Delivery Rate (DR)

Delivery rate is the percentage of emails that are accepted by recipients' mail servers without bouncing. It shows how many of your sent emails clear the technical checks so they can be placed in a mailbox.

Also known as DR

Delivery rate tells you how many of your emails reach the receiving mail server without bouncing. It is calculated from the emails you send and the ones that fail. A high delivery rate means mailbox providers accept most of your traffic. It is a basic health check for your sending.

People use delivery rate to spot problems with list quality or technical setup. If it drops, it often points to bad addresses, authentication issues, or reputation trouble. Watching this number over time helps you catch issues before they become bigger. It also gives helpful context to other metrics like open rate.

As a simple habit, review delivery rate after every big campaign. If it falls below about 95 percent, look at your bounce report and remove bad addresses. Then confirm your DNS records and sending domain are set up correctly. Small fixes here protect your reputation and make every later send more effective.

Related terms

Articles about Delivery Rate (DR)

More references.

Every SMTP reply code, with real bounces from mailbox providers and spam filters and who needs to act.

Step-by-step fixes for bounces from Gmail, Yahoo, Outlook, Apple, and more, plus what each provider expects from senders.

Get more of your email into the inbox.

Authentication setup, reputation monitoring, and send pacing are built into Bento. Free for 30 days.