Journeys are automated email sequences that run for individual contacts. Each contact gets their own "run" through the journey — their own timer, their own decision results, their own send history.
### Journey Status Lifecycle
| Status | Meaning | |---|---| | **Draft** | Being built. No contacts are enrolled. | | **Active** | Enrolling eligible contacts and processing runs. | | **Paused** | No new enrollments; in-progress runs hold at their current step. | | **Archived** | No active processing. Return it to draft before activating it again. |
- **Activate:** Activation publishes the Journey. Eligible contacts can enroll immediately. A future start date in **Delivery safeguards** delays the first action; activating early never bypasses that date. - **Pause:** In-progress contacts keep their place and resume when you reactivate. - **Archive:** Cannot archive a journey with active runs.
### Automatic Enrollment
Automatic enrollment rules live in the **Delivery safeguards** tab.
1. Open the **Delivery safeguards** tab. 2. Use the **Audience editor** to build matching rules. 3. Click **Preview** to see which contacts currently match. 4. Click **Save enrollment rules** to save.
**How enrollment works:** - When the journey is **active** and you save enrollment rules, eligible contacts who currently match and do not already have an active run are enrolled right away. - The platform also re-evaluates contacts when relevant data changes — for example, when a tag is added. - When the journey is **draft** or **paused**, saving rules stores criteria but does not enroll anyone. - Duplicate-run and eligibility safeguards are always enforced.