Metrics defined

Every analytics report shows numbers and percentages. This article defines what each means so you can interpret your reports accurately.

Send-level metrics

Sends — total number of emails sent for an issue (or across a date range).

Delivered — emails that successfully reached the recipient's mail server. Doesn't necessarily mean inbox (could be spam).

Bounces — emails that failed delivery.

• Hard bounce — permanent failure (invalid email, deleted account, domain doesn't exist). Suppressed automatically.
• Soft bounce — temporary failure (full inbox, server issue). rasa.io retries.

Bounce Rate — bounces ÷ sends, expressed as a percentage. Healthy is under 2%; 5%+ is a warning sign.

Open metrics

Opens — total times the email was opened. One person opening twice counts as two opens.

Unique Opens — number of unique recipients who opened. Better measure of audience reach than total opens.

Open Rate — unique opens ÷ delivered, as a percentage.

Important note about opens: Open tracking has gotten less reliable since Apple's Mail Privacy Protection (which inflates iOS opens). Treat open rates as directional, not absolute. Click rates are more trustworthy.

Click metrics

Clicks — total clicks on any link in the email.

Unique Clicks — number of unique recipients who clicked at least one link.

Click Rate (CTR) — unique clicks ÷ delivered, as a percentage.

Click-to-Open Rate (CTOR) — unique clicks ÷ unique opens. Measures how often openers actually engaged with content. Useful for evaluating content quality independent of subject line performance.

Suspect clicks

Suspect Click — a click that's likely from a bot, scanner, or corporate security tool rather than a real human reader.

Most reports have a Without Suspect Clicks toggle so you can choose whether to include or exclude them. See Suspect clicks for more.

Article and content metrics

Article Clicks — clicks on links to specific articles.

Top Articles — articles ranked by total clicks.

Articles Read — estimated articles a subscriber engaged with (based on click patterns).

Avg. Articles — average articles per subscriber per send. Higher numbers usually indicate deeper engagement.

Subscriber metrics

Active Subscribers — subscribers who have opened or clicked recently (default range: 30 days).

Subscribed — date a contact was added or opted in.

Last Activity — most recent open or click for a specific contact.

Last Open / Last Click — date of last specific action.

List and audience metrics

Total Contacts — everyone in your database.

Total Subscribers — contacts opted in to at least one subscription type.

Total Recipients — for a specific send, the count of contacts who received it (excluding suppressions, exclusions, etc.).

Unsubscribe metrics

Unsubscribes — contacts who clicked the unsubscribe link or otherwise opted out during a send.

Unsubscribe Rate — unsubscribes ÷ delivered, as a percentage. Healthy is under 0.5%; 1%+ is a warning.

Spam Complaints — recipients who marked the email as spam. Auto-unsubscribes them and is a strong negative signal to inbox providers. Aim for 0; 0.1% is concerning.

Engagement segments

Highly Engaged — subscribers who open and click frequently.

Moderately Engaged — subscribers who open occasionally.

Inactive — subscribers who haven't opened or clicked in a long time (typically 90+ days).

For more on managing inactive subscribers, see List hygiene and cleaning.

Comparing metrics

Different metrics tell different stories:

• Open rate dropping but click rate stable — subject line issue or open tracking issue
• Open rate stable but click rate dropping — content quality issue, or maybe deliverability suspicion
• Bounce rate climbing — list hygiene problem or new bad import
• Spam complaints rising — content or frequency mismatch with expectations
• Unsubscribes rising — content drift or frequency too high

What's next

• Analytics overview — the full map of reports
• Suspect clicks — the bot filtering metric
• Industry benchmarks — what good looks like