Email Marketing Statistics 2026: Open Rates and Benchmarks

Choose one open rate benchmark before you set a target, and compare your number only with that publisher's figure. Publishers count Apple Mail Privacy Protection (MPP) opens in different ways, so the same campaign can score differently in each report.

Apple MPP pre-fetches an email and registers an open even when the recipient never views it. Brevo's standard average leaves those bot-triggered opens out.

Brevo's 2025 data gives an average open rate of 20.73% without MPP bot opens and 33.87% with them. Its top 10% of senders reach 44.02% without MPP and 59.89% with it.

Automation and transactional emails average a 30.63% open rate in the same Brevo data, against 20.73% for standard campaigns. Plan flows and campaigns against separate benchmarks.

Litmus counted the Apple group at 76.56% of opens across over 1.5 billion opens in September 2026. That group includes Apple Mail, iPhone, iPad and MPP opens, which is why raw open rates are inflated.

MailerLite makes the same point. Apple Mail Privacy Protection marks emails as opened, so real open rates run lower than dashboards show, and its click-to-open rate is inflated.

Klaviyo's 2026 benchmark gives 31% for campaigns and 32.2% for flows. Its page does not say how it treats MPP opens, so ask that question before you compare.

Published averages run from 21.5% in Campaign Monitor's 2021 data to 43.46% in MailerLite's 2025 data. Do not average these figures, because the years, samples and open definitions all differ.

Judge automated emails on revenue per email, not on click rate alone. Automations earn more per email than campaigns in the same data, so set a separate target for each message type.

Brevo's 2025 data puts the average click-through rate for marketing campaigns at 2.27%, measured against total recipients, and the top 10% at 5.22%.

Automation and transactional emails average a 7.39% click-through rate in the same data. One click target for both message types would mislead you.

Omnisend's 2025 data sets revenue per email sent at $0.155 for campaigns and $3.41 for automations. Back in stock automations reach $9.14 per email, the highest value in its list of automation types.

Klaviyo's 2026 benchmark says flow revenue per recipient is nearly 18x higher than campaigns. The top 10% of flows reach as high as $7.79 per recipient.

Judge each flow type against its own benchmark, and read the email automation flows page beside the flow figures in the table above.

MailerLite reports a click-to-open rate of 6.81% for 2025. Its own page warns that Apple's privacy feature inflates this metric, so read it beside the open rate caveats above.

Click rate definitions differ between publishers. Mailchimp divides clicks by emails delivered, and its all-users click rate is 2.62% for data as of December 2023.

MailerLite reports an overall click rate of 2.09% for December 2024 to November 2025, on its own base. Do not mix the two bases in one report. Compare your click rate only with the same publisher's figure for the same period.

GetResponse's 2023 data, covering 4.4 billion+ messages, gives an average click-through rate of 3.25% and a click-to-open rate of 8.62%.

Track your unsubscribe rate against your own history first, because published averages move with list type and year. Set your complaint alarm at 0.1%, well below the 0.3% line that Google uses for mitigation.

Brevo's 2025 data gives an average unsubscribe rate of 0.46%, and its top 10% of performers stay at 0.05%.

MailerLite's overall unsubscribe rate more than doubled, from 0.08% in 2024 to 0.22% in 2025. MailerLite ties the rise to Gmail's sender changes, but that is its own explanation, not a proven cause.

Unsubscribe rates also vary by industry. MailerLite's highest figure is 0.40% for photo and video, and its lowest is 0.09% for legal.

Automated sends draw more opt-outs. Omnisend reports an unsubscribe rate of 0.20% for campaigns and 0.59% for automations, so review flow opt-outs separately from campaign opt-outs.

Few major publishers print a bounce rate. GetResponse's 2023 data gives an average bounce rate of 2.33%. Treat it as a rough reference, since it is one 2023 figure from one platform.

Brevo defines bounce rate as the percentage of email not delivered successfully, split into soft (temporary) and hard (permanent) failures. Its page gives no average, so use its definition to set up your own tracking.

In a Validity poll of its State of Email Live attendees, only one quarter said their spam complaint rate sat in the under 0.1% band that Validity links to best-practice programs. Validity calls complaint rates the single biggest factor that degrades sender reputation.

Validity also reports that complaint rates rose after the first Gmail and Yahoo enforcement, dropped, and then trended up for the rest of the year. It suggests shifting more sending to weekends to lower complaints.

ZeroBounce's survey of 1,091 participants on four continents found that 43% unsubscribe mainly because the sender emails them too often. Test send frequency before you rewrite content when unsubscribe rates rise.

Plan deliverability by mailbox provider, not by one global average. Gmail, Microsoft, Yahoo/AOL and Apple together carry most of a typical program's sending volume, and their inbox rates differ widely.

Validity's 2026 benchmark report, using 2025 data, puts global inbox placement at 87.2%, spam placement at 6.6% and missing at 6.1%. Validity calls that a 3.7 percent uplift year over year. The 2025 report, using 2024 data, had global inbox placement at 83.5%, spam placement at 6.7% and missing at 9.8%.

The inbox rate fell through 2024, with a dip in the Q4 peak sale season. Spam placement almost doubled over the same year.

Provider rates differ sharply. Validity's 2025 data gives Gmail 89.8% inbox placement and 6.4% spam placement. Microsoft gets 77.4% inbox and 15.1% spam. In the 2024 data, Gmail had 87.2% inbox and 6.8% spam placement, and Microsoft 75.6% and 14.6%.

Validity still calls Microsoft the toughest mailbox provider to send to. In the 2025 report's 2024 data, Gmail carried 48.5% of tracked mailbox volume, and Validity says Gmail has about 2.5 billion users.

Europe is the best-performing region, at 91.1% inbox placement in 2025 and 89.1% in the 2024 data. Validity also said in its 2025 report the US inbox rate sits six percentage points below select countries that require double opt-in.

Authentication shows up in these numbers too. Validity reports that most new DMARC adopters set their policy to none, which only monitors mail and does not enforce anything. The email deliverability guide covers the setup steps.

Omnisend reports 98.4% campaign deliverability in its infographic. Compare that figure only with other deliverability numbers, not with inbox placement rates.

Check each provider's rules before a large send, because the thresholds, deadlines and failure responses differ. Google and Microsoft both set their high-volume line near 5,000 messages, and Yahoo's best-practices page does not state a volume line.

Google's sender requirements apply to all senders from February 1, 2024. They require SPF or DKIM, valid forward and reverse DNS, TLS, and a Postmaster Tools spam rate below 0.3%.

Google calls a sender bulk when it sends close to 5,000 messages or more to personal Gmail accounts. A sender that meets that threshold once stays a bulk sender permanently.

Gmail's FAQ says a spam rate above 0.1% already hurts inbox delivery, and 0.3% or higher has a greater negative effect. Google calculates the rate daily and shows it in Postmaster Tools.

From June 2024, bulk senders with user-reported spam above 0.3% lose eligibility for mitigation. They regain it after 7 consecutive days below 0.3%.

Google recommends fulfilling unsubscribe requests within 48 hours. It also says enforcement against non-compliant traffic has ramped up, so a sender that ignores these rules can face rejection.

Microsoft's high-volume rule covers 5,000 or more messages to its consumer email services, all sent with the same From domain. Both SPF and DKIM must pass, and a DMARC record must be published. Failures return error 550 5.7.515.

Yahoo states its unsubscribe window as a requirement: honor unsubscribes within 2 days. Google states 48 hours as a recommendation. The two windows are the same length, so honor unsubscribes within 48 hours for every provider.

Yahoo's best-practices page does not state a bulk volume threshold. Treat its list as a deliverability standard that applies to every sender, not as a volume test. Its page also asks for SPF and DKIM, plus a valid DMARC policy of at least p=none that passes.

Read the email compliance rules for the unsubscribe and one-click requirements that apply on top of these provider thresholds.

Use ROI figures in a business case only as a range, and label the year of each one. Litmus's ratios come from a 2020 survey, and its newer band comes from a 2025 survey of nearly 500 marketers.

Litmus reports that 35% of marketing leaders say email earns $10 to $36 per $1 spent, 30% say $36 to $50, and 5% say more than $50.

Treat the bands as a range, not a precise split. The same Litmus infographic cites a 2025 survey of nearly 500 marketers and a 2020 survey of more than 2,000 marketers.

Litmus's 2020 ratios put retail, ecommerce and consumer goods at 45:1, and software and technology at 36:1. Use these ratios as history, not as a current benchmark.

Statista estimates 376 billion emails sent and received per day worldwide in 2025, and projects 424 billion for 2026. The count includes received mail, so it does not show your own sending volume.

Omnisend reports that only 0.6% of brands used back in stock automation in 2025. Abandoned cart was used by 22.5% of brands with automations active by year-end.

Litmus's 2025 survey lists the top personalization challenges as developing content efficiently (17%), collecting and analyzing data (16%), and measuring impact on email performance (15%).

Litmus also expects AI-driven content and analytics to be the biggest change in email. 29% of marketers say so.

Litmus says mobile devices are the primary reading environment for most subscribers, but its page gives no share. Design for mobile first, and do not quote a mobile percentage from older roundups.

Use each benchmark for one decision, and quote it with its publisher, year and metric. A number moved out of its study loses the conditions that made it true.

• Check the year and data period first. Campaign Monitor's averages use 2021 data, and Mailchimp's use data as of December 2023.
• Check whether opens include Apple MPP bot opens. Brevo publishes both versions, and Klaviyo's page gives no MPP note.
• Check the click base. Mailchimp divides clicks by emails delivered, and other publishers use different bases.
• Separate campaigns from automations before you compare. Omnisend and Brevo both report automations ahead of campaigns on opens, clicks or revenue.
• Compare trends inside one publisher, not levels across publishers. Each publisher measures its own sample with its own method.

Track clicks, click-to-open rate and revenue per email next to opens, and set one target for each message type. A single blended target hides the automations that earn the most revenue per email.

Read the email marketing overview for the channel basics, and the ESP platform comparison if your sending tool limits which metrics you can split by message type.

Widely repeated numbers without an original source appear in many email roundups. Do not put these claims in client decks, pitches or articles. Replace each one with a sourced row from the tables above.

• $36 for every $1 spent on email. This is the lower edge of one Litmus band, where 30% of marketing leaders say $36 to $50. It is not an average.
• $42 for every $1 spent on email. It combines figures from different years and currencies, so no single study supports it.
• 4.6 billion email users. It traces to an older forecast, and no current original study supports it.
• A 65% drop in unauthenticated messages to Gmail users, and 265 billion fewer such messages. Both reach this market second-hand, through a Valimail post and a Forbes article about an M3AAWG meeting. Quote Google's own sender requirements instead.

When a roundup repeats one of these figures, trace it to the original study first. If you cannot find that study, leave the figure out of your work.