Have you noticed the recent changes in the information in Contact View in Eloqua?
- Invalid means an email address is deemed undeliverable by Eloqua.
- Inactive is a helpful metric indicating the fatigue level for a specific contact.
When a contact is marked as invalid, this means an email address is deemed undeliverable by Eloqua. This protects us all from inadvertently mailing to spam traps (often old/out of use email addresses). The Marketing Automation team monitors this, and you can get in touch with us if you have concerns about (a) specific contact(s).
Inactive is a helpful metric indicating the level of activity for a specific contact, the amount they are “fatigued,” defined as having received no emails in the last 45 days or indicating this is a new contact with no engagement history. This is not a problem and does not prevent the contact from receiving emails.
See this screenshot for the fatigue level (on the left) and the Status (Invalid) on the right in Bucky Badger’s Contact View in Eloqua:
Fatigue Level is a new(ish) metric that became available in fall 2025 with some of the Advanced Intelligence features Oracle released. It is only meant to help us understand that contact’s behavior, and it is not a permanent condition—this activity level will be constantly evaluated and can change based on the contact’s behavior. You can filter on this metric in a Segment to help you contact or exclude those who have a specific status. i.e. you may want to exclude those who have been labeled inactive or perhaps reach out to them with a re-engagement campaign.