What is a good reply rate for cold emails to employers?
Cold outreach is normally quoted at 1% to 5%. Across 86 cold emails to UK employers the rate was 26%, which is not a writing trick: the letters were near identical and the variable that moved was who received them, from 10% at a generic inbox to 38% at a named person. Two things to hold on to when comparing your own. A reply is not an interview, and plenty of those 22 were polite noes. And a rate quoted without the count under it is not worth reading, which is why every figure here carries the number it came from.
The benchmark, and what happened
Cold outreach is normally quoted at 1% to 5%. Across 86 cold emails to real UK employers over four weeks, 22 came back. That is 26%.
| Who received it | Sent | Replied | Rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| A named person | 34 | 13 | 38% |
| A hiring inbox | 10 | 5 | 50% |
| A generic inbox | 42 | 4 | 10% |
| Everything | 86 | 22 | 26% |
The letters were near identical to each other. The variable that moved was who opened them.
Three things before you compare your own
- A reply is not an interview. Plenty of those 22 were polite noes. Counting a rejection as a win is how a number improves while things get worse.
- A rate without its count is not worth reading. 50% here is five replies out of ten. It is in the table because leaving it out would be dishonest, not because it is a result.
- This is one person's log in engineering and technician roles in Scotland. A different trade may behave differently.
What a bad rate usually means
Not the writing. On this sample the gap between the best recipient and the worst was about four times, which no amount of rewriting closes. If replies are not coming, look first at who the letters went to, then at whether the adverts were fresh, and only then at the letter itself.
The live figures, updated after every run and including the bad months, are on the numbers page.
Where these numbers come from
86 cold emails to real UK employers over four weeks, sent by one person looking for work, logged as they went. 22 replies. The full method and every table is in the playbook, free, no account.
They are engineering and technician roles in Scotland, so a different trade may behave differently. Where a row is thin it says so on the row.
Since then: 171 applications across 137 employers, 32 replies, 19%. Live, and updated after every run.
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