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Cold email reply rate

A reply rate is only meaningful alongside the denominator it was calculated against.

Michael Sparks · Published 2026-08-18 · Last reviewed 2026-08-18

Definition

Cold email reply rate is the share of cold emails that receive a reply, expressed against a stated denominator: total emails sent, delivered emails, unique recipients or unique opens. The same campaign produces very different percentages depending on which is used, so a reply rate quoted without its denominator cannot be compared with anything.

How it is calculated

Divide the number of replies by the chosen denominator and multiply by 100. Replies per email sent is the most conservative measure because it includes bounces and messages that never reached an inbox. Replies per open is the least reliable, because open tracking has been distorted by image pre-fetching in mail privacy features.

Typical values

Belkins analysed 7,530,489 cold emails sent in 2025 and reported an average of roughly 0.45 percent replies per total emails sent, about 20 percent lower in the second half of the year than the first. Source: Belkins cold email response rate analysis.

Related measures

Positive reply rate counts only replies that continued the conversation and is usually the more useful campaign metric. Meeting rate and opportunity rate sit further down the funnel and are less sensitive to message wording.

Convert your own campaign with the reply rate calculator.

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