What is a good email open rate?
A good open rate is one at or above the benchmark for the same kind of email, counted the same way. For newsletters and campaigns to people who signed up, the big platform benchmarks put the typical open rate between about 36% and 43%. For cold email, Hunter's users averaged 30% in 2025. Each figure below is a platform's own data about its own users, checked 4 November 2026.
| Source | Open rate | Which number | Sample | Data period |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mailchimp benchmarks | 35.63% (all users) | Average unique open rate | Billions of emails; only campaigns sent to at least 1,000 subscribers | Last updated December 2023 |
| MailerLite benchmarks | 43.46% | Median | More than 3.6 million campaigns from 181,000 approved accounts | December 2024 to November 2025 (published 3 Dec 2025) |
| GetResponse benchmarks | 39.64% | Average | More than 4.4 billion messages; active senders with at least 500 contacts | 2023 (2024 report) |
| Hunter, cold email | 30% | Average | 31 million emails sent by Hunter users | 2025 (2026 report) |
For a B2B sender, the industry rows matter more than the headline. They spread widely, even for similar businesses:
| Segment | Open rate | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Business + Finance | 31.35% | Mailchimp |
| Marketing and advertising | 37.23% | MailerLite |
| Software and web app | 39.31% | MailerLite |
| Business and finance | 43.34% | MailerLite |
| Consulting | 45.96% | MailerLite |
| Senders in North America | 45.30% | GetResponse |
| Welcome emails | 83.63% | GetResponse |
Read the sources closely before you quote one. Mailchimp's table gives 35.63% for all users, while the same page also tells readers to aim for around 34.23 percent. MailerLite's method says every benchmark is a median, though its summary calls 43.46% the average. And Hunter itself says 30% is lower than senders should aim for, blaming deliverability problems as Gmail and Outlook tighten their spam filters.
How do you calculate email open rate?
Open rate is unique opens divided by emails delivered, times 100. Mailchimp's help page defines it as the share of successfully delivered emails that were opened, counted when a tiny transparent image in the email is downloaded. Mailchimp also counts a click as an open, since a reader must open an email to click, even if the image didn't load. MailerLite divides by total campaign recipients instead, so check which base your tool uses.
Here is a worked example. The campaign is made up; the arithmetic is ours.
| Step | Sum | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Emails sent | 2,000 | |
| Bounced | 40 | |
| Delivered | 2,000 − 40 | 1,960 |
| Open rate, dividing by delivered | 784 unique opens ÷ 1,960 | 40.0% |
| Open rate, dividing by sent | 784 ÷ 2,000 | 39.2% |
| Open rate after your tool removes 470 Apple and bot opens | 314 ÷ 1,960 | 16.0% |
| Click rate | 39 unique clicks ÷ 1,960 | 2.0% |
The honest answer for this campaign is a range: somewhere between 16.0% and 40.0% of people opened it, because a filtered Apple open may or may not have been a person reading. The click rate is the firmer number. At 2.0% it sits just under MailerLite's 2.09% median click rate and below Mailchimp's 2.62% average, both measured on their own users.
Is a 20%, 30%, 35% or 38% open rate good?
It depends on the kind of email. Against the opt-in benchmarks above, 35% to 38% is normal and 20% is low; for cold email, 30% matches Hunter's 2025 average. This table is our reading of those published figures, not a rule from any platform:
| Your open rate | Opt-in newsletter or campaign | Cold email | Check first |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 20% | Below the lowest industry figures Mailchimp (27.34%) and MailerLite (30.1%) report | Below Hunter's 30% average | Where test emails land in your own Gmail, Outlook and Yahoo inboxes |
| 20% to 30% | Low next to most segments; Mailchimp's Business + Finance average is 31.35% | Around or under Hunter's average | Bounces, and spam rate in Google Postmaster Tools |
| 30% to 35% | Close to Mailchimp's 35.63% all-user average | At or above Hunter's average | Clicks or replies, which tell you more |
| 35% to 40% | Around GetResponse's 39.64% average and MailerLite's 39.31% for software | Above Hunter's average | How many of your readers use Apple Mail |
| 40% to 45% | Around MailerLite's 43.46% median and its 43.34% for business and finance | Well above Hunter's average | How many of your readers use Apple Mail |
| Over 45% | Above MailerLite's 43.46% median; welcome emails average 83.63% at GetResponse | Check for machine opens | Your tool's bot or Apple filter |
A high number isn't automatically good news. MailerLite suggests open rates can run higher where iPhone ownership is high, such as Australia, the US and Canada, because Apple's privacy feature could mark more emails as opened.
Why are open rates less reliable since 2021?
Because since 2021 Apple Mail can record an open without anyone reading. Apple announced Mail Privacy Protection in June 2021, saying it stops senders from using invisible pixels to collect information. Apple's iPhone guide says it prevents senders from seeing whether you opened their email. MailerLite says the feature marks emails sent to Apple Mail as opened, so real open rates are lower than dashboards show.
The scale is large. Litmus's email client report, from more than 1.5 billion opens in September 2026, puts Apple at 76.56% of opens and says almost 90% report as Apple or Gmail. Litmus adds that opens from Mail Privacy Protection users don't pass along which email client and platform was used, so it doesn't consider them reliable opens. Mailchimp recommends excluding Apple and other bot activity from your reports.
Gmail doesn't use your open rate either. Google's email sender guidelines say Google doesn't track open rates, can't verify open rates reported by third parties, and that low open rates aren't necessarily a sign of deliverability or spam problems. For how tracking pixels affect cold email, see our guide to whether open tracking hurts deliverability.
What are the 30/30/50 and 60/40 rules in email?
Neither is a mailbox provider's rule, and each has more than one meaning. The funnel version of the 30/30/50 rule comes from Close's sales benchmarks post, first published in June 2018 and updated 26 June 2026. It sets minimums for a cold email funnel: at least 30% of recipients open, at least 30% of those who open reply, and at least 50% of those who reply convert.
Run it through 1,000 delivered cold emails and it implies 300 opens, 90 replies and 45 conversions: 9 replies per 100 recipients. Hunter's 2025 average was 4.5 replies per 100 recipients, and Belkins' 2026 study measured a 0.45% reply rate per email sent, across 7.5 million emails from its own client campaigns in 2025. Close first published these benchmarks before Apple's 2021 change, so treat its 30% open floor as a rough alarm and its reply floor as a stretch. Our comparison of cold email reply rate benchmarks shows why those figures differ.
Other writers use the same name for effort, not results. Tario's version splits a cold email into 30% personalisation, 30% value and 50% follow-up, which adds up to 110%.
The 60/40 rule also has two meanings. Instantly's guide, updated 26 January 2026, describes it as 60% of emails giving educational or helpful value and 40% carrying a promotional ask. The same guide notes that in email design it sometimes means 60% text and 40% images. Google's sender guidelines mention neither ratio (checked 4 November 2026).
How do you improve your email open rate?
Send to people who want the email, from a name they recognise, with a subject that says what is inside. Then judge the change by clicks or replies, since opens are partly machine-made. Five steps for this week:
Make leaving easy
Google's sender guidelines say letting people opt out of your messages can improve open rates, click-through rates and sending efficiency. Put a clear unsubscribe link in every marketing email.
Split the list
Mailchimp's help page suggests segmenting by location, interests or actions, and testing how often you send if your open rate is well below your industry's benchmark.
Test the subject line
Our free subject line tester scores a subject from 100 and takes points off for length, risky phrases, capitals, exclamation marks, fake replies and emoji, then shows roughly how it looks on a phone.
Rule out spam first
A fall in opens can mean the email never reached the inbox. Work through our fix list for emails going to spam before rewriting copy.
Report a range, plus clicks
Write down the open rate with and without Apple and bot opens, as in the worked example, next to the click or reply rate. If your campaigns go out from Siela's built-in CRM, which has open and click tracking, compare campaigns on clicks.
Frequently asked questions
What is a normal open rate for email marketing?
On the big platforms, the typical figure sits in the mid-30s to low 40s. Mailchimp's all-user average was 35.63% in data updated December 2023, GetResponse's 2023 average was 39.64%, and MailerLite's median for December 2024 to November 2025 was 43.46%. All three are inflated by Apple's privacy feature, so a normal-looking number can still hide few real readers.
Does Gmail look at open rates when deciding what is spam?
Google says it doesn't track open rates and can't verify open rates that other tools report. Its sender guidelines add that a low open rate isn't necessarily a sign of spam classification. The number Google asks senders to watch is the spam rate in Postmaster Tools: keep it below 0.10% and avoid ever reaching 0.30%.
What is a good click rate for email?
Benchmarks put it at around 2% to 3% of recipients. Mailchimp reports a 2.62% average click rate across all users, MailerLite a 2.09% median click rate for 2025, and GetResponse a 3.25% average click-through rate for 2023. MailerLite calls click rate the most accurate engagement measure for newsletters now, because it doesn't rely on tracking opens.
Why did my email open rate suddenly jump?
One common cause is that more of your list reads mail in Apple Mail with Mail Privacy Protection on, which marks emails as opened without a person reading. Hunter's 2026 report also quotes a practitioner saying corporate security filters prefetch emails. Check whether clicks and replies rose too. If only opens moved, the change is probably machine opens, not a better subject line.
Should I track open rates on cold email?
Hunter's 2026 report, based on its users' 2025 sends, found sequences with email tracking enabled had a 4.4% reply rate, against 7.4% for sequences without it. That is Hunter's own data and doesn't prove tracking caused the gap, and Hunter's own advice is to leave open and click tracking off unless you really need it.
Sources
- Mailchimp: Email Marketing Benchmarks and Industry Statistics (data last updated December 2023; checked 4 Nov 2026)
- Mailchimp Help: About Open and Click Rates (checked 4 Nov 2026)
- MailerLite: Email marketing benchmarks by industry and region for 2026 (published 3 Dec 2025)
- GetResponse: Email Marketing Benchmarks (2024 report, 2023 data) (checked 4 Nov 2026)
- Hunter: The State of Email Outreach 2026 (checked 4 Nov 2026)
- Belkins: What are B2B Cold Email Response Rates? (2026 Study) (checked 4 Nov 2026)
- Apple Support: Use Mail Privacy Protection on iPhone (checked 4 Nov 2026)
- Apple Newsroom: Apple advances its privacy leadership with iOS 15 (7 Jun 2021)
- Gmail Help: Email sender guidelines (checked 4 Nov 2026)
- Litmus: Email Client Market Share (September 2026 data) (checked 4 Nov 2026)
- Close: Sales Benchmarks, the 30/50 Rule for Cold Emailing and Cold Calling (published 18 Jun 2018, updated 26 Jun 2026)
- Tario: What Is the 30/30/50 Rule for Cold Emails (checked 4 Nov 2026)
- Instantly: The 60/40 Email Rule for High-Engagement Outreach (updated 26 Jan 2026)