Cold Email Benchmarks by Industry

Here's a breakdown by industry to help you benchmark your performance.


To help you benchmark your performance, we've gathered industry-specific stats from top cold outreach platforms including Scout, QuickMail, GMass, Mailmodo, and others. These insights are based on millions of cold emails sent across dozens of sectors.

⚠️ Note: These are average benchmarks. Your results may vary depending on your audience, messaging, subject line quality, follow-up cadence—and your outreach platform (like Scout 😉).


📈 Average Cold Email Performance by Industry

Industry Open Rate Click-Through Rate (CTR)
📢 Advertising & Marketing 20.5% 1.8%
🌾 Agriculture, Forestry, Fishing 27.3% 2.4%
📚  Education 28.5% 2.2%
🏦  Financial Services 27.1% 1.9%
🏥  Healthcare 23.7% 3.0%
💻  IT / Software / Tech 22.7% 2.0%
📦  Logistics & Wholesale 23.4% 2.0%
🎬  Media & Entertainment 23.9% 2.9%
❤️  Nonprofit 26.6% 2.7%
💼  Professional Services 19.3% 2.1%
🏠  Real Estate 21.7% 1.14%
🛍️  Retail 17.1% 1.5%
✈️  Travel & Hospitality 20.2% .77%
🧘  Wellness & Fitness 19.2% 1.2%