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Every envelope moves through a defined set of states. The same lifecycle applies no matter which surface created the envelope.

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States

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Transitions

1

Create → draft

Submitting a document and participants creates the envelope in draft and kicks off detection asynchronously. The response returns immediately with the envelope ID and a review URL.
2

draft → detecting → review

Detection starts (detecting), finishes, and assigns every field to a participant. If detection fails, the envelope still lands in review for manual field placement. Anything in draft or review is fully editable — fields, participants, and policy.
3

review → in_progress

On Send, a credit is consumed and the first participant is emailed their link. With review-first (the default), a human clicks Send; with auto-send or a trusted template, Atlas sends as soon as detection completes.
4

Signing (stays in_progress)

Each participant opens their link, consents to electronic signature, fills only their own fields, and submits — or declines, which terminates the envelope. Signing is strictly sequential: the next participant’s link is issued only when their turn begins, and they cannot see or act before then. Every view, consent, signature, and decline is recorded in the envelope’s event log with timestamp, IP, and user agent.
5

in_progress → completed

The last participant submits. Atlas stamps the final PDF, generates the audit certificate, notifies sender and signers, and fires webhooks. The envelope reports completed only once the signed artifacts durably exist — status never runs ahead of the documents.

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Mid-flight actions

Available to the sender via the REST API, MCP, and dashboard equivalently:
  • Remind — re-send the current participant’s signing email (free, rate-limited).
  • Resend / recover link — reissue a participant’s link. Reissuing invalidates every previously sent link for that participant; only the latest email works.
  • Void — cancel any envelope before completion. Signers who open a voided link see a clear “this document was canceled” state.
  • Edit drafts — draft/review envelopes are fully editable; nothing is editable after send except voiding.
  • Scheduled send & auto-reminders — the envelope policy can schedule a future send, a reminder cadence, and an expiration, all handled without caller involvement.

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After completion

  • Signed PDF — the original with all signatures, values, and completion stamps embedded.
  • Audit certificate — the companion PDF documenting the evidentiary record.
  • Structured extraction — on request, Atlas extracts the contract’s substantive terms (parties, dates, amounts, renewal, governing law) as structured data, optionally delivered by webhook.
  • Verification — a public surface to confirm a signed document’s integrity.
Track lifecycle transitions with webhooks rather than polling — every transition above emits an event.