autoresponder

noun

au·​to·​re·​spond·​er ˌȯ-tō-ri-ˈspän-dər 

variants or auto-responder or less commonly auto responder

plural autoresponders or auto-responders also auto responders

: a software feature that automatically sends a response to incoming messages (such as emails)

… it has an email autoresponder that you can use to send follow-up emails to customers after they have made a purchase.

—Angela Scott-Briggs

The auto responder is a company's introduction to potential clients and customers. It sends … informational messages to site registrants. It delivers reminders about products and services.

—Mitch Tuch

Think about a short message—conveyed on voice mail and on email and SMS auto-responders—that says something like: "As you can imagine, I'm very busy at the moment. …"

—Kwame Anthony Appiah

also : a response sent by an autoresponder : auto-response

"One of the most important things that I do before I go on vacation to keep me from being overwhelmed after is I put up an autoresponder that is a little bit more detailed than 'Hey, I'm out of the office from this day to this day.' …"

—Anna Dearmon Kornick, quoted in HuffPost

An SMS autoresponder … is an automated message that is sent to customers. The message is triggered when a customer sends a text to the business.

—PRWeb Newswire

"If you want weekends off, you can write an auto-responder that says, 'I'm away from my e-mail until Monday morning. If this is an emergency, please call me on my cell,'" suggests [Sherry] Turkle.

—Liz Welch

Examples of autoresponder in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Lauren Goode: Boone wrote back to my autoresponder the other day. —Michael Calore, WIRED, 17 Oct. 2024

So consider using an email autoresponder to save yourself some time. —Mark Snell, Forbes, 9 June 2022

Is there anything more satisfying than setting up an OOO autoresponder? —Emma Laperruque, Bon Appétit, 1 Aug. 2022

Word History

Etymology

auto- + responder

First Known Use

1994, in the meaning defined above