---
aliases: ["Newsletter Open Rate"]
Is A: Measure
Belongs to: "[[responsibility-grow-newsletter]]"
Unit: "percent"
---
# Newsletter Open Rate

Open rate is the primary engagement metric for the newsletter and a critical input to [[responsibility-sponsorships]] pricing conversations. It measures the percentage of delivered emails that are opened, serving as a proxy for audience trust, content relevance, and list health. A consistently high open rate signals that subscribers find the content valuable enough to prioritize in their inbox.

Open rate is also the metric sponsors care about most (alongside click rate). The newsletter's ability to command premium sponsorship pricing for [[measure-sponsorship-mrr]] is directly tied to maintaining an above-industry open rate.

## How it's tracked

Reported by the email platform (Substack/ConvertKit) for each issue. The monthly average is calculated across all issues published in the month and logged in the tracking spreadsheet. Note that email open tracking relies on pixel loading, which undercounts opens on privacy-focused email clients (Apple Mail Privacy Protection, Hey, etc.). The true open rate is likely 5-10% higher than reported.

## Targets

- **Minimum**: 40%. Below this for a list of this size suggests declining content quality, list hygiene issues, or audience mismatch.
- **Target**: 45-50%. This range is well above the industry average for newsletters (typically 20-30%) and supports premium sponsorship pricing.
- **Stretch**: 55%+. Achievable on high-interest topics or following a viral social media post that drives engaged subscribers.

## Notes

- Open rate naturally declines as [[measure-subscribers]] grows because larger lists include a higher proportion of passive subscribers. The goal is to slow this decay, not prevent it entirely.
- Subject line quality is the single biggest lever for open rate. Specific, curiosity-driven subject lines consistently outperform generic ones.
- Regular list hygiene (removing subscribers who have not opened in 90+ days) can boost open rate by 3-5 percentage points. Run this quarterly.
- The 47% open rate achieved at 53,000 subscribers in 2024 is exceptional. Maintaining above 43% at 85,000 subscribers ([[2025-reach-85k-subscribers]]) would be a strong result.
- Track per-issue open rates to identify topic patterns. Some topics reliably over- or under-perform, which informs editorial planning.
