Designing Emails That Look Great Everywhere With Inbox Preview

They say beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but when that beauty is your email marketing and that beholder is an email client, things can get lost in translation. Email clients aren’t as consistent at rendering emails as web browsers are at rendering websites. For example, a campaign opened on an iPhone will look different from the same campaign opened in Outlook 2007. Outlook 2007 renders HTML emails using code borrowed from Microsoft Word rather than Internet Explorer.

Use Inbox Preview to Ensure Consistency

Our Inbox Preview feature shows what your campaign will look like in more than 40 different email clients, so you can refine your campaign before sending. Inbox Preview is available to everyone and uses a token system; each time you successfully create or update a preview, the cost is one token. Each billing cycle, Monthly Plan accounts receive 25 free tokens, and Mailchimp Pro accounts receive 100 free tokens.

Focus on the Right Email Clients

There are tons of email clients and platforms, but you don’t have to worry about all of them. Some variation will always exist due to fundamental differences in rendering. Start by testing clients that are popular with your own list. You can find this data in the Top Email Clients section on the Lists page of your Mailchimp account. If no one is using Lotus Notes 9, for example, you can skip it.

Why Mobile Optimization Matters

Mobile email clients like iOS and Android dominate the top 15 clients across all Mailchimp lists, representing over 50%. While you should base your testing on your list’s unique usage, chances are at least one mobile client ranks high. For mobile optimization tips, check out our mobile campaign best practices and research on mobile email engagement.

What’s Next

We’ve reviewed the landscape of email client usage and outlined general testing strategies. Next time, we’ll go deeper into how the top email clients render emails differently. Meanwhile, we’d love to hear how Inbox Preview has helped you improve your campaigns.