What Time Of Day Are Most Emails Read?

Knowing when emails are read is essential to the success of email marketing campaigns. You want to reach your subscribers when they’re primed to read and engage with content. Otherwise, marketing emails are more likely to go ignored. 

This article will take a deeper look at what time emails are read, when the best email send times are, and resources that can help you improve your email marketing strategy. 

What Is The Best Time Of Day To Send An Email?

Several studies have analyzed the best time of day to send marketing emails. They’ve found that the middle of the day between 9am-3pm is the most effective time on average. Consumers are more likely to engage during this timeframe because it’s the point of the day when they’re most likely to have the highest energy and check their inboxes. 

What Time Of Day Are Most Emails Read?

The average time of day that most emails are read is between 9am and 3pm. 

That time of day is optimal for sending emails and having them read for the same reason. It’s the middle of the average person’s daily activities. They’ll likely be checking their inbox frequently for personal emails, work-related emails, and simply to pass the time during breaks in the day. 

You want to send emails when consumers are most likely to read them due to how new content appears in email inboxes. When someone checks their inbox, they see the most recent emails they received first. That means sending at the right time puts you higher on their list. 

Ultimately, when someone sees your email first, they’ll be much more likely to read and engage. 

What Time Of Day Do People Respond To Emails?

The time of day people respond to emails also correlates with the best send times and when most emails are read. Email response rates are highest during the late morning to early afternoon. Responses start to increase around 9am and peak between noon and 3pm. As you get later in the day, especially after 5pm, email response rates drop quite a bit. 

To round out all of that information, sending between 9am-12pm is a good idea if you want a response to an email within the same day. You could then likely expect a response between 12pm-3pm. 

The closer to 9am you send your initial email, the more likely you’ll get a response that day, since it gives people a chance to think it over before that peak response time. 

Is It Ok To Send An Email On The Weekend?

It can be ok to send a marketing email on the weekend. If you’re wondering if sending your marketing email content on the weekend will seem unprofessional, it won’t, and your subscribers won’t likely think much of it. However, engagement rates on the weekends do tend to be a bit lower. 

Ultimately, whether to send marketing email content on the weekend comes down to your specific audience. Some audiences may be highly engaged on the weekends, whereas others don’t engage much at all. 

Why The Best Time And Day To Send Emails Is Dependent On Your Audience

Studies on the best times to send emails are helpful. However, that said, they are limited in how much guidance they can give you. The results from those studies are very generalized based on data from the average consumer. 

Plenty of consumer bases are outside that average schedule, like doctors, entrepreneurs, people working third-shift, etc. This means sending marketing content at that average 9am-3pm time slot may not always be the right strategy, depending on your audience.

To find out when subscribers are most likely to read emails, you need more data on when your specific subscribers are most likely to engage. If you’re wondering how to do that effectively, email insight software can help. 

How Audiencepoint Can Help With Your Email Marketing

AudiencePoint’s email insight software can help you determine when your subscribers will most likely read and engage with new content. 

AudiencePoint works by using three easy-to-implement tools to help you optimize email campaigns. Those tools are called Send Time Optimization, ListFit, and Real Time Optimization. 

These tools work effectively together by providing you with data from a second party pool that helps you optimize send-times, analyzing subscriber activity, helping you to segment your email lists, helping you re-engage email lists, and more. 

Audiencepoint Helps With Apple Mpp To Give Accurate Metrics For Send Time Optimization

In addition, if you’re wondering when emails are most likely to be read, you need to consider Apple MPP opens. Apple MPP has affected open rate metrics, since it causes emails sent to Apple devices to be opened on Apple proxy servers before landing in inboxes. 

AudiencePoint’s Send Time Optimization tool helps with this by isolating Apple MPP opens from reporting to give you more accurate metrics.

If you’re interested in getting started with AudiencePoint to take advantage of all these tools, you can contact us today. We’re here to answer any additional questions you may have.