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[kba]

Clearbit shut down their avatar service Dec.1.

https://clearbit.com/changelog/2025-06-10 [nofollow]

[milligandw]

Looks like Clearbit sunset the free api but a subscription api is still available. I suspected that it may have been an api fee issue. But what about Gravatar?

https://docs.gravatar.com/pricing/

[Martin - Aqua Mail Support]

Hello,

We’re aware of the Clearbit change, and this is indeed where the issue originally came from. As for Gravatar, it should still be working (and it does in our internal tests). That said, we know some users are still seeing problems in real-world usage.

We’re currently working on a solution to improve the reliability of avatar fetching and fallback handling, and this should be live soon.

Thank you very much for your patience, we really appreciate it.

[Boothy]

Hi Martin,
Thanks for the update. Hopefully the issue is resolved soon.

When you mentioned "some users" are experiencing a lack of icons showing - is there anything I / we can do on our side? Any idea why only some, and not all users are affected?.

Cheers,
Dave.

[Martin - Aqua Mail Support]

Update: Contact images are now provided via the Apistemic service instead of Clearbit. Because of this change, images may take a few seconds to load, especially the first time they are displayed. This delay is expected and depends on network conditions and the availability of the image on the service side. Once loaded, the images are usually cached and should appear faster next time.

This is the current behavior of the feature.

[Justin]

Thanks. Do we need an app update for that?

Additional question:
Any news about this issue?

Stored contact images were not shown in notifications.

[Boothy]

Hi Martin,
Thanks for the update.

I've opened Aqua Mail (version 1.56.0-589, originally Pro) on my Google Pixel 6 (android 16), & Samsung Galaxy Tab S4 (android 10), but no external contact images are displayed other than the ones I have personally attached to my own contacts.

I've cleared cache (after leaving A.M. open for over 5 minutes - still no avatars for "common" senders (Amazon.com; Google calendar / Play / alerts, etc; Ancestry.com; Santander bank; Chase bank....). Some of those I imagine should have an icon from Apistemic or Gravatar (if that's supposed to be working?).

I believe my settings should allow the avatars to show up - I'll attach a screenshot. Maybe they'll show up later if Apistemic service is still "loading"?

[Martin - Aqua Mail Support]

The updates is available for all beta users.

Justin, no news, we are still investigating and trying to reproduce the issue.

[Justin]

Hi, some weeks ago I sent screenshots to your email address and answered your question.

I don't know how it is not reproducable for you. It happens on all 4 devices here (Samsung).

What about other users in this thread?

Could you please check if there are contact images in notifications? Not for me.

[milligandw]

No contact avatars yet on my device. It may coincidental, but I'm pretty sure they stopped working just after I installed the early December update. It was mentioned earlier that some users are experiencing this issue.

Could it be that for financial reasons this feature was effectively removed in the Pro perpetual license version, but is still included in the subscription version? This would make good business (model) sense given the change that occurred with Clearbit in December, i.e. , when they discontinued the "free" API option.

[Boothy]

Martin mentioned the update is currently available on the Beta version of the app (which I'm not running) so it looks like we might have to wait for the release version to check things out.

[stephanre]

Released now.
TY

[Boothy]

Thanks for the heads-up, Stephanre 👍

I've now updated the app, and see many more accounts with icon badges showing 😁

Obviously not every "business" sender has their avatar registered on Apistemic, but its a great improvement thanks Martin.👍👌

A few fairly well-known senders not showing icons (other than single-letter circles) -
PayPal, Halifax, Sainsbury's, Outlook, Ancestry, National Trust.

[milligandw]

I'm not seeing a new release on Google Play.

[Boothy]

I'm on post-Pro version which is the updated one I just installed from Google Play, here...

1.57.0-603

2026-02-09 13:59
c0b2ea8576

Does that help?