Troubleshoot BIMI issues

Follow the troubleshooting steps in this article if:

Many BIMI issues can be identified and resolved by following the steps in this section.

First, verify BIMI is set up correctly

Before you take any troubleshooting steps, make sure your BIMI record is set up correctly by verifying the setup steps in Set up BIMI.

If your brand logo doesn’t appear as expected in the recipient’s inbox, there are several possible causes.

Recommended steps:

Email client doesn't support BIMI

Verify that the recipient is using an email client that supports BIMI. Refer to the documentation for the email client.

For DKIM authentication:

If you're setting up DKIM with an email system other than Google Workspace, do not use the DKIM length tag (l=) in your outgoing messages. Messages using this tag are vulnerable to abuse. Learn more

For VMC issues:

Verify the status of your VMC. Check with the certificate authority that issued your VMC. Learn more
If your VMC is approved, verify that the PEM file for the VMC is accessible on your public web server.
Verify that you've appended any other issued files or certificates to your PEM file. Learn more
If you have hosting issues or errors with the PEM file, contact your domain provider.
Verify the URL for the PEM file is correct in your BIMI DNS TXT record. Learn more
Make sure the SVG embedded in the VMC is correctly formatted.

For BIMI logo image issues, verify that:

The SVG file for your brand logo meets the requirements and recommendations for BIMI image files. Learn more
The SVG file is accessible on your public web server.
The public web server is in the same domain as the domain where you added the DNS TXT record for BIMI.
The URL for the SVG file is correct in your BIMI DNS TXT record. Learn more.

If messages from your domain are sent to spam, the issue might be email authentication for your domain.

Recommended steps:

Verify DMARC is correctly set up for your domain. Learn more about email authentication, and get detailed setup steps at Prevent spam, spoofing & phishing with Gmail authentication.
Verify your DMARC policy is using values that support BIMI:
- Policy option (p) must be set to quarantine or reject. BIMI doesn’t support DMARC policies that have the p option set to none.
- Percent option (pct) must be set to 100. This value applies the DMARC policy to all outgoing mail (100 percent) from your domain. BIMI doesn’t support DMARC policies that have a pct value other than 100.

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