Australian E-Commerce Email Benchmarks 2026: What Good Actually Looks Like

One of the most common questions we get from Australian e-commerce brands is: “Are our email results good?” The honest answer is that most brands don’t have a clear reference point — they’re comparing themselves to global averages that don’t account for Australian consumer behaviour, the Australian retail calendar, or the distinct characteristics of each product category.

This guide provides the 2026 benchmarks we use when evaluating Australian e-commerce email programmes. These are drawn from our experience across the Australian market and reference available industry data relevant to Australian brands. Use them as a directional guide — your own benchmarks will vary based on your list quality, frequency, and segment mix.

Important note on attribution: The benchmarks below assume a consistent attribution model — for email revenue share, we use a 5-day click and 1-day open attribution window. Benchmarks will vary significantly depending on attribution settings in your ESP.

Open Rate Benchmarks for Australian E-Commerce

Open rates are the most widely tracked (and widely misunderstood) email metric. Since Apple Mail Privacy Protection (MPP) was introduced in 2021, iOS devices automatically open emails before a recipient reads them — which inflates open rates across all senders.

A significant proportion of Australian email opens are now machine opens from MPP. This means raw open rates are higher than they were pre-2021, but they’re also less reliable as an engagement signal.

Adjusted 2026 open rate benchmarks for Australian e-commerce (accounting for MPP inflation):

Vertical	Strong	Average	Weak
Supplements / Health	42–52%	32–41%	Below 30%
Fashion / Apparel	38–48%	28–37%	Below 25%
Beauty / Skincare	40–50%	30–39%	Below 28%
Food & Beverage	38–48%	28–37%	Below 26%
Homewares / Furniture	34–44%	24–33%	Below 22%
Outdoor / Sporting	36–46%	26–35%	Below 24%
Jewellery / Accessories	38–48%	28–37%	Below 25%

Why open rates vary by vertical: Supplements and health brands typically have highly engaged subscriber bases who are genuinely interested in product information and wellness content. Fashion brands often have broader, less targeted lists that include window shoppers who subscribe but buy infrequently.

A note on sending to active segments only: The benchmarks above assume you’re sending to an appropriately segmented list — not your full database including unengaged contacts. Brands that broadcast to their entire list (including inactive subscribers) will see open rates 10–15 percentage points lower than brands sending to active segments. If your open rates are well below these benchmarks, list hygiene and segmentation are the first places to investigate.

Click Rate Benchmarks

Click rates are a more reliable engagement signal than open rates, because clicks require genuine human action. They’re also the metric most directly correlated with campaign revenue.

2026 click rate benchmarks for Australian e-commerce:

Vertical	Strong	Average	Weak
Supplements / Health	3.5–6.0%	2.0–3.4%	Below 1.8%
Fashion / Apparel	2.5–5.0%	1.5–2.4%	Below 1.2%
Beauty / Skincare	2.5–5.5%	1.5–2.4%	Below 1.3%
Food & Beverage	2.0–4.5%	1.2–1.9%	Below 1.0%
Homewares / Furniture	2.0–4.0%	1.0–1.9%	Below 0.8%
Outdoor / Sporting	2.0–4.5%	1.2–1.9%	Below 1.0%
Jewellery / Accessories	2.0–4.5%	1.2–1.9%	Below 1.0%

Click-to-open rate (CTOR): CTOR — the percentage of openers who click — is a better indicator of content and offer relevance than raw click rate, because it adjusts for the MPP inflation in open rates. For Australian e-commerce, a CTOR of 8–15% is typical for well-performing campaigns. Below 6% suggests the email content isn’t connecting with the segment receiving it.

Flow Performance Benchmarks

Automated flows typically significantly outperform campaigns on a per-email basis, because they’re triggered by specific behavioural signals.

Welcome series:

• Email 1 open rate: 55–75%
• Email 1 click rate: 8–20%
• Series conversion rate (subscriber to first purchase): 2–5% (strong), 1–2% (average), below 1% (weak)

Abandoned cart:

• Email 1 open rate: 45–65%
• Email 1 click rate: 10–25%
• Series conversion rate (abandonment to purchase): 8–15% (strong), 4–8% (average), below 4% (weak)

Browse abandonment:

• Email 1 open rate: 35–55%
• Email 1 click rate: 6–15%
• Series conversion rate: 3–7% (strong), 1.5–3% (average), below 1.5% (weak)

Post-purchase (cross-sell focus):

• Review request email click rate: 5–12%
• Cross-sell email conversion: 2–6%

Replenishment:

• Open rate: 45–65%
• Click rate: 8–18%
• Conversion rate: 15–35% (extremely high because of purchase intent)

Win-back:

• Email 1 open rate: 20–35%
• Re-activation rate (win-back sequence to purchase): 8–15% (strong), 3–7% (average), below 3% (weak)

Email Revenue Share Benchmarks

Email revenue share — the percentage of total store revenue attributed to email — is the metric we consider most important for Australian e-commerce brands.

2026 email revenue share benchmarks for Australian e-commerce:

Vertical	Best-in-class	Strong	Average	Weak
Supplements	38–45%	28–37%	15–27%	Below 15%
Fashion / Apparel	32–42%	22–31%	12–21%	Below 12%
Beauty / Skincare	35–45%	25–34%	14–24%	Below 14%
Food & Beverage	30–40%	20–29%	12–19%	Below 12%
Homewares / Furniture	25–35%	15–24%	8–14%	Below 8%
Outdoor / Sporting	28–38%	18–27%	10–17%	Below 10%
Jewellery / Accessories	28–38%	18–27%	10–17%	Below 10%

Why supplements are top of the range: Health supplement brands have high repeat purchase rates, clear replenishment triggers, and an audience that actively wants product information — which drives unusually high email engagement and conversion. The combination of automated replenishment flows, education-first email content, and subscription offers makes email disproportionately powerful in this vertical.

Why homewares is at the lower end: Higher average order values and longer consideration cycles mean purchase frequency is lower, and the replenishment dynamic largely doesn’t apply. Email still delivers strong ROI in homewares, but the revenue share is naturally lower because a single purchase may not recur for months or years.

Australian Email Benchmarks vs. Global Averages

Australian e-commerce email benchmarks differ from global averages in a few meaningful ways:

Higher engagement in lifestyle categories: Australian consumers in lifestyle, outdoor, and wellness categories tend to be highly engaged with brand communications from brands they’ve chosen to follow. Average click rates in Australian outdoor and health brands often exceed comparable US or UK benchmarks.

Stronger EOFY and Boxing Day campaign performance: Australian-specific retail events (EOFY, Boxing Day, Click Frenzy) generate campaign revenue that isn’t reflected in global benchmarks. Australian brands with a well-built seasonal email calendar typically outperform global benchmarks during these periods.

AWST timing sensitivity: Australian brands sending to a national audience that includes Perth subscribers — without adjusting for the AWST time zone difference — consistently underperform on open and click rates compared to brands that properly segment and time zone-adjust. This is an Australia-specific deliverability and engagement factor that global benchmarks don’t capture.

Unsubscribe and Spam Complaint Rate Benchmarks

Unsubscribe rate:

• Acceptable: Below 0.2% per campaign send
• Warning: 0.2–0.5%
• Serious concern: Above 0.5%

Spam complaint rate:

• Acceptable: Below 0.1%
• Warning: 0.1–0.08% (Google’s threshold for bulk senders is 0.10%)
• Critical: Above 0.1% — immediate action required

Australian compliance note: Under the Spam Act 2003, every unsubscribe request must be processed within five business days. A high unsubscribe rate is a legal compliance signal as much as it is a marketing performance signal.

High spam complaint rates are typically caused by:

• Emailing contacts who did not provide valid consent
• Sending too frequently to unengaged subscribers
• Email content that doesn’t match subscriber expectations (e.g., promotional emails to subscribers who signed up for editorial content)

List Growth Rate Benchmarks

For Australian e-commerce brands in growth mode, a healthy list growth rate is 10–20% net new subscribers per month (after accounting for unsubscribes and suppressions).

Growth rate	Interpretation
20%+ per month	Aggressive growth — ensure list quality is maintained
10–20% per month	Healthy growth
5–10% per month	Moderate growth — room to improve acquisition tactics
Below 5% per month	Stagnant — list growth strategy needs urgent attention
Negative	Losing subscribers faster than you’re gaining them — critical

Using These Benchmarks

These benchmarks are a guide, not a verdict. Context matters:

• A brand with a small, highly curated list of 2,000 subscribers might outperform these benchmarks on open and click rates while appearing to underperform on revenue share simply because the list is too small to generate high volume
• A brand that recently migrated ESPs may have temporarily elevated bounce rates and suppressed open rates that don’t reflect their long-term programme health
• A brand in a new market testing new content formats may see temporary dips in engagement that don’t represent structural underperformance

The goal of benchmarking is to identify where your programme has the largest gap between current performance and achievable best practice — and to prioritise the improvements that will close that gap fastest.

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We’ll review your current programme against these benchmarks and give you a clear picture of where you stand and what to fix first.