MailVitalsEmail deliverability
Sign inEarly access
Module 9 · Lesson 26 of 37

Delivery Rate vs. Inbox Placement

Part of The Complete Email Deliverability Course — Monitoring & Analytics.

The most important distinction in deliverability:

  • Delivery rate = Any successful delivery (including spam folder)
  • Inbox placement rate (IPR) = Only messages reaching the actual inbox

An email "delivered" to spam still counts as delivered by your ESP. The gap between these two reveals problems invisible to standard reporting.

Measuring IPR requires seed list testing tools like Validity Everest or GlockApps.

📊 Key insight: A 98% "delivery rate" means nothing if 30% of those deliveries land in spam.

Sign in to keep track of what you have read.

Beat · paid monitoring

A heartbeat for your email.

Beat runs every check on this site on a schedule — 41 checks, 34 blacklists, real inbox placement — and the moment something breaks it tells you what broke, why it matters, and the exact fix.

Get early access to BeatSee what Beat watches
example.comWatching
  • SPFpass
  • DKIMpass
  • DMARCp=none
  • Blacklists0 of 34

Illustrative. Your domain, every few hours.

Also from us:Pulse — your own sending infrastructureConsulting — $65/hr, no retainer