How are email bounce rates calculated and what is considered a good bounce rate?

Email marketer from MailerQ Blog explains that bounce rate is calculated by dividing the number of bounced emails by the total number of emails sent, then multiplying by 100 to get a percentage. This percentage represents the proportion of emails that were not successfully delivered to recipients.

Email marketer from Neil Patel Blog shares that factors such as sending to old or purchased lists, having poor list hygiene, or having deliverability issues can negatively impact bounce rates.

Email marketer from Reddit explains that buying email lists almost always leads to higher bounce rates because the addresses are often outdated, invalid, or spam traps.

Email marketer from HubSpot explains that an acceptable bounce rate is typically under 2%. Anything above 2% indicates a need to clean up your email lists and improve sending practices.

Email marketer from Moosend answers the question on the importance of removing inactive users. Cleaning your email lists regularly and removing inactive or unengaged subscribers, is key to maintaining a healthy sender reputation.

Email marketer from GMass forum shares that using double opt-in, authenticating your email with SPF, DKIM, and DMARC, and segmenting your list can lead to a lower bounce rate.

Email marketer from Litmus says that consistently monitoring your bounce rates helps you identify and address deliverability issues promptly, preventing long-term damage to your sender reputation.

Email marketer from ActiveCampaign shares that regularly cleaning your email lists by removing unengaged subscribers and invalid email addresses is crucial to maintain a low bounce rate.

Email marketer from Sendinblue explains that a good bounce rate should ideally be below 2%. Bounce rates between 2% and 5% should be investigated and anything above 5% should be addressed immediately.

Email marketer from ZeroBounce shares that high bounce rates negatively impact sender reputation, leading to more emails being marked as spam and decreasing overall deliverability.

Email marketer from Email on Acid recommends that the best way to avoid bounces is authenticating your email list with SPF, DKIM, and DMARC, which will greatly improve chances of your emails reaching the inbox.

Expert from Word to the Wise shares that monitoring your bounce rate is crucial for identifying potential problems with your email sending practices and maintaining a healthy sender reputation. Regular review of bounce codes can help pinpoint issues.

Expert from Email Geeks says that unless you define "hard bounce" and "soft bounce" the conversation is pointless, implying that industry benchmarks based on them are also pointless, as ESPs define them differently.

Expert from Email Geeks shares that ISPs use attempted deliveries to non-existent addresses as a spam signal, which is where a lot of the 1-3% bounce rate comes from. They add that a well-run program should not see temporary or soft failures, or mail sitting in the queue.

Expert from Email Geeks explains bounce rates usually line up with the method that the ESP writing it uses to calculate delivered rates - some use `total sent - all bounces` others use `total sent - hard bounces only`. It's important to know the method they use. They see 1-3% bounce rate as inline with normal churn numbers.

Expert from Email Geeks explains that if an email ultimately delivers, it is not a bounce. A bounce means the email could not be delivered in the allotted retry period or was rejected outright by the receiving MTA.

Expert from Spam Resource explains that hard bounces are typically caused by invalid email addresses, while soft bounces are due to temporary issues like full inboxes or server problems. A high bounce rate can negatively impact your sender reputation.

Documentation from Mailgun explains that a hard bounce indicates a permanent reason an email cannot be delivered (e.g., invalid email address), while a soft bounce indicates a temporary issue (e.g., full inbox).

Documentation from SparkPost explains that bounce rate is the percentage of emails that could not be delivered. It is calculated as (Number of Bounced Emails / Number of Emails Sent) * 100.

Documentation from RFC Editor describes SMTP reply codes, including those indicating permanent and transient delivery failures, providing the basis for understanding bounce codes.

Documentation from Amazon SES notes that permanent bounces (hard bounces) are due to invalid email addresses, and transient bounces (soft bounces) are due to temporary issues. High bounce rates can damage sender reputation.