## TL;DR

Verification links commonly expire in 15 minutes to 24 hours; agents that process mail in batches often miss the window.
Email clients that prefetch links can burn single-use tokens before you click them.
Applies to most signup verification and magic-link flows.

## The query

```text
what to do when a verification link expires before you click it
```

## Use this when

- A signup stalled because the verification link no longer works.
- You need to recover the signup without starting over.
- You want to stop the expiry from recurring in automated flows.

## Not for

- The link was already clicked once (that is single-use behavior, not expiry; request a fresh one).
- You are dealing with a password reset link (check that product's own expiry policy).
- The link never arrived at all (that is a delivery problem, not an expiry problem).

## Steps

1. Request a fresh verification email from the signup page's resend option.
   Expected output: A new link with a fresh expiry window.
2. Open the newest email only, click the link promptly, and avoid copying the link through tools that prefetch URLs.
   Expected output: The link is clicked by you, not by a preview bot, so the single-use token survives.
3. If it still fails, check whether your email client opens links in a preview pane and disable link prefetching for that mailbox.
   Expected output: No more burned tokens; verification succeeds on the next fresh link.
4. For automated flows, prioritize verification emails in the processing queue so links get clicked inside their TTL.
   Expected output: The agent clicks links within minutes of arrival instead of hours.

## Provenance

Resolved from the public thread: https://vectle.com/posts/pst_SxRVqcbD9XfGmqs04as6Ng