What Is a Good Bounce Rate for Cold Email?
inboxy team · · 3 min read
Bounce rate benchmarks
| Bounce rate | What it means | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| Under 2% | Healthy | Keep verifying lists before each send |
| 2% to 5% | Warning sign | Re-verify the list and remove risky addresses |
| Over 5% | Damaging your reputation | Pause, clean the list, then restart slowly |
These are widely used rules of thumb across sequencers and deliverability teams, not limits published by Gmail or Outlook. Inbox providers don't share exact thresholds, but a high bounce rate is one of the clearest signals that a sender doesn't know who they're emailing.
How do you calculate bounce rate?
Bounce rate = bounced emails ÷ emails sent × 100. If you send 1,000 emails and 15 bounce, your bounce rate is 1.5%. Measure it per mailbox and per campaign, not only across your whole account, so you can spot a bad list or a struggling inbox early.
Hard bounces vs soft bounces
- Hard bounce: a permanent failure. The address doesn't exist, the domain is gone, or the server refuses mail from you. Remove these addresses immediately and never email them again.
- Soft bounce: a temporary failure, such as a full mailbox or a server that's briefly down. Most sequencers retry soft bounces. If an address soft-bounces repeatedly, treat it like a hard bounce.
Hard bounces do far more damage to your reputation. Our guide to email bounce codes explains what each error means.
Why is your bounce rate high?
- Unverified or old lists. Email lists decay as people change jobs, so a list from six months ago will bounce more than a fresh one.
- Guessed addresses. Pattern-guessed emails ([email protected]) bounce often unless verified.
- Catch-all domains. These accept everything at first, then some addresses bounce later. Send to them carefully, in small batches.
- Authentication problems. Some servers reject mail that fails SPF, DKIM or DMARC, which shows up as bounces. See our setup guide.
How to keep your bounce rate under 2%
- Verify every list with an email verification tool before sending.
- Re-verify any list older than about 30 days.
- Remove role addresses (info@, sales@) and anything the verifier marks invalid or risky.
- Send to catch-all addresses in small, separate batches.
- Remove hard bounces automatically and suppress them in every future campaign.
- Check that SPF, DKIM and DMARC pass on every sending domain.
A low bounce rate is one item on our cold email deliverability checklist, which covers everything else to check before you send.
Skip the setup
inboxy creates Google Workspace mailboxes on your cold email domains with SPF, DKIM and DMARC already configured, connects them to your sequencer for free and keeps them warm, at a flat $3 per mailbox a month. See pricing.
quick answers
What is a good bounce rate for cold email?
Under 2%. Between 2% and 5% is a warning sign, and above 5% is damaging your sender reputation.
How do I calculate bounce rate?
Divide the number of bounced emails by the number of emails sent, then multiply by 100. For example, 15 bounces from 1,000 sends is 1.5%.
What is the difference between a hard and a soft bounce?
A hard bounce is permanent, such as an address that doesn't exist. A soft bounce is temporary, such as a full mailbox. Remove hard bounces immediately.
Why do sequencers pause campaigns for high bounces?
Because a high bounce rate quickly damages your sender reputation. Many sequencers pause sending at around 5% to protect your domain.
How do I lower my bounce rate?
Verify every list before sending, re-verify lists older than about 30 days, remove risky and role addresses, and make sure SPF, DKIM and DMARC pass.
