Benchmark · Cold email
Cold email reply rate benchmarks, and why they disagree.
By Nouman, founder · 26 September 2026
Published 2026 benchmarks for B2B cold email put the average reply rate anywhere from under half a percent to around four and a half percent, because they count different things. Belkins reports 0.45% across 7.5 million emails its agency sent in 2025, dividing replies by every email sent. Hunter reports 4.5% overall, and 3% for sales, across 31 million emails its users sent in 2025. Compare your own number only with a benchmark that divides by the same thing.
From Belkins and Hunter, read on their own pages. Checked 26 September 2026.
The two studies, side by side
Belkins, 2026 study (updated 26 June 2026)
- Data: 7.5 million cold emails sent across the agency's client campaigns in 2025; 34,393 replies.
- How it's counted: replies divided by all emails sent, not by opens.
- Average: 0.45% (0.50% in the first half of 2025, 0.40% in the second).
- By seniority: founders and owners 0.57%, C-level 0.42%, VPs 0.32%.
- By company size: 0.72% at companies of up to 10 employees, 0.22% at 10,000 or more.
- By timing: Wednesday and Thursday mornings, 8 AM to 12 PM, did best at 0.54%.
Hunter, State of Email Outreach 2026
- Data: 31 million emails sent by Hunter's users in 2025, plus surveys of decision-makers.
- Average: 4.5% overall; 3% for sales outreach, 6.2% for marketing.
- By campaign size: 6.2% for campaigns of 21 to 50 recipients, 2.4% for 500 or more.
- By follow-ups: 3.3% for a single email, 6.8% for a sequence of three.
- By personalization: 3.6% with none, 5.6% with two custom attributes.
- By tracking: 7.4% for campaigns without open tracking, 4.4% with it.
- By sending domain: 5.2% from a company domain, 2.5% from a personal webmail address such as Gmail.
Figures as published by Belkins and Hunter. Checked 26 September 2026. Both are providers' own datasets, and differences between groups are correlations, not proof of cause.
Why they disagree tenfold
The denominator. Dividing replies by every email sent, follow-ups included, gives a much smaller number than dividing by the people contacted, because each person gets several emails and replies once. The senders differ too: one agency sending for many clients, against many individual users of a prospecting tool, each running their own campaigns.
Neither is wrong. But a "good" rate from one is a bad rate from the other, and most posts quoting "the average" don't say which one they mean.
What the patterns suggest
- Smaller and more specific does better. In Belkins' data, small companies reply more than large ones; in Hunter's, small campaigns reply more than large ones.
- The people who own the problem answer. In Belkins' data, founders and owners reply more than C-level executives and VPs.
- Follow-ups matter. In Hunter's data, a sequence of three gets about twice the replies of a single email.
- Machinery costs replies. In Hunter's data, open tracking and personal webmail addresses go with lower reply rates. We don't use open tracking in our own outreach.
Each pattern is from one provider's data, and a correlation, not evidence of cause.
Work out your rate both ways
The values filled in are examples. Replace them with yours. Nothing you type leaves this page.
What counts as a good rate for you
Your own baseline, counted the same way every time, beats any published average. Track positive replies per person contacted, by segment and by message, and change one thing at a time. A falling rate on one segment tells you more than a benchmark from someone else's list.
It's how we report our own work: every result as "X from Y", including the ones that miss. See a results report with every denominator shown
If replies are low because emails land in spam, fix that first: a 12-point deliverability check. If they land and nobody answers, the email is the problem: send it to us for a teardown.
Sources
- Belkins, "What are B2B cold email response rates? (2026 study)"
- Hunter, "State of Email Outreach 2026"
Both are providers of cold email services or tools. Checked 26 September 2026; re-checked every 90 days.
Or email Nouman: scipioform@gmail.com, or call +44 7400 754177 or WhatsApp