone.
Prerequisite
Contribute/Edit" access to the SharePoint site list or document library where you wish to receive notifications.
Would you like some self-help with this topic?
To get alerts on item changes in SharePoint:
You can receive an alert whenever a file, link, or folder is changed in a SharePoint document library. Depending on the item (file, folder, or link), you may see different options when setting an alert.
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Go to the list or library.
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Select the file, link, or folder for which you want to receive an alert.
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From the options menu, select the ellipses (...), then choose "Alert Me."
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In the "Alert me when items change" dialog, select and adjust the options as needed.
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To save, select "OK."
To get alerts on all changes in a SharePoint document library:
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Go to the list or library and ensure no items are selected.
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From the options menu, select the ellipses (...), then choose "Alert Me."
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In the "Alert me when items change" dialog, adjust or fill in the desired options.
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Select "OK" to save.
To Cancel alerts in SharePoint:
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Go to the list or library where you've set the alerts, select the ... (ellipses), and then select Manage my alerts.
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In My Alerts on this Site, next to the alert you want to delete, select the checkbox.
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Select Delete Selected Alerts, and then select OK.
Technical Limitations
The alerts feature may experience issues when used with certain other features, including:
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Usernames or folders containing special characters. While some Microsoft apps accept ampersands (&) and single quotation marks ('), these characters cannot be used for alerts.
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Alerts or views that filter on multi-value, lookup, or calculated columns.
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Libraries that require content approval.
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A limit of 50 immediate alert emails per subscribed email address per minute across all lists and libraries.
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Daily alert emails will include up to 25 activities for a maximum of 50 items per list or library.