Updated for 2026. Is a 25% open rate good for an online store? Is a 1% click rate a problem? Without context, your email numbers mean very little. This guide brings together the most recent ecommerce email benchmarks published by Klaviyo and Omnisend, broken down by campaigns vs. automated flows, by industry and by email type, so you can see where your store stands and what to fix first.
All figures below come from published platform data, not estimates. Each section names its source so you can check it yourself.
Email marketing benchmarks at a glance (2026)
Klaviyo's 2026 benchmarks are based on data from more than 205,000 B2C brands. They split results into campaigns (one-off sends to a list) and flows (automated, behaviour-triggered emails such as a welcome series or abandoned cart).
| Metric | Campaigns (average) | Campaigns (top 10%) | Flows (average) | Flows (top 10%) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Open rate | 31.0% | 45.1% | 32.2% | 45.8% |
| Click rate | 1.69% | 3.38% | 5.58% | 10.48% |
| Placed order rate | 0.16% | 0.36% | 2.11% | 4.30% |
Source: Klaviyo, Email marketing benchmarks 2026.
Omnisend's 2026 Ecommerce Marketing Report (more than 20 billion campaign emails and 470 million automated sends across 27,000+ brands) gives a second, independent view of campaign averages:
| Metric (campaigns) | Average |
|---|---|
| Open rate | 30.41% |
| Click-through rate (CTR) | 0.74% |
| Click-to-open rate (CTOR) | 2.44% |
| Conversion rate | 0.08% |
| Unsubscribe rate | 0.20% |
| Deliverability rate | 98.4% |
Source: Omnisend, Email marketing benchmarks and the 2026 Ecommerce Marketing Report.
Why the two sources differ: each platform defines clicks and conversions slightly differently and has a different customer mix. Compare your store against the platform you actually send from, and use the other as a sanity check.
Campaigns vs. flows: the gap that matters most
The most useful finding in both reports is how much better automated flows perform than campaigns:
- Klaviyo: flows get about 3x the click rate of campaigns (5.58% vs. 1.69%) and 13x the placed order rate (2.11% vs. 0.16%). Flows produced nearly 41% of email revenue from just 5.3% of sends.
- Omnisend: automations made up 2% of email sends but generated 30% of email-driven revenue, with conversion rates 19x higher than campaigns (1.49% vs. 0.08%).
If your store relies mostly on newsletters and sale announcements, the fastest way to beat these benchmarks is not a better subject line. It is setting up the core flows: welcome, abandoned cart, browse abandonment and post-purchase.
Email benchmarks by industry
Klaviyo's 2026 data by industry. Use the row closest to what you sell.
Campaign benchmarks by industry
| Industry | Open rate | Click rate | Placed order rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Clothing & accessories | 33.1% | 1.83% | 0.12% |
| Automotive | 29.4% | 1.83% | 0.11% |
| Electronics | 29.3% | 1.85% | 0.09% |
| Food & beverage | 31.2% | 1.70% | 0.26% |
| Hardware & home improvement | 30.9% | 1.84% | 0.11% |
| Health & beauty | 30.5% | 1.24% | 0.19% |
| Home & garden | 32.5% | 1.78% | 0.13% |
| Jewellery | 32.5% | 1.60% | 0.08% |
| Mass merchant | 28.7% | 1.77% | 0.14% |
| Office supplies | 28.9% | 1.88% | 0.14% |
| Specialty | 32.0% | 1.65% | 0.18% |
| Sporting goods | 31.9% | 1.88% | 0.11% |
| Toys & hobbies | 31.7% | 2.03% | 0.19% |
Automated flow benchmarks by industry
| Industry | Open rate | Click rate | Placed order rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Clothing & accessories | 34.4% | 5.54% | 2.15% |
| Automotive | 30.2% | 5.45% | 1.94% |
| Electronics | 30.3% | 6.11% | 1.95% |
| Food & beverage | 33.0% | 5.80% | 2.46% |
| Hardware & home improvement | 31.7% | 5.65% | 2.07% |
| Health & beauty | 30.5% | 4.80% | 1.96% |
| Home & garden | 34.2% | 5.96% | 2.12% |
| Jewellery | 32.8% | 5.42% | 1.85% |
| Mass merchant | 29.7% | 5.55% | 1.95% |
| Office supplies | 28.8% | 5.81% | 2.18% |
| Specialty | 30.7% | 5.47% | 2.06% |
| Sporting goods | 33.3% | 6.13% | 2.13% |
| Toys & hobbies | 31.8% | 5.96% | 2.14% |
Source for both tables: Klaviyo, Email marketing benchmarks 2026.
Industries sit within about two percentage points of each other on most metrics. If your store is further than that from its industry row, the cause is usually your list or your setup rather than "our niche is different".
Benchmarks by email type (automations)
Omnisend publishes results per automation type. These are the ones most online stores run:
| Email type | Open rate | CTR | Conversion rate | Revenue per email |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Back in stock | 58.80% | 21.31% | 6.72% | $9.14 |
| Welcome series | 35.53% | 3.94% | 2.11% | $6.16 |
| Abandoned cart | 37.12% | 4.13% | 1.72% | $3.59 |
| Customer reactivation | 33.11% | – | 0.54% | $0.51 |
| All automations (average) | 30.21% | 4.66% | 1.49% | – |
| Campaigns (for comparison) | 30.41% | 0.74% | 0.08% | – |
Source: Omnisend, 2026 report data.
Two takeaways for store owners:
- Back-in-stock emails convert best of all, yet Omnisend found very few brands use them. If your store regularly runs out of popular items, this is the cheapest win on the list.
- Abandoned cart and welcome emails drive most automation orders. If you only have time to build two flows, build these. Baymard Institute puts the average documented cart abandonment rate at 70.22%, so most stores have a large pool of carts to recover.
What each metric tells you (and how much to trust it)
Open rate
The share of delivered emails that were opened. Apple Mail Privacy Protection pre-loads emails for many users, which counts as an "open" whether or not anyone reads it. Klaviyo itself calls open rate a directional metric. Use it to compare subject lines against each other, not as proof that people read your emails.
Click rate (CTR) and click-to-open rate (CTOR)
Click rate is clicks divided by delivered emails. CTOR is clicks divided by opens, so it shows how well the content worked for people who opened. Because opens are inflated, click rate is now the more reliable engagement metric.
Placed order rate / conversion rate
The share of recipients who placed an order attributed to the email. This is the number that pays the bills. Klaviyo's averages of 0.16% for a campaign and 2.11% for a flow are a fair "normal"; roughly double those puts you near the top 10%.
Unsubscribe and bounce rates
Omnisend's campaign unsubscribe average is 0.20%. Consistently higher than that means you are sending too often, to the wrong segment, or content people did not sign up for. High bounces point to an old or bought list and will hurt deliverability for every other email you send.
How to compare your store against these benchmarks
- Split campaigns and flows before comparing anything. Mixing them hides problems in both.
- Look at the last 90 days, not a single send. One Black Friday email can distort a month.
- Use click rate and placed order rate as your scorecard; treat open rate as a hint.
- Compare against your industry row, then against the top 10% to set a target.
- Fix in this order: missing flows first, then list hygiene and segmentation, then content and subject lines.
Why your numbers might be below average
- No automated flows, or flows that were set up once and never checked. This is the most common gap we see.
- Sending to everyone, every time. Unsegmented lists drag down clicks and push up unsubscribes.
- Deliverability problems. Missing SPF, DKIM or DMARC records, or a sending domain with a poor reputation, send emails to spam where they never get counted.
- Slow or broken landing pages. An email can earn the click and still lose the order if the product page loads slowly or the checkout is awkward on mobile. Email performance is also a website performance problem.
B2B email benchmarks
The figures in this guide are for B2C online stores. B2B emails usually see different engagement, longer buying cycles and other conversion goals (a demo request rather than an order), so these tables should not be used to judge a B2B program. If you sell to businesses through a webshop, compare your order-driving emails with the benchmarks above and measure lead-generation emails separately.
Frequently asked questions
What is a good email open rate for an online store in 2026?
Around 31% is average for ecommerce campaigns and about 32% for automated flows in Klaviyo's 2026 data; the top 10% of brands reach around 45%. Because of Apple Mail Privacy Protection, treat open rate as directional.
What is a good email click rate for ecommerce?
Klaviyo's 2026 averages are 1.69% for campaigns and 5.58% for flows. Above 3.38% on campaigns or 10.48% on flows puts you in the top 10%.
What is the average email conversion rate?
For campaigns, a 0.16% placed order rate (Klaviyo) or 0.08% conversion rate (Omnisend). For automated flows, 2.11% (Klaviyo) or 1.49% (Omnisend). Back-in-stock emails convert highest, at 6.72% in Omnisend's data.
Why are my email open rates high but sales low?
Inflated opens from Apple Mail Privacy Protection are the usual reason. Look at click rate and placed order rate instead; if those are below the averages above, the issue is the offer, the segment or the landing page, not the subject line.
Need help turning clicks into orders?
Email gets people to your store; your store has to do the rest. ShopWhizzy builds and hosts fast Magento stores and fixes the checkout and performance issues that lose orders after the click. Talk to us about your store.